PD9 - Online Teaching & Persons with Disabilities

Recording of the 9th Panel Discussion

The entire discussion was translated into Sign Language by a team from Dr. Shakunthala Misra Rehabilitation University, Lucknow.

(Conducting this panel discussion demonstrated to us the practical difficulty in keeping a presentation, an interpreter and the speaker pinned, especially over the YouTube live cast. This is a reminder that we have still a long way to go before we find software truly conduc ive for online teaching. We are grateful to Ms. Chandni Sonwani, and Mr. Parveen Kumar Jat of DSMRU, Lucknow for their real-time interpretation of the panel discussion.)

Links to resources and articles and also tips shared by the panelists can be seen on the following page:

Disabilities Resources

Online Teaching & Persons with Disabilities

Panelists:

1. Mrutunjaya Mishra DSMNRU, Lucknow.

2. Siddhartha Bhaskar, OPJGU, Sonipat.

3. Raka Mandal and B P Mandal, BHU, Varanasi.

4. Annavaram N, (UoH/JNU)

5. Beula Christy, LVPEI, Hyderabad

6. Shilpi Bhattacharya, OPJGU, Sonipat.

Chair: : Ram Ramaswamy, IIT Delhi

Moderator : V Madhurima, CUTN

Major Points Shared:

1. The Rights Of Persons With Disabilities (RPWD) act, 2016, (See for example, this site) came about as a response to India being a signatory on the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and its optional protocol (details can be seen here). As per RPWD, 21 disabilities are recognized.

2. The courts of the country had taken cognizance of the needs of the disabled for online evaluation; however, the fear of loss of an academic year is pushing the students with disabilities to try and complete the evaluation process along with other students.

3. A sudden change to online teaching did not give teachers with disabilities (especially mental health issues) adequate time to prepare themselves for the transition. A sudden transition can overwhelm an already stressed person.

4. For students with disabilities, getting into the education system is itself difficult, It is important to keep them in the system, and them staying in hostels was an important part of this process. With the shift to online teaching, many hostels were shut down and have forced many students with disabilities to abandon their education.

5. All students, but more importantly students with disabilites should be educated on ergonomic matters so that they reduce the pain associated with long hours in front of a screen. Special attention needs to be given to the screen being at eye level, the contrast being set correclty for the individual to minimize eye-strain, and to sitting posture.

6. Care should be taken to announce class-timings before hand so as to not overwhelm the students.

7. It is important to send out study material in advance to the students. All study material should be converted into braille/disabled accessible. Such material can be posted free of cost in the country.

8. Students with hearing disabilities use multiple modes to communicate, some of them being sign language, speech and lip reading, air writing etc. The currently available software for online teaching do not incorporate all the needs of persons with (hearing) disabilities.

9. Students with visual disabilites often use the Tadoma technique for communication, which requires the speaker to be present with the student - something that the online teaching-learning process lacks.

10. For students with visual disabilities, school children seem to have been effected the most. not only since they did not have gadgets but also because most of the mobile phones currently in market do not have adequate accessibility features.

11. e-content prepared for online teaching must have closed captions/live captions to make them accessible to those with disabilities.

12. The automatic captioning that is available on some platforms supports only English and not vernacular languages. Sign language is not fully developed to include all (and new) scientific terms.

13. Online teaching-learning process was more helpful to those with mental and physical disabilites than it was to those with visual and hearing disabilities.

14. To a person with mental disability, online teaching removes the added stress of travel and preparation for the day. It also reduced the anxiety regarding student and peer reactions.

15. Online teaching enables teachers with mobility issues to conduct blackboard work via the whiteboards available on the laptops and also takes away the stress of the need to move around a class, either while teaching or while proctoring an examination.

16. Compassion is a key factor to meet the challenges of online teaching and this is especially true for persons with disabilities. They should not be denied access the online classes just because "there are no trained teachers". Compassionate teachers can always train themselves to help their students.