Best Online School – Seth Anandram Jaipruia School Lucknow

Education in the time of the pandemic has evolved in the most unusual ways. Two to three years prior to the pandemic, no one would have imagined that our primary education would mostly be online.

Presently, our school isn’t conducting offline classes due to the directives given out by the state government, but the school authorities are fully prepared for reopening when the regulations are eased.

Students in our school are eagerly waiting for the schools to reopen because according to us, it leads to better learning and interaction with the teacher. Also, the concentration level drastically dips during online classes due to increased comfort levels and varying distractions.

It is increasingly difficult for the student council members to carry out their responsibility during virtual school, but we ensure that we maintain decorum in the class in case the teacher is not present, carry out various co-hosting responsibilities and vehemently intervene in case any unwanted person enters the meeting. It is much different as compared to offline schooling, as we used to indulge personally with each and every student and used to carry out other school responsibilities in person.

In our school, student response to offline schooling has been splendid, as the majority of the students living in Lucknow attended classes, with the exception mostly being students residing out of town. The preferred choice for students in our school has been the in-person classes, as it promotes them to not only study better but also indulge in beneficial co-curricular activities and fruitful discussions with their peers during the assembly.

According to me, to bridge the learning gap caused by the pandemic it is important for the students to not rush with the syllabus, and study it smartly by making crisp notes and important for the teacher to not focus only on course completion and entertain the queries and interactions with the students.

I feel it has now become extremely important to return to physical education, as it not only enhances better concentration among students but also promotes the holistic development of a child. Online education, on the other hand, is very distracting, inefficient in the long run, and also very harmful for one’s visual, mental, and physical health.

The journey from March 2020 has definitely been a rough patch in every student’s life, as all of sudden, the whole mode of education was shifted to virtual platforms, but we learned to adapt to this mode during the pandemic by engaging in interesting interactions with our peers and teachers, incorporation of online tools like Padlet, Quizizz, etc. in our studies, and most importantly, strengthening our minds to accept this transformation in our education system.

Nothing can give the ‘live’ experience given in the practical labs when we do experimentations and proceedings ourselves, but still, our teachers tried very hard to fill that void by using online simulation tools such as OLabs, PheT, etc. More recently, when the schools reopened in between, we got to experience all of it first hand in the school labs, wherein students were called in groups to school following COVID guidelines.

Thankfully, peer interaction was not missing in the case of our school, as our school managed to hold online classes in such an interactive way, that every student used to discuss and interact with each other during the class. It was basically like a normal classroom, just online. We were able to stay connected with each other on WhatsApp groups, and MS Teams school groups.

It was very difficult to adjust to a new format when exam patterns and evaluation criteria were suddenly changed, but our teachers ensured that whatever the exam pattern may be, we knew how to write the answers to all the questions. They made us learn the concept by heart rather than learn an answer, so whether that concept came for a 1-mark, 3-mark, or a 5-mark question, we knew the answer to it.

According to me, the government should allow schools to operate offline now that most students have been vaccinated because we as fortunate kids can study online anytime we want, but the less fortunate children who don’t have the necessary equipment for online classes can’t. If public parks, malls, cinema halls, and party places can operate fully, why can’t schools be?

We were fortunate to be in a school, which organizes career counseling sessions and workshops every fortnight. We never felt incomplete on that end as we have our school’s own career counselor just a call away from us. Our teachers are also always ready to give advice to us and incorporate these types of discussions in their daily lectures.

We have a school counselor whom we would call if we used to face any kind of exam stress. We were also given a pressure-free environment by our teachers during our classes.

I am preparing for the competitive exams using reference books, guidance from my school teachers, and self-study. Our teachers don’t forget to give us tips for competitive exams during their lessons and try to teach us one notch higher to build more knowledge among us.

The National Education Policy 2020 is according to me, a spectacular achievement for the Indian Education System. It has made it move on from being knowledge-centric to more student-centric, as it delivers to the best interests of the students of this country. It will be a trailblazer policy if executed properly. N.E.P. will surely put Indian Education System at par with foreign systems it idolized.