Mental Health Activities Organised during School day celebrations in Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu State Board schools will commence on Monday, June 13, 2022, for classes 1 to 10 for the academic year 2022-2023. Earlier this year, in assembly, the school education minister announced some new additions to the academic calendar, such as regular extracurricular and co-curricular activities, physical fitness sessions, and dedicated time for reading. School Education department, as per the new introductions, has planned to include dedicated sessions for students to share their experiences with the prime focus on their mental health. These weekly sessions will be led by their class teachers and they are required to interact and bring out their experiences in their sharing sessions. 20-minutes every day post-lunch will be fixed for reading, where students can indulge themselves in reading articles from periodicals, magazines, newspapers, and books from their library in the school.

k.Nandhakumar, School Education Commissioner, and G. Arivoli, Director of Elementary Education have issued a circular to all the physical education teachers to be present on the school campus at least 30 minutes prior to the beginning of the morning assembly in the school to monitor the discipline and ensure the safety of the students. Sports activities needn’t be constricted only to school day, the physical fitness sessions can also be continued every week depending on the convenience of the commute for the students, and the distance between the school and their residences.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic and its consequent lockdown, over the last few years, the schools have been closed and the physical sessions, be it training or competitions have been canceled. Some schools tried to factor them in some of their online sessions, but many struggled to keep the students active despite their multiple efforts.

Various interactive fun co-curricular and extra-curricular activities have been planned for the upcoming year. For students from classes from VI-X, two periods will be allocated from their class schedule every week for the above-mentioned co-curricular and extra-curricular activities. These two periods could be accommodated any day of the week as the last two periods based on the convenience of the class according to the model timetable released by the ministry. Co-curricular activities could include arts and crafts, such as origami, folk arts, different forms of dance, instrumental and vocal music, and movie screenings suitable for children. The schools are also encouraged to form clubs with the literary, environment, or IT as their central themes as part of the extra-curricular activities and organize weekly meet-ups to discuss the student activities.