Virtual Schooling: The Need Of The Hour

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Action During the Pandemic

Ever since the Pandemic has disrupted the “normal” lifestyle across the world, the virtual world has come to rescue. GD Goenka Global School has shifted its base to virtual platforms to conduct online classes for the academic year 2020-2021. The School has taken up the demo-sessions on virtual schooling from the 1^st week of March. The Principal Ms. Navina Chadha welcomed the parents through digital media and shared the school’s progress and achievements of the academic session of 2019-2020. She articulated the necessary steps being taken up by the school in the present situation and kept them abreast of upcoming changes.

The “Goenkans” provide a potential solution to all challenges. The school’s PYP Coordinator Ms. Mandeep Khaira, designed an excellent virtual learning programme to keep in touch with students through e-assignments. Teachers share all information about the subjects and their assignments daily to ensure that students don’t miss out anything planned by them. The professors have worked seamlessly through these hard times to ensure the students receive a continuous and smooth virtual learning experience.

Team GDGGS is always prepared!

After an initial session with the Principal a parent orientation was taken by the PYP Co-ordinator on 28^th March 2020, where she explained about the policies of our school through a live session on Facebook. The journey of the new and virtual session began from 1^st April, 2020 through Zoom app.

How Team GDGGS Jumped Through the Hurdles

With the security issues in the news for Zoom, the school had to shift to Microsoft Teams and again its IT Team assisted parents and teachers with the new MS TEAMS. The school held demo sessions with the Principal Ms. Navina Chadha, Co-ordinator, and the teachers to rule out any possible hurdle. Regular marking of attendance, planning Synchronous and Asynchronous, inquiry based grouping and re-grouping activities for the young minds are part of the remote learning programme designed by the Programme Co-ordinator. To rule out any errors, the Coordinator checks the virtual planners on a daily basis. The school follows the GETEPIC App for the online reading programme. The app includes read aloud, read along and audio/video books along with the activities designed for each age group.

Discovering New Ways to Learn at GD Goenka Global School

The teachers at GD Goenka Global School have discovered a few apps like KAHOOT, PADLET, SOCRATIVE.com, FlIPGRID and GOOGLE FORMS. This makes teaching and learning fun for both the teachers and children. The school gets excellent feedback from parents and gives importance to whatever criticism it gets. It then works towards improving its shortcomings to meet the needs and requirements of the students.