Pragyata Guideline

Subject: Polity

Context:

Human resource and Development Minister has released guidelines for online education ‘Pragyata’

Concept:

• The guidelines have been issued to ensure the safety and academic welfare of the students. The guidelines issued by MHRD entail suggestions for administrators, school heads, teachers, parents and students on the following areas:
• Need assessment
• Concerns while planning online and digital education like duration, screen time, inclusiveness, balanced online and offline activities, etc level-wise
• Modalities of intervention including resource curation, level-wise delivery, etc.
• Physical, mental health and well being during digital education
• Cyber safety and ethical practices including precautions and measures for maintaining cyber safety
• Collaboration and convergence with various initiatives
• These guidelines, prepared by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), are only advisory in nature, and State governments have been asked to build on them and formulate their own rules, based on local needs.
• The ministry has recommended a cap on the screen time for students. As per the guidelines, online classes for pre-primary students should not be for more than 30 minutes. It further mentions that two online sessions of up to 30-45 minutes each should be conducted for classes 1 to 8 and four sessions for classes 9 to 12.