In order to engage students meaningfully during their stay at home due to COVID-19 through educational activities at home with the help of their parents and teachers, the alternative academic calendar has been developed by the NCERT under the guidance of the MHRD.

This Alternative Academic Calendar was released by  Union Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ in New Delhi on 16th April.

Speaking on the occasion the Minister said that this Calendar provides guidelines to teachers on the use of various technological tools and social media tools available for imparting education in fun-filled, interesting ways, which can be used by the learner to learn even while at home.

However, it has taken into account, the varying levels of access to such tools-Mobile, Radio, Television, SMS and various social media. 
The fact that many of us may not have internet facility in the mobile, or may not be able to use different social media tools- such as whatsapp, facebook, twitter, google, etc., the calendar guides teachers to further guide parents and students through SMS on mobile phones or mobile call. Parents are expected to help elementary stage students to implement this Calendar.

This Minister said that all the classes from I-XII and subject areas will be covered under this calendar. This calendar will cater to the need of all children including Divyang children (Children with Special Need)- link for Audio books, Radio programmes, Video programme will be included.

Pokhriyal further said that the calendar contains a week-wise plan consisting of interesting and challenging activities, with reference to theme/chapter taken from syllabus or textbook.

Most importantly, it maps the themes with the learning outcomes. The purpose of mapping of themes with learning outcomes is to facilitate teachers/parents to assess the progress in the learning of children and also to go beyond textbooks.

How to download an alternative academic calendar: (Prrimary students)

• Step 1: Go to the official website of NCERT – ncert.nic.in.
• Step 2: On the homepage, under the announcement section, click on the link Alternative Academic Calendar
• Step 3: Upon clicking, a new page will appear on the screen
• Step 4: Read the notification and download the calendar.

The Minister highlighted that the calendar also covers experiential learning activities such as Arts Education, Physical Exercises, Yoga, Pre-vocational skills, etc.

This Calendar contains class-wise and subject-wise activities in tabular forms. This Calendar includes activities related to four languages as subject areas, i.e., Hindi English, Urdu and Sanskrit.
This calendar also gives space to the strategies of reducing stress and anxiety among teachers, students, and parents. The calendar includes a link for Chapter wise e-content available on the e-pathshala, NROER and DIKSHA portal of GoI.

The Minister also said that all the given activities are suggestive in nature, not prescriptive, nor is the sequence mandatory. Teachers and parents may opt to contextualise the activities and do those activities that the student shows interest in, irrespective of the sequence.

This calendar would be disseminated through DTH Channels and also conducting video conferencing with SCERTs, Directorates of Education, SCERTs, KendriyaVidyalaySangathan, NavodayaVidyalayaSamiti, CBSE, State School Education Boards, etc.

This will empower our students, teachers, school principals and parents to find out positive ways to deal with Covid-19 using on-line teaching-learning resources and also improving their learning outcomes getting school education at home.