By Manjima Dhakal

Kathmandu, June 2: The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology has decided to engage children in learning activities from June 15 through alternative means. The Ministry has issued “Directives on Student’s Learning Facilitation through Alternative Media, 2077” for the management of children’s learning activities.
Though the people have been criticising the government for its plans to run classes in the risky environment, the directives stated that schools and local governments would facilitate students to create learning environment at home rather than inviting them to schools.
According to the directive, the federal, state and local governments and schools have to coordinate to reach the students through different mediums. The government targeted to reach the school students through different alternative mediums like online, offline, radio, television, print, according to access of technology to the students.
The schools have to collect names, addresses, contacts and their access to technology of the students in coordination with the local government, and the schools have to facilitate students to be engaged in learning activities.
The local governments and the schools will classify students in five categories, namely the students who do not have any access to technology, having access to radio, having access to television, having access to computer but without internet connection, and having internet access, the directive read.
As per the directives, the students who don’t have access to any type of technology could learn through textbooks and printing materials made available by the local governments and schools. The federal government will manage the availability of materials. Besides availability of print contents, locally available teachers as well as volunteers will be mobilised from local governments to help the children who don’t have access to any other technology. Guardians also have their role to motivate children to learn.
For the students having access to FM radio, the local and state governments have to manage for the broadcast of learning materials free of cost from local FM stations, and students having access to FM radio could learn from the

FMs and they can share their creations and write ups through those FM stations.
Likewise, the students having access to television will benefit from the contents broadcast from national and local televisions. And the schools and wards will ensure available offline or downloaded materials for those students who have access only to laptop and computer without internet connectivity. But the students having internet access could learn from the link www.learning.cehrd.gov.np and others made available by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.
The directive asked schools to publish weekly and monthly schedule of learning facilitation programme.
The directive stated that if the students have access to multiple mediums, they can choose one or multiple options according to their interest. Schools and teachers themselves could develop materials on their own initiative, the directive further said.