Covid-19 impact: Primary school students struggle with syllabus

Hyderabad: A Class 5 student from a government school in the city fails to understand when asked ‘how are you’ in English. She has difficulty in solving basic arithmetic problems and can neither read nor write in Telugu.

She has returned to school after two years of Covid-19 restrictions. She was ‘promoted' to Class V straight from Class 3.

In the Class 5 English textbook, she is supposed to learn ‘The witty Nasruddin,’ ‘The clever jackal.’

Not only is she having trouble coping with the syllabus, but is also unable to study from the bilingual textbook. There are at least 10-15 students in each class like her in the primary sections (Class 1-5) across government schools, said teachers.

Covid-19 impacted students from private schools when it comes to their reading, writing and learning abilities. However, they have carried on with the syllabus. However, to help students cope, government schools continue teaching support courses along with the syllabus.

“This course is being taught every alternate period since July. This will continue till the annual exams. The government has asked to focus on this course and also complete the syllabus as students need a lot of attention in improving their reading and writing skills,” said Chandrashekar, primary teacher at a government school.

“This course focuses on English, Telugu and mathematics. Alphabets, two and three-letter words, grammar, reading and writing are the focus areas. Simple addition, multiplication, and division are taught in mathematics for all the primary classes,” he said.

Another teacher, requesting anonymity, said that of the syllabus, only the gist of the lessons was taught as children are unable to grasp all information in textbooks.

She added that the teachers need to understand that each child is different. While some understand better when they listen to the teachers during class, some understand lessons taught practically. However, this teaching method is not followed in any schools due to high student strength and lack of teachers.

There are only a handful of students who can cope with the present syllabus.

Children are unable to study at home. Some of them have to help with household work, said M. Khaja, another government primary school teacher.