Hyderabad govt schools struggle to fill learning gap while pvt schools finish almost 50% of the syllabus

While the private schools are done teaching 50-60 per cent of the syllabus for the academic year and are about to conduct half-yearly exams soon. The government online education system which got launched after a long delay is trying hard to fill the learning gap that has been created, due to COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the teachers, online lessons offered by the government on TV and the internet are only to fill the learning gap, as the curriculum is yet not taught. "The online teaching system framework of state government is basic. We have not started the syllabus yet. Not even, for higher classes IX and X. Besides, teaching is not one-way communication. In our case, however, it is. We do not know what and how students are learning. How many are learning," said CH Ravi, general secretary of Telangana State United Teachers' Federation.

"Private schools are way ahead of us. For them, it is a must for the teachers to ensure that students are learning. Teachers there keep a track on students progress online with periodical assessments, tests and even exams. In our case, unless a student asks us for doubts which, only a minority of students can afford due to lack of resources, we can teach them in the right way," Ravi added. "We have been requesting the government to re-open the schools at least for IX and X classes to avoid the loss of the academic year. But we have not heard a word from them."

It is learned that in rural Telangana, 40 per cent of houses have no smartphone. The other 30 per cent only have only one smartphone, per household, which is with the user (usually the head of the family) through the day as the user carries it to work. TV meanwhile, is a mean of one-way communication that is not suitable for teaching, according to the teachers. Private schools in the city have finished 50-60 per cent of the syllabus for classes IX and X.

"We take a fee to repay it with the services. Our duty is to provide the best in these testing times to stay in par with the other competing schools. Initially, it was difficult for us. Slowly, both students and teachers accepted this of learning and have been doing better," said Rekha Rao, headmistress from a well known private school in the city, "We have gone slow. Yet we had no difficulty in keeping in par with the syllabus. We have conducted periodical assessments, tests and exams. We have even planned final exams for classes I to VIII in March," added she.