Despite the initial opposition from several quarters about the conduct of public exams for classes V and VIII in Tamil Nadu, schools have gradually started to prepare students to face the exams at the end of the academic year.
Students of class 5 will be writing the exams in only three subjects — English, Math and Tamil. Class 8 students will however take up the exams in all five subjects. The exams are scheduled to begin for class V in April and for Class VIII from the end of March 2020.
Dinesh Babu, a teacher in a government school, said that they had initially addressed both the parents and students to not feel pressured or stressed due to the exams. “For the slow learners in Class VIII, we’ve been giving additional coaching once a week if required. In the third term, if any student needs help in any subject, we’re ready to coach them as well,” he said. While a few districts had considered holding special classes and conducting short tests on a daily basis, most schools across the State have held back from it and have opted for extra coaching only if the students need it.
“Through the first and second term, we’ve been giving the students a few extra questions based on their daily lessons. This is just to help with their preparation and we are keen to ensure that they treat this as a normal exam,” said P.K. Ilamaran, president of the Tamil Nadu Teachers Association.
The public exams will test the students on the syllabus of all three terms and not just the third term alone, as was the norm for annual exams in most educational institutions in the past.
Since it is the first year that the exams are being conducted, K.R. Nandhakumar, State general secretary, TN Nursery, Primary, Higher Secondary, Matric and CBSE schools, said that they expected the papers to be simple and hope that the focus is on evaluating students on the basics.
“Many private schools, however, have been using textbooks by private publishers for many years now. Schools which are making the switch to textbooks printed by the Textbook Corporation Tamil Nadu Textbook and Educational Services Corporation in the third term have instructed students to go through the first and second term books as well.”
Since some schools have gone ahead and scheduled special classes for students of classes V and VIII during the ongoing holidays, the Director of Elementary education in a circular said that strict action would be taken against government and government aided primary and middle schools if they continue having classes for the children. The director has also asked Chief Educational Officers across districts to take cognisance of the same.
