Aug 10, Colombo: Sri Lanka’s all government schools re-open today for all grades nearly five months after they were first closed due to the risk of coronavirus spreading in the country.

The Ministry of Education has announced that all government schools will resume their education activities for all grades from Monday, August 10. However, all government schools opened for the students in grades 11, 12 and 13 from 27th of July.

Initially, the Ministry of Education closed all government schools in the country from March 13 until April 20 due to the coronavirus pandemic outbreak.

However, after re-opening the schools for all students on 6th July, the Education Ministry in consideration with the guidelines of the health and defense sources decided to extend the vacation until 17th July as the risk of COVID-19 has risen.

Following the extended vacation, all government schools closed due to the coronavirus epidemic resumed studies only for Grade 11, 12 and 13 students on July 27. All schools were then again closed last week in view of the general election on August 05.

The schools are allowed to re-open from today in several phases to prevent overcrowding within confined spaces.

Accordingly certain days of the week have been reserved for particular grades and students to attend school.

Accordingly, students from Grade 1 to Grade 10 are scheduled to start school from tomorrow.

All grades will begin on August 10 for schools with less than 200 students.

For schools with more than 200 children, Grade 1 and Grade 5 will be held on Monday, Grade 2 and Grade 5 on Tuesday, and Grade 3 and Grade 5 on Wednesday., and grades 1 and 5 for schools over 200 will be held on Mondays, grades 2 and 5 on Tuesdays, grades 3 and 5 on Wednesdays. .

In addition, schools for grades 4 and 5 will be held on Thursdays and Fridays, according to the Ministry of Education.

Meanwhile, secondary schools with more than 200 students will be held on Mondays for grade 6 through grade 13, on Tuesday from grade 7 to grade 13 and on Wednesdays for grades 8, 10, 11, 12 and 13.

The Ministry of Education said the secondary schools will be open on Thursdays and Fridays only for grades 9 through grade 13.

The school hours for grades 6, 7, 8 and 9 will be from 07.30 am to 01.30 pm and for grades 10 to 13 it will be from 07.30 am to 3.30 pm, the Ministry of Education said.

Furthermore, from Monday all academic staff of the schools will be required to report for duty and in addition to activities related to teaching, they are also responsible for supervision, checking assignments, and healthcare and discipline. The working hours of all the teachers except the teachers who have a schedule till 3.30 p.m. will be from 7:30 am to 1:30 pm.

Meanwhile, school principals have been told not to open school canteens until health officials confirm that the situation is under control.