Enabling ICT Literacy through Learning Action Cells

Enabling ICT Literacy through Learning Action Cells (Day 21)

by Rey Laguda

(This is the  20th day of 50-day journey of DepEd Undersecretary Rey Laguda as being serialized here with his permission, culled from his Facebook account - Blogger/owner)

It is really not enough to simply provide hardware and equipment to schools. While access to technology was provided, adoption and use was varied and was affected by many factors. It did not automatically translate to effective use for teaching and learning. There was a need to support provision of technology with ample professional development.

There have been numerous ongoing efforts of industry partners and groups to train teachers for productivity, teaching and learning objectives. However, given the number of teachers to be trained, it was just a huge challenge to cover the whole ground. Further, these partners were not operating or present in all areas of the country. So the Department of Education made a decision to complement this with internal training and development as well. The whole process entailed development of a program after consulting with teachers from the field, and experts from the bureaus and ICT service from the Central Office.

ICT Literacy Facilitators

School Principals Are Now Committed in Doing Good Governance

Fr. Nebrers

It's done the workshop-training of four city divisions in Negros Occidental. They were well represented in the recent School Governance Regional Training with the theme, "Changing the Lives of Children" at L' Fisher Hotel, Bacolod City.

Synergeia with the cooperation of USAID, and Effective Governance, at the cutting EdGE of Education effectively trained the 188 school heads on problem tree analysis, listening, consensus building, participatory leadership, and decision making as far as school improvement plan (SIP) and school governing council operation are concerned.

Synergeia Foundation is a coalition of individuals, institutions, and organizations, working together for the improvement of the quality of basic education.

INSET Setting Teacher's Job in Order

The DepEd Order No. 4, series of 2014 so requires for strict compliance the implementation of the new school forms for school year 2014 - 2015.

The Balabag Elementary School under its new school principal, Gil Camporazo conducted an in-service training (INSET) for its 16 teachers of which 14 are class advisers and 2 are relief teachers.

The school principal, Gil Camporazo utilized the DepEd video presentation which he compiled from the Learners Information System (LIS) website.

As required by the DepEd, the modified schools forms should be adopted for public elementary and secondary effective the end of school year 2013 - 2014. Thus, by SY 2014 - 2015, the public schools in the country are obliged to use the seven modified school forms. These forms have replaced the 15 previous forms as shown below.

How To Sustain Text2Teach Program

Our school, Cubay Elementary School, is one of those recipients of Text2Teach Program of Ayala Foundation, Inc. and four selected grade 5 and 6 teachers have undergone the 3-day training for the first batch.

On the third, every school head has to come up with a school action plan to effectively implement Text2Teach technology to grades 5 and 6 pupils.

My four teachers, Mrs. Jema B. Esparagoza, English; Ms. Gemma D. Salazar, Science; Mr. Edgardo S. Amar, Math; and Mr. Mario A. Malacaman, Values Education, who joined the training huddled together and we discussed the practical areas of concern to deliver the services needed for our pupils.

We have decided to limit them into 6 categories and I reported them before my fellow, school heads in attendance.

The School, the Community Working Hand in Hand

Is it possible that what the school wants to achieve with the support of the community, a better, well-educated child is developed?

At the conclusion of the 3-day in-service training of the teachers of Cubay Elementary School, community is tapped as one of the major helping hand in making the pupils achieved or facilitated their learning.

Community linkages could have a vital role in sustaining the education of every pupil in the locality.

The community could serve as the laboratory for learning. The community could provide rich and practical resources on the transfer of learning.
The community could also serve the training venue for the application of classroom learning which the pupils acquired.

ICT: CES Curriculum Enhancement

In the division of La Carlota City, the Cubay Elementary School Teachers have spent their time while their pupils are taking their semester break for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in-service training in their school.

This could be a part of their curriculum enhancement wherein they may have the skill on how to use ICT in teaching and learning for their pupils as what has been indicated in their National Competency-Based Teacher Standards-Training Needs Assessment (NCBTS-TSNA) prepared by their school head for the school plan for professional development (SPPD).

Thirteen teachers of CES inclusive of kindergarten, primary and intermediate teachers  took their precious time listening to the lecture and doing the hands-on activity as introduced by their trainor, Mr. Gilbor D. Camporazo, Junior a programmer instructor of Technological Foundation Institute (TFI) of Bago City.

Teachers Now Ready for Opening of Classes

Teachers are now ready for the opening of classes in June. Preparing of the regular classes is all it takes for the teachers in the small Division of La Carlota City. In this division, everything is ready.

Meaning, not only school facilities have been prepared for the opening of classes this June, the newly hired teachers and those who are already teaching for one year up to three years in the public elementary and secondary schools have been also prepared in the Division 3-day seminar/workshop as a part of teachers' induction program.

In June 3 as the opening and regular conduct of classes in the public elementary and secondary schools in the said Division of La Carlota City start, these teachers are not only ready for their  classes, but they are well-equipped of the methods, techniques and even the skills to teach their pupils competently.

School Heads Keep The Wheels on Turning

For their capacity as a transformative leaders in their respective schools, the 27 school heads and department heads of secondary schools are now ready to discharge their capability building task for the professional development of their teachers when they get back to their own schools.

Training and JEL relationship

They are now well equipped to implement what they've acquired from their 4-day series of  training/workshop at the conference hall of the division office of La Carlota City under the able, competent set of trainers.

In her message, OIC-Schools Division Superintendent Portia M. Mallorca of La Carlota City was confident in challenging them to do their role as effective transformative school principals in providing opportunities for their teachers to improve their output in their academic performance of their pupils.