Post-pandemic lessons, Students struggle to cope with curricula

Learning online  and limited access  to teachers and  friends have  deeply impacted  the learning  curve for young  students. Studies  show that they not  only failed to gain  skills, they have  lost existing ones  too. Schools are  working overtime,  introducing  remedial classes  and taking  measures to bring  students up to  speed.

By Kumaran P. | NT

Bengaluru: The state government’s  decision to reopen  schools has received a  positive response, with  attendance levels  touching 90 percent among kids  between grades one to five.  However, several challenges have  presented themselves and schools  say that students, after a year of  learning from home, are unable to  cope with the curriculum. They  have also fallen back on reading  skills.

An official from the Department of Education (Primary and  Secondary) told News Trail that  even a day missed has an impact  on students. “It’s not easy for kids  to learn from home. They need to  return to school or the learning  curve is affected. And this impact is  especially severe for rural kids.  Many don’t have connectivity and  also, they depend on their mid-day  meals.”

According to Dr Ted Mockrish,  Head of School, Canadian  International School, several  educational studies have been  performed over the past year,  looking at the significant loss of  learning, especially in reading  skills in elementary and math  skills across the board, of  school-aged children around the  world.” These deficiencies, He  says, are even more marked in  low-income areas where schools,  families and students lack basic  tech infrastructure to keep pace  online. However, these data  measure quantifiable specific  content skills and not actual  growth in critical learning skills.”

According to a study conducted  by Azim Premji University in  January 2021, the closure of schools  due to the Covid-19 pandemic has  “led to a complete disconnect from  education for the vast majority of  children.” Alternatives like online  education, including mobile  phone-based learning have proved  inadequate. The study found not just  a loss of learning but a “widespread  phenomena of ‘forgetting’ by  students, indicating a regression in  curricular learning. Students who  were once proficient in skills like  reading with understanding and  basic mathematics have forgotten  what they have learned, impacting  their ability to learn more and also  their conceptual understanding  across subjects.

The study says that 92 percent  of the children surveyed have lost at  least one specific language ability  from the previous year. This  includes oral descriptions, reading  familiar words, comprehension and  writing simple sentences based on a  picture. Around 82 percent of  children on average have lost “at  least one specific mathematical  ability” from the previous year  across all classes.

A survey by the Centre for  Disease Control and Prevention in  the United States, which spoke to  public school K-12 teachers,  showed that the pandemic  resulted in a “significant”  learning loss for students.

Dr Mockrish says that  measures like in-class support and  open communication with  families are being taken to remedy  “any loss of content-based skills.”  No students will be retained at  any grade because they have  tested lower in their assessments.  “It is important for our students to  return to their cohort of classmates, as they provide additional  support to closing these content  specific gaps.”

Mockrish suspects that we will  see a serious increase in these  more important, lifelong learning  approaches from students who  have weathered the pandemic and  that the loss of content-related  skills will dissipate with time.

Another expert said that all  children across classes have been  impacted, with most children who  are returning to school not ready  in terms of expected abilities for  further learning at the appropriate class level.

“We have to ensure that all  stakeholders come together to  address this problem quickly and  not allow it to fester among other  children in the future. The  pandemic has had a profound  effect on students