Another ‘Pehal’ for special children

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, April 15

As government schools across the district have been consistently running campaigns to highlight infrastructural development during the pandemic, ‘Pehal’, the only government-run school for children with disabilities in the city, has been making efforts to connect digitally with students, despite several limitations.

Dharminder Gill, coordinator, Pehal Resource Centre, said awareness programmes being run by schoolteachers focus on providing education to children with disabilities and impart them skill development training under the Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan. “Unlike mainstream schools, we have to focus on convincing parents of special children to not deny them basic learning and skill education. The programmes have been made child specific. We are encouraging a home-based learning set up, where special educator and one family member work together to make the child learn without any gaping holes. It’s a challenging task,” he said.

Pehal has already enrolled 127 students in the current session, which is a slight dip from previous years. Gill said they were limiting number of students due to the changed scenario.

“As our teachers have to adopt a different strategy to impart education, we are not aiming for high number of enrolments. Teachers have to coach family members of wards as well. Those who do not have means or family support to get through digital transformation of learning are being reached out individually.”

While most parents were familiarising to the new concept, the school has been imparting virtual physiotherapy classes for students with physical disabilities and online training for athletes.

“We have several students who take part in Special Olympics. So, making up for the lost time due to pandemic, we are giving them counselling and online practice sessions. Our dance team has been selected to participate in Indo-Nepal Dance Sports Championship scheduled to be held in June,” said Gill.

Meanwhile, to cope up with dearth of special educators in the district, Pehal has tied up with GNDU’s Department of Education to provide teachers and infrastructural support to the school.