The Covid-19 pandemic-induced lockdown hasbrought significant changes to our life and one of them is a transformation inthe mode of education. To most students and parents, online studies seemhectic and irrelevant as children do not pay much heed to the lessons.
However, there are some students who areinterested to study but do not have enough resources to learn lessons fromanother tutor. In order to keep up with the interest of students, a teacherfrom Punjab’s Bathinda decided to impart knowledge for free to the studentsacross the nation.
Sanjeev Kumar, a government school teacherfrom Bathinda, is teaching students of Chennai, Kochi, Mumbai, Mysore, Panaji,and Indore about trigonometry and algebra.
Presently, Kumar has over 3,500 students ofclass VIII to XII mainly from Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Jammu & Kashmir. Notonly national students are getting benefited from Kumar’s kind gesture butthere some 80 students from Kenya, UAE, Malaysia, and Saudi Arabia who attend Kumar’sfree lectures.
Sanjeev Kumar, who is 43 and has over 18years of teaching experience started the free online education project duringthe first Covid-19 lockdown that happened in March 2020.
"Since last week of March 2020, I amconducting free online classes of mathematics for students of Class VIII to XIas then I had ample time due to lockdown. The students are from various partsof the country. My first class was on March 29 of the last year in which only 50students participated. However, the other day, I got 350 messages and withinten days the strength of my class rose to 600 to 700 students,” said Kumar.
"Till March 31, 2021, I had 2,500students. About 700 of them left as most of them were of Class XII and they hadcompleted their studies. We were left with 1,800 students and in April, anotherbatch of 1,700 students joined. Now we have more than 3,500 students,” addedKumar.
He further added, “Maximum students are fromKerala, Tamil Nadu, and Jammu and Kashmir with students requesting fromTelangana. Also, more than 80 students from across the nation (UAE, Saudi Arabia,Kenya and Malaysia) joined the classes.”
With the increasing strength of the students,Sanjeev Kumar devised another strategy to impart education in an effective andefficient manner. Therefore, he purchased a zoom business plan and decided to deliverlectures group-wise.
To ensure student participation, Kumar said, “Wegive them codes 10 minutes prior to their class, we send them the password tojoin classes on zoom.”
To assess their children’s performance, manyparents also starting attending the zoom classes.
"There are five classes daily for onehour each. I take two special extra classes per week for the students of Kenyaand UAE to clear their doubts and also twice a week classes to prepare studentsfor National Talent Search Examination (NTSE)," Kumar said.
Besides teaching himself, Kumar had alsoadded guest lecturers from 15 renowned doctors, educationists, and actors.
"From this session, I have startedtaking one-hour online live tests of students after teaching a chapter and givethe students’ feedback on their performance. We select the topper of the testand courier a subject-related book worth Rs 500 to the child," said Kumar.
It is to be noted here, Kumar’s wife, also a teacher is extending help to her husband as she prepares the notes for allstudents and sends them.