Essen – The German national soccer player and university lecturer Turid Knaak is very worried about children with learning difficulties or socially disadvantaged children due to the school dropout in the Corona crisis.
“The current situation is a disaster, especially for students with learning difficulties. These are often also children who receive little support from home and who often lack the help of their parents, »said the 29-year-old striker from Bundesliga club SGS Essen to the German Press Agency.
Knaak is a research assistant at the University of Cologne, where she works in the area of special education. For her dissertation, she researches the acquisition of written language by children with learning difficulties. «You can’t reach that at the moment. Due to the absence from school, they are in a very bad situation because they need a lot of encouragement and a direct and personal approach from teachers, »said Knaak.
In addition, digital learning or video-based support is “not so easy in every family and every household. Often there is also a lack of technical equipment like a printer, »said Knaak, who deliberately opted for a two-track career consisting of professional football and an academic career. “I really appreciate it because each one is a compensation for the other,” she says.
However, the corona pandemic has recently changed her life fundamentally. Instead of working at the university, Knaak works exclusively in the home office and is preparing to complete the coming semester with online seminars. Because the women’s Bundesliga is paused, it keeps fit with individual training sessions.
