Educationists feel technical aids need to be stated and provided to empower inclusive learning at the school level. Hence, The Ministry of Education has issued guidelines specifying the need to develop e-content for children with special needs(CwSN).
What are the issued guidelines?
The ministry focuses on developing special e-content for children with special needs which will lead to attaining equity and inclusion.
In the guidelines, they have promoted the use of radio, community radio, and podcasts for grades I to XII. The focus of the ministry is on developing sign language videos for learners with hearing disabilities, which will be provided on the official portal.
Director, Digital Education, DoSEL, Ministry of Education, Rajnish Kumar says that the e-content will aid employment and social inclusion for CwSN with the help of educational programs that include peer support and networking opportunities which is at present enjoyed by sighted students in mainstream education.
“The guidelines have been widely shared with content creators, content designers, developers, publishers, experts in the field of special education, and e-distributors already engaged or likely to be engaged for developing, uploading, and distributing e-content,” said, Kumar.
On being asked if developing e-content will help students with disabilities such as visual impairment, to which the principal of MP International School, Kerela, Abdul Jaleel P, says, “While providing e-resources for the students is the first step, the government also needs to provide assistive devices to schools to a subsidized rate to equip them adequately. As per the National Education Policy(NEP)2020, there will be no special schools for children with special needs. However, streamlining the education system at mainstream schools to adjust to the needs of these students is difficult.”
A regular analysis is needed
Usha Chaujer who is an educator shows his concern towards the issue that e-content may not be the answer to all your queries because their consideration should also be taken into mind that whether they feel the same or not, their likes and dislikes.
Peer learning should be promoted
Through peer-to-peer learning, it is aimed to bring all the children to the same level. E-content will help with this to some extent, a different process such as Braille and sign language as the third optional language must be introduced. This will help them understand the needs of their peers with disabilities in a much better way.
In the conversation with the educationists, a question got raised that whether e-content will restrict the movement of CwSN to schools, to which Kumar said that rather it will help us towards achieving complete inclusive learning with the standards as recommended in the guidelines for better educational and professional development of all.
