Within this context, it is understandable that a lot of educators and parents alike have started to worry that their children’s social-skill development might be impaired within the confines of the virtual activities and home quarantine at a critical period when these young ones should be developing and achieving their social-development milestones.

Yes, the current situation is not ideal for child development but we need not be all that pessimistic. Many educational experts have pointed out how teachers and parents can work together to inculcate social smarts in their children, even within the limitations imposed by the coronavirus.

Multimedia Nusantara University lecturer Doni Koesoema, who focuses on character-building issues in education, recently said that with a little bit of imagination, teachers could actually incorporate social dimensions in any teaching materials, even when they are teaching mathematics.

“Say you are teaching addition to elementary school students. You can actually assign them to add up the total numbers of the ages of all their family members. This will require them to actually engage in a conversation with their family members to ask them how old each of them is,” Doni said.

Teachers will find this incorporation easier when they are teaching humanities subjects, according to Doni.

“For instance, instead of asking your children to list down the procedures of a particular religious ritual, the answers to which they can easily browse online to copy and paste into their worksheets, ask them instead to elaborate on their social and spiritual experiences while conducting these religious rituals with their family members, for instance,” he illustrated.

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