The recent study conducted by the non-governmental organization Child Rights International (CRI) showed that distance learning is not effective in Ghana. Online schooling only reached five per cent of children, Ghanaian Times reports.
In Ghana, the COVID-19 pandemic made all schools close their doors several months ago. However, online learning as an alternative to in-person teaching showed its ineffectiveness. First of all, due to poor access to the digital space.
According to the CRI study conducted from March 11, 2020 to November 9, 2020, about 3,967 out of 4,458 school children surveyed across Ghana said the distance learning platforms had not been effective.
The digital platforms for education only reached five per cent of children, while the radio and television coverage reached 32 per cent of the children. The full report “COVID-19: State of the Children in Ghana” has presented in Accra on Tuesday, November 17, 2020.
Despite the digital platform’s existence, not many people are aware of the time scheduled for lessons, so as to make them sit at home and listen to these programmes via TV-sets or radios. In other words, both the Ghanian environment and setting have not so much been purposely created for online or any kind of distant learning.
In 2020, the coronavirus has devastated and brought Ghanian society and all within it to its knees. Now, the government has to rethink, diversify and re-strategise the approaches to everything, including education.
