New Delhi: It has been over a year and a half since the fight against COVID-19 pandemic began. The pandemic affected almost everyone in the world. The children were one of the biggest sufferers of this crisis. They missed school, games, meeting friends, and many other things and have been forced to take online classes.


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Zee News Anchor Aditi Tyagi on Tuesday (June 1) discussed the impact of the pandemic and consequently the online classes on children.


Before the pandemic, children used to go to school as soon as they woke up in the morning. They used to meet their friends and study at school. Then they used to come home and relax. Some children used to go to tuition classes after school. They used to do their homework. Their playtime was fixed. Parks used to be full of them in the evenings.


But the pandemic changed everything. It had a drastic effect on the lives of children. Now, they are confined to their home all day round, seven days a week.


In such a situation, when a six-year-old girl addressed her complaint to the Prime Minister regarding long online classes, it was bound to have an impact. The video of the Kashmiri girl went viral and the Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, Manoj Sinha took note of it.


Sinha ordered that online classes for students of Classes 1 to 8 will not be more than one and a half hours. The online class of classes 9 to 12 will be of 3 hours. And no homework will be given till class 5.


The girl raised valid questions. Many studies say that children should stay away from mobile phones, computers and laptops, but now these devices have become the ladder of their future.


The question is, is online education as effective as schooling. Some points to note in this regard are:


1. Doctors believe that social interaction plays a big role in the development of a child. A child goes out, meets friends, interacts with teachers and learns many things in such social situations. But the pandemic and online studies have kept children away from social interaction.


2. Another major disadvantage of online learning is that the knowledge and understanding a student gets from online classes are limited. Often children complain that they do not understand things in online classes.


3. Spending too much time on mobile phones spoils the sleep pattern of children.


4. Due to online studies, the ability of face-to-face communication in children is not developing well.


5. Online education is pushing children towards loneliness.


6. Another major disadvantage of online education is that the children could be exposed to a lot of harmful information available on the internet.


It is not that online education is wrong. It has become very much a necessity today. At a time the schools cannot function normally, the internet has become a very useful tool in the education of children. However, we must also be aware of the burden it is putting on the minds of children. People need to find ways to help the children in these difficult times.


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