Representational Image
The Union HRD Ministry has announced guidelines for online classes by schools. The ministry has recommended a cap on the screen time for students. It said that the online classes for pre-primary students should not be for more than 30 minutes. The guidelines mentioned that two online sessions of up to 45 minutes each should be conducted for classes 1-8 and four sessions for classes 9-12.
The guidelines were released by Union HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank today. He said that the guidelines provide a roadmap or pointers for carrying forward online education to enhance the quality of education. He highlighted that the guidelines will be relevant and useful for a diverse set of stakeholders including school heads, teachers, parents, teacher educators, and students. The guidelines also stress upon the use of an alternative academic calendar of NCERT, for both, learners having digital devices and learners having limited or no access.
| CLASS | RECOMMENDATION |
| PRE PRIMARY | On a given day for interacting with parents and guiding them, not more than 30 minutes |
| CLASSES 1-12 | Recommended to adopt/adapt the alternative academic calendar of NCERT at ncert.nic.in |
| CLASSES 1-8 | Online synchronous learning may be undertaken for not more than 2 sessions of 30-45 minutes each on the days the states/UTs decide to have online classes for primary sections |
| CLASSES 9-12 | Online synchronous learning may be undertaken for not more than four sessions of 30-45 minutes each on the days as decided by states/UTs |
GUIDELINES OUTLINE SUGGESTIONS FOR ADMINISTRATORS, SCHOOL HEADS, TEACHERS, PARENTS, AND STUDENTS ON THESE AREAS:
- Need assessment
- Concerns while planning online and digital education like duration, screen time, inclusiveness, balanced online and offline activities, etc level-wise
- Modalities of intervention including resource curation, level-wise delivery, etc.
- Physical, mental health, and wellbeing during digital education
- Cyber safety and ethical practices including precautions and measures for maintaining cyber safety
- Collaboration and convergence with various initiatives
