Digital pathway

'Sustainable development' by practicing in schools

Ramanujan, a ninth-class student in Chennai uses his I-pad to go through the video lectures shared by his science teacher and submits the assignment in word format through emails. Raghuram, who studies 8^thstandard in Mumbai Public School has not attended the class on last Thursday and his parents received a message from school regarding the attendance. Mr. Varun has given an interview through video conference to a Delhi-based school for admission of his 10-year-old daughter. All these examples show the development and usage of Digital Technology at school level.

Before 1990, Mr. Raman a Biology teacher in a Mumbai school used blackboard/chalk board to draw and explain the process of how chlorophyll plays role in preparing food in plants (by absorbing sunlight and CO2) to his students. In early 90's with the introduction of overhead projector, his job of drawing the process became easy. Further in mid-90s, with the introduction of world wide web, projectors and projection presentation software, Mr. Raman's job of delivering the concept became more easy and creative. Learning the biology concept in Mumbai school got less complicated with the adoption of video lectures in early 2000s, where students could visualize the concept on open screen (TV/Projector) and watch it as many times as they needed to grasp the concept. The introduction of video capturing also helped Mr. Raman to make his lectures available to those students who missed the class room lecture.

During the year 1498 and until 2008, the written communication in schools was mainly through printed text books and class notes. With the new age of computer, world wide web and email in early 1990s and MS word in late 90s, Mr. Murthy a social teacher in a Delhi-based school was able to share the class notes and receive the assignments online. This took a leap forward when I-phone and Android was developed in the year 2008 that advanced the usage of I-pads and Tablets in schools, enabling the students to assess the contents of Mr. Murthy's lectures through web links and mobile applications.

As delivering a lecture on black board has transformed to projecting a video/presenting a lecture in the past 25 years, the print text books and class note books were replaced by PDF and word files. The adoption of these technological developments by schools is increasing year on year and had a great impact on how teachers engage with their students. It not only resulted in the ease of teaching, the way the students grasp the concepts, but also reduced the usage of materials like paper (note books), board and other reading/writing materials. Usage of paper (note books) has now been replaced by E-mail (through which the class notes is shared with students and all the assignments are received), normal class board (wood) is replaced by smart boards (which can project the subject videos and also acts as a normal screen to scribble on it), and the usage of writing materials (chalks, pens and pencils) are replaced by MS Word and PDF (typing in the Tab or Laptop). The shift from conventional teaching techniques to Smart or Tech-Imbibed way of teaching helped in saving or reducing the usage of natural resources that are used to make paper, black boards and writing materials. Thus, the inclusion of technology in educational institutions helps in limiting the usage of natural resources , for example using less papers or completely going digital contributes in saving the trees for carbon sequestration (natural).

Symbiosis school in Pune adopted the recent advancements in technology like IoT, Artificial Intelligence and Cloud network. With the help of IoT, the campus has turned to a smart campus where all the data related to faculty presence, class schedule, bus timings, etc are collected and displayed in school mobile app. In school, the attendance of students is taken online and if a student misses a class, he receives email from school administration. The class assignments given to students are saved in cloud database (cloud network) and shared with parent institution for yearly verification of the curriculum. By practicing the above advancements in technology, the school saved a total of 1560 kg paper sheets last year, that means they reduced their carbon footprint by 3900 kg CO2.

The utilization of video conferences and webinars helped faculty in delivering the lectures online to their students in a Hyderabad-based school and at the same time, these technological adoptions helped students and teachers to engage with communities, who live in remote areas of the state and spread awareness on deforestation, climate change and resource management.

Taking one more step forward, technological advancements like Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality had a great impact on the teaching methodology, where a practical world can be created to make students understand the science, maths and sociological concepts. These two advancements in the educational sector replaces the burden of traveling to the locations (forlearning) with in-situ virtual learning (where an augmented real world is created for the students to experience the practical learning without actually being there). These advancements not only save the resources but also help the students in understanding the concepts in an easier way. For example, to explain the students what is the need of afforestation and its impacts on climate change, in conventional teaching way the teacher can only make a student understand the advantages of afforestation and the disadvantages or impacts of deforestation on the climate in theoretical manner, but with the help of internet (videos related to the topic) amd virtual reality (to explain the difference in climate pattern) delivering the concept too an efficient turn. The students not only get the theoretical knowledge but also feels the practical world and understands the actions that are to be taken from their side for better world.

Thus, adoption of technology in teaching methodology in schools not only save the resources like paper, wooden infrastructure and boards (trees), but at the same time imbibe the students with knowledge of sustainable development and helps them to understand the importance of sustainable practices and its impact on the human kind and earth.