Schools plan Saturday classes to make up for days lost

KOLKATA:

School

students and teachers are gearing up for Saturday classes to make up for the time lost due to the extended summer holiday. While state government schools choose to remain shut till the end of this month, private schools have already begun classes in full swing following repeated squalls that have helped bring the temperature down. Officials of schools that have reopened after classes were called off due to the recent heatwave said that they would try to compensate for the days lost by taking

extra classes

on Saturdays.

“We have planned to keep extra classes on Saturdays to compensate for the two days lost due to the extension of summer holiday last week,” said Sarmistha Banerjee, principal of Vivekananda Mission School. T H Ireland, principal of St James School, said, “We are planning to extend the working hours and keeping extra classes on Saturdays.” Parents of Heritage School students received an SMS from the institute’s management on Tuesday, declaring the details of extra classes on Saturday. “Dear parents, Normal school on Saturday, June 30, 2018 from 7:20am to 3:30pm. Thursday’s timetable will be followed,” read the SMS.

Some other schools have taken a decision to utilize free periods and extracurricular periods to make sure the academic syllabus is covered on time. Classes of junior KG to Class V had been called off for for three days last week at Birla Bharati School. “We will conduct the first unit test from July 6. So we have thought of utilizing the craft periods on Fridays to finish the rest of the syllabus and have revision classes,” said their principal Apala Datta. “We are also thinking of keeping extra classes on Saturday this week from 8:25am to 12pm,” she added.

Classes at Methodist School,

Dankuni

, were suspended from Nursery to Class VIII. “We are now utilizing extra periods to make up for the loss. The teachers will take a call on whether they will require extra classes or not. We are yet to take a decision regarding that matter,” said spokesperson Raja Mcgee.

“We received an SMS on June 20 that school will reopen on July 2, but on Monday we received an SMS declaring that classes will resume from Tuesday. It was an extremely sudden decision and very inconvenient for the students and their guardians,” said the mother of a Class-III student of Heritage School.

While the parents of students of junior classes are having a tough time to adjust with the frequently-changing class timings, senior students are in a fix over finishing their syllabus. “Due to the loss in time, the chapters cannot be taught in a detailed manner and we will have difficulty in understanding the topics,” said Aarshi Roy, a Class XII student of Patha Bhavan, which follows the state board curriculum.