Anambra State Government has announced plan to include COVID-19 education as a subject in the school curriculum.
The state commissioner for Basic Education, Prof. Kate Azuka Omenugha, announced this to newsmen at the secretariat complex Awka on Thursday May 21, 2020.
He noted that the initiative was aimed at instilling the culture and practice of simple personal hygiene in primary and secondary school pupils, and educating them on the covid19 preventive measures.
Omenugha stated further that the initiative was essential, especially as the government intensifies efforts to curtail the spread of the deadly coronavirus in the state.
The commissioner also disclosed that the government would expand as well as repackage its ongoing On-Air-Learning Programme to meet the special needs of over 500 pupils living with hearing impairment, stressing that the government would introduce the Sign Languages and other means to carry deaf students along in the programme.
“What we are doing now is to get prepared to welcome the students.The teachers are back and they are trying to get the schools tidied up; fixing information materials on hand-washing and others on the walls of the classrooms.
”We will also domesticate covid19 education by introducing it into the school curriculum so that people doing history can talk about the history of fluids all over the world; those in biology can talk about personal hygiene and so on.
”So we are trying to see what we can put into the curriculum in relation to covid19. We are also decongesting the classrooms to make sure there is enough space for pupils to maintain physical distancing,” Omenugha stated.
She continued that the state government was adequately prepared to welcome students back to school but would need to obtain directives from the federal government on formal reopening of schools across the nation .
“It is not for me to say when schools will reopen and His Excellency Governor Willie Obiano has also said that the federal government will say when schools will reopen,” she said.
She also explained that teachers would be trained on the Covid19 prevention protocols as well as pedagogy, methodology and other forms of teaching technics to meet the learning needs of the pupils at this critical time.
