8TV Living Delight (2020): Schools reopening, what can we do?

The founder and consulting psychologist of Azon Connect People Development Sdn Bhd, Ms. Lee Li Li, had shared on a topic, "Schools Reopening, What Can We Do?", on 8TV (Live) Talk Show: Living Delight, on 22nd June 2020 (Monday), 2:00 p.m.

The government has implemented the Recovery Movement Control Order (RMCO) as the pandemic gradually diminish in recent weeks. At the premise of abiding the Standard Operating Procedures (SOP), the economic, educational, religious, cultural, and sports sectors are resuming back in operation by stages. Among them, the resumption of school classes brings great attention to all. Parents, students, and school authorities are gradually becoming busier in making preparations for the resumption of classes. Other than complying with the SOP, how can one manage the fluctuations of psychological distress while resuming to classes? There are many limitations in online learning; one of which is that majority of the online learning is only capable of incalculating the knowledge to the students.

Social Development: Other than the need to learn new knowledge, the children's social development is one that is not to be neglected. The school compound is like a small community. The advantages of being in school, such as the interaction with one another and the use of problem-solving skills in different situations, are something that cannot be achieved through online classes.

Behavioural Development: The discipline and rules to follow are looser at home. In the absence of supervision during the online classes, children might turn off the camera or perform tasks that are unrelated to their classes. If such "freedom" is practised in the long run, it may affect the children's discipline in life.

Learning Development: In the school compound, children are able to have better support for their academics as they can get assistance from their teachers, classmates, and parents. At home, the teachers can only provide very minimal guidance through online platforms, whereas the parents may not be able to guide their children academically due to their busy work schedules.

Learning Model: The availability of a wide range of online resources has allowed some teachers to design more creative lessons to engage their students to learn. However, the teachers who are not technology-savvy have great difficulty in teaching their students.

Environment: The school environment is more conducive to providing experiential learning whereas children can only learn through the screen with online learning. Besides, the children tend to struggle in concentrating to learn when they are in the home environment. The atmosphere of studying at home is not as strong as in school.

It is common for parents to experience anxiety and fear when adapting to the new norm while facing uncertainties. However, parents ought to be mindful of their emotions and to manage their anxieties as soon as possible to avoid projecting these negative emotions to the children.




In regards to the schools' standard operating procedures (SOP), the school needs to ensure that students are always practising social distancing, such as queuing, attending classes, using the washroom, etc. In addition, the school can make use of modern technologies in measuring and recording the children's body temperature, as well as disinfecting every classroom. Schools also have to take into consideration that the implementation of the SOP may take up some time. Hence, the rescheduling of classes will need to be taken into consideration.

• Emotional regulation: Parents may begin to provide psychological preparedness for their children two weeks before resuming to classes, which may help the children to regulate their emotions better. Other than practising the new norm (e.g. social distancing, wearing a mask, washing hands) at home, readjusting the routine after the class resumption (e.g. adjusting play/break time) and the routine of preparing for classes (e.g. preparing the class equipment), parents may also spend time to listen to their children's thoughts and feelings in regards to resuming to classes, and guide them in adjusting to the new normal with a positive light. In conjunction, parents may also role model the situation with their example of resuming of work.


• Correctly instil the knowledge of pandemic prevention: Parents may introduce children about the coronavirus, how it is spread and affect our health, and the steps to protect themselves from the coronavirus through pictorial teaching materials. More importantly, we need to broaden the children's perspective in facing this pandemic through life education; educating them that everyone needs to put in the effort to end coronavirus rather than just a personal effort while leading them to have a sense of responsibility to follow the precautionary steps, and to appreciate the value of life even more.

Teachers may arrive earlier to school to learn and practice the precautionary measures that need to be taken while taking into account of working efficiently in preparing the teaching materials. This could help the teachers to have psychological readiness to adapt to the new normal.

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Note： The above shared information is adopted from 8TV (Live) Talk Show: Living Delight – "Schools Reopening, What Can We Do?" on 22nd June 2020 (Monday), 2:00 p.m. Please kindly contact our office for more information and further assistance. Thank you.