KOCHI: For Fathima S, a parent of a seven-year-old, homeschooling has become a way of life. A month ago, Fathima started homeschooling her child who couldn’t cope up with online education owing his learning disabilities. “Though homeschooling was a drastic change to shift from conventional learning, it has helped me to reduce my child’s screen time and get him to do things at his leisure which is impossible in conventional schooling,” she says.
Several parents have started discovering the virtues of homeschooling due to the challenges posed by the haphazard shift to online education. Special educators said that though the state government had taken steps to make online learning inclusive, it hasn’t created much impact. “Though the state government had come up with the White Board project to provide lessons to the differently-abled children through various media, it is not a solution.
The issue varies for each type of disability- visual, hearing or speech impaired. Moreover, screen time also impacts concentration and sleep patterns of children with special needs,” said Seema Lal, special educator and co-founder of Together We Can.
A study was conducted recently on making online education inclusive, especially for children with special needs. As a solution, a software has been developed wherein the limitation of the child will be assessed and the course will be designed accordingly. “A mobile app will be created for parents also. They will have to take the videos of the child to assess progress and if the child passes, they will be admitted to the next level,” said Mohammed Asheel, executive director, KSSM.