While Elaine has kept herself busy with our next video for the website, she was also the usual gofer for the day and completed a few smaller jobs, like replacing the refurbished inspection hole cover at the helmstation. She was, however, pleasantly surprised to find all the gates reopened along the promenade, allowing her to enjoy a lovely morning walk for the first time in weeks. The scenery was vastly different, though, and it was clear we’d definitely entered the “dry season”. The lawned area was brown, the flowers were nowhere to be found, certain shrubs looks weathered and some of the trees were looking a tad sad too. But, regardless, there was a refreshing cool breeze, very few people were out and the seascapes were as beautiful as ever. Having the otters come to say hello, just added to the delight.
Other news from Malaysia pertains to the reopening of the schools, given the disruption due to the pandemic. Unfortunately, children were only able to attend in-person classes for 5-6 months of 2020. Instead, pupils have been turning on a computer every morning for their online classes and, in some cases, sitting through five hours of lessons, with breaks every hour. Also 400,000 pupils were supposed to sit for their Malaysian Education Certificate (SPM) examination, an O-Level equivalent, between November and December last year, in addition to those who were supposed to sit their A-Level equivalent, the Malaysian Higher School Certificate (STPM) examination. Unfortunately all schools were closed again on 9th November as cases spiked with the third wave.
However, physical school sessions began again on 20th January, but only for those sitting the school-leaving examinations. This was to ensure the availability of enough space for appropriate social distancing and safety while pupils sit their examinations from 22nd February to 25th March, as more space than just an examination hall is now needed. Additionally, transit rooms have been prepared for those taking two papers on the same day.
Remaining pupils will return to school in phases, beginning with pre-schoolers and the first two grades of primary school on the 1st March, followed by the rest of the primary school pupils on the 8th March. This will allow teachers the time to get their youngsters familiarised with the SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) and handling dispersal at the end of the school day. All levels of the secondary schools will then return on 4th / 5th April, depending on the State.
While teachers have sought a variety of creative workarounds, such as conducting classes via Zoom and other video-conferencing applications, to help students keep up with their studies over the past year, home-based learning has proven to be a challenge, not only for parents who have been expected to shoulder the burden of supervising, assisting and teaching their children in a “home classroom”, but rural areas have also grappled with connectivity issues and families haven’t had enough electronic devices for their children. As a stop gap, a special television channel, dedicated to educational content, was launched in an effort to increase access to education for students.
It’s fair to say, these kinds of disruptions and issues have faced teachers, parents and pupils worldwide, never mind the psychological impacts all of this has had on these young minds, but, as the vaccine rollouts take place around the globe, there is indeed hope that life can return to some normalcy for students everywhere, albeit with stringent SOPs in place for the foreseeable future, acknowledging that some time will be required to bring everyone up to speed again.
After our movie tonight, though, we had a firsthand account of the impacts this pandemic has had on the schooling of our own grandsons; a video call as dad drove them to school. Besides enjoying a fabulous sing-a-long to various nursery rhymes and children’s songs, as well as hearing all about what they’re learning and who their friends are, it was the goodbyes that brought tears to Grandma’s eyes; seeing these little nippers don their masks, put their backpacks on their backs and jump out of the car to be escorted by school staff to their classrooms; it was akin to a “school drive-through”, where parents have to remain in their cars. The reverse is true at pickup time, except walkie-talkies are used to call each child from their classroom when the parent drives up. Initially every car had the child’s name and class posted on the windscreen, but, as time has marched on, the cars and parents are now familiar to the staff. For the pre-schoolers, Keenan was at least allowed to accompany the twins into the grounds, donning his own mask of course, but not for the kindergartener, William. The worst part is that for them, this new world was “normal“; they simply don’t know what school was like before this pandemic.
The last straw was William saying to Elaine: “but I can’t feel you, Grandma!” in response to Elaine blowing them all kisses and William putting his hand to the camera for Elaine to do the same. Just heartbreaking!
