Coronavirus: Online learning a challenge for teachers, students

During the nationwide lockdown due to COVID-19 pandemic, the online platform has been the only way to reach students. However, the digital medium comes with its own set of obstacles. Students and teachers located in far-flung regions are struggling on account of slow internet and connectivity issues. The situation is no different for city-dwellers too as they are also finding it challenging. Higher institutions such as IITs have found that about 10 per cent of their students are not equipped to access online classroom instructions from home. A survey by IIT-Kanpur revealed that 9.3 per cent of its 2,789 students, who responded to the survey, cannot download any material sent by the institute or study online.

According to a student from Indraprastha Global School, Noida, it was tough to understand concepts online. The student informed that every day, the classes were being conducted through Zoom for four to five hours. However, a communication gap impacts understanding. She stated that due to the server issues, the videos get stopped in the live feed. By the time videos restart, one has missed out on the live session. Apart from this, there is barely any option to clear doubts.

For students from non-urban and remote regions, the situation is worse. For many students, poor connectivity and lack of smart gadgets are proving trouble. Nonetheless, some teachers feel things can be accomplished over a phone call or through television and radio. Punjab School Education Board has commenced an education channel and radio to finish the syllabus during the lockdown. The channel number 279 broadcasts live lectures and students having access to the radio can tune in to ‘Doaba radio’. Both these platforms have an assigned schedule for board exam students, and class 10, 12 students can follow the audio and virtual lessons.

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