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| The projector screen where projection is projected. (Photo not ine, but I did not steal it.) |
It’s been a while since I have written a post. I have been
busy in fact the whole school has been very busy with contests, scouting activities etc, and wrapping things up for the end
of the semester. We are also engaged in an ongoing school based seminar on ICT.
The school has been conducting seminars on ICT for years and
its getting more complicated as the years go by. Now we are into bits of
animations and other inter active web enhanced stuffs, a long way from word
processing, spreadsheet and PowerPoint presentations of five years ago.
But despite all the advances in computing, the paper works
seem to be multiplying exponentially as we advanced into the wireless and
paperless internet age.
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| The audience listening, obviously. (Photo mine, not theirs) |
I agree some manual paper works like word processing and
computations of grades have become a cinch because of MS Word and Excel and
other office applications but the amount of papers being used did not decrease,
in fact, it almost doubled!
Take for example class records, the traditional way to do it was to record the pupil’s performance and test scores in the class-record then after each grading period the class-record is fine-tuned and reconciled and then rewritten and consolidated in the rating sheet.
With the introduction of the e-grading system, I thought this intermediate stage, this raw-class record stage can be disposed of because the spreadsheet is easily editable and the figures are automatically computed on Excel.
Take for example class records, the traditional way to do it was to record the pupil’s performance and test scores in the class-record then after each grading period the class-record is fine-tuned and reconciled and then rewritten and consolidated in the rating sheet.
With the introduction of the e-grading system, I thought this intermediate stage, this raw-class record stage can be disposed of because the spreadsheet is easily editable and the figures are automatically computed on Excel.
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| Me, scratching my head. (Photo mine) |
I guess its a bit disappointing to find out that we still need to submit the traditional class records as one of the performance checklists in our job evaluation. I was sharing my reservations about this with the school’s ICT coordinator because it beats the computerization and the e-grading system project of the department, and she agrees with me.
I guess there’s still the divergence between the old and the new which will take time to converge. I guess the 21st century teacher is still trapped in the manual records keeping, so technically we are 21st century teachers who still uses 19th century technology and I guess it would be in the 22nd century before the 21st century teacher would be realized to its fullest.
Am I being sarcastic here, hell no!
Most countries have been using the 12 grade basic education system
for millennia and it's just now in the second decade of the year 2000 that we
have adapted it. See! And now Finland, the country with the best educational
system in the world is showing the world that less is more. And yet our
educational system is on the early stage of the 12 Grade system while one of the most
advanced nations on the planet is experiencing a paradigm shift in its educational system by adapting the unorthodox less is more philosophy. And it would be a matter of time before the other countries will see the advantage of this system and later on adapt it if not in its entirety at least in phases or in part. There are already indications that the educational tide
is going the other way around and yet we are still on the beginning stage of adapting
an already deteriorating educational paradigm.
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| My co-teachers enjoying the seminar. (Photo not mine, again) |
Anyway, I guess traditionalism still has hold in the system.
Our retired master teachers have insisted on the importance of keeping a
physical records and I wouldn’t blame them because this was the way they have
been trained in the service. The tedious effort of writing figures in small
fields in a class record is part of their identity, it is a job ritual and even
the slow and progressive introduction of computer technology has had little
effect on that psychology. I guess it’s hard to give up the concrete, touchable
paper for the digital records.
So, those who have not adapted did not adapt and retired in
the service without benefiting from the modernization and I guess they are
looking forward to retirement and saw little benefit in learning new skills
given the little amount of time they have left in the service, logical. Those
who have adapted have adapted well.
I have run out of stuffs. My mojo needs recharging...tomorrow.
I have run out of stuffs. My mojo needs recharging...tomorrow.
This post sucks!
2 comments:
If you still remember the seminar we had attended in Tagaytay almost a decade ago, well that's an exaggeration since I guess it's 2009, I had put my mindset that TES will soon have its own website where we will have our own student information system, where grades and personal records of pupils will be instored and kept. The process maybe so slow but Sir until now I never lose hope. All things will be possible if and only if everyone will have the same dream and will work with me to achieve that dream.
think positive hehehehe
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