This 2020
has been a very special year full of challenges for everybody, but I am sure I
will not be considered mistaken if I assert that teachers are among the most
affected.
It’s been
many years since many teacher trainers started speaking about education for the
21st century and the necessary skills that in-service teachers needed
to help students to develop. Of course, we had to develop those skills in ourselves
first. Nevertheless, many teachers were reluctant to accept that ICT had to be
included in our practice. They displayed a panoply of reasons which were not a
lie: lack of time, resources, interest, to name a few. Those issues should have
been addressed by teachers themselves but also by policies, which were not up
to the standards needed. The result was evident. Many teachers were overloaded
with demands because they had to learn how to use ICT at the same time they had
to plan and prepare lessons using technology. On the other hand, many students
did not have the means to attend the virtual lessons they were offered. When
students had to connect to the internet, they found that there was only one
computer for all the members of the family, they lacked internet connection,
they were too young to connect themselves to the internet while parents were
out at work, and I could go on enumerating obstacles that hindered their way to
successful learning.
A special
note should be made about teachers’ efforts to keep the pace of their teaching
needs. Not only did they have to plan lessons in a different way but they also
had to use their own means to work efficiently. They needed their own internet
connection and their own ICT devices. Moreover, if they hadn’t been trained in
the use of ICT, they had to attend online workshops and start experiencing
their newly acquired knowledge. The positive side could be the fact that they
started working collaboratively, thus developing empathy and the capacity to
share and work together with others. Some teachers even started working on cross
curricular projects.
Cross
curricular projects deserve a special paragraph because they are useful and
effective to educate learners. Through cross curricular projects we can achieve
many aims, for example:
·
make learning significant. Students understand that whatever
they learn is useful in real situations in their contexts.
·
help students to develop
collaborative skills.
They learn to work cooperatively and they understand that individual effort has
an effect on the final product the group has to present.
·
help students to learn to state
their point of view and defend it. Students have to discuss
courses of action and material to use without the help of a teacher checking
every detail.
·
help students to learn to work on
active listening. They have to listen carefully to their
classmates’ opinions to give feedback
and draw group conclusions to agree on a course of action to fulfil a task. In
this way, they become aware of how relevant it is to listen to each other.
·
help students to develop critical,
lateral and creative thinking in order to apply the new knowledge acquired to solve the problems
presented by teachers. They can even present new problems to be solved by their
classmates.
·
encourage ICT creative use to interact with teachers and
classmates. Many students are well acquainted with social networks and videogame
sites but they don’t know much about the real potential connectivity has for
their research works. Designing appropriate tasks, teachers can help students to
discover how many tools they have at hand to do research and contact different
kind of people online.
·
help students to develop individual
responsibility.
They have deadlines they need to meet, but they don’t have their teachers
checking every single detail. They can consult teachers, but they have to
organise their queries to access teachers’ help on the agreed instances. They
have to decide together with the members of their groups when the task is
complete and apt to be handed in.
All in all,
as I am usually a positive thinker, I take this pandemic as a valuable opportunity
to grow. Not only will students become more mature, teachers will also learn to
evaluate tasks and provide feedback in a different way. Remote teaching and
learning provide a wonderful opportunity for growth. Moreover, I think
e-learning has come to stay. We will go on working remotely for quite a long
time, so let’s make the most of it!
"
