It is my wish to share my experience and the benefits of this ICT course. I had an opportunity to share my knowledge with hundreds of my colleagues during an ICT conference which was held at the Gauteng East district in March 2009. It was recommended that I present the same paper to different clusters in our districts as per evaluation feedbacks.I presented a paper on e-maturity in schools. The focus of the presentation was to show ICT educators in schools ways in which they can assess the level of ICT use in their schools. The BECTA site was the main resource that I used as a source of reference in my presentation.
This gave me an insight into the shortcomings in the way the White Paper on e-Education has been advocated in our schools. Most of the educators are still in the dark as far as this policy is concerned. This gives us a challenge as ICT students to go out there and share information with our colleagues on this exciting experience and how they can make their lessons interesting for their learners by creating positive learning ICT environments in their classrooms.
Let us be change agents, and positive resources in our schools and institutions for the benefit of our learners and to help in driving the goal of bridging the digital divide by 2014.
Hi there!
ReplyDeleteI think that it is absolutely treu what you are saying in advocating for ICT educators to be agents of change. The greatest challenge is with the management who are either for or against change, as the former will require induviduals to move out of their comform zone to explore new and exciting trends.
The building of Computer labs don't have to just be window dressing, like Gauteng Online labs where a maximum of 20 computers are installed in a lab. The learner population of respective schools must be taken into cognisance to ensure that each learner is allocated a workstation durinng CAT or IT period.
I would also appreciate it even more if CAT or IT can be offered as compulsory subjects to ensure that all learners, irrespective of whether they do Maths/Science, have had access to a computer during their schooling days.
Technology is upon us, we just have to embrace it, equip ourselves with its trends so that it won't render us redundant.
I think we as educators we need to take an initiative of doing e-education advocay.We can use forums like meeting of staff,parents,learners to do advocay or even opportunities like the one you had when giving feedback to fellow educators.
ReplyDeleteI support TK on his comments.Iam teaching at a school where the staff is about 20 . In this stuff only six are computer literate . Even the top management including the head are computer illiterate. As for now they are busy doing basic courses in computer literacy because Iam motivating them. I have demonstrated to the head how easy to get circulars, policies and relevant document from the government portals with easy. This is the kind of initiatives that we can do.
ReplyDeleteOn issues raised by Moavus, I can say even when the computers are less in the computer lab , this learners are exposed to the digital computer technology. Think about learners that passed grade 12 and supposed to further their studies at university level. They encounter problems because they have to use advanced technology like we are using edulink ,so with no computer knowledge think how difficult it is.
To the author,Namane Iam saying that sharing your experience is a wonderful think. It is only through our sharing of experience that other people realised the importance of this technology.In my school the District people came to evaluate the school and one of their instrument was to check the availability of policies and gazetes for education . I helped the principal by dowwloading those that were not available. My experience was to show them that everything is possible with ICT. Another experience that I exposed to my entire staff of 20 educators and about 600 learners was to do progression schedules and report within a period of two days which normally took a week for every staff members to complete the process.I was able to do this by using mail merge application tool. So keep on sharing your wonderful experience.You are a well of knowledge and inspiration . Keep it like that.
Hi Lobi. I am one of the female educators in our ICT group and would therefore like to encourage you to publish as much post as you possibly can because women are the dominating ones in the ICT field. In your profile you stated that you are an energetic person who is also goal orientated. With due respect, show evidence and live up to your claim.
ReplyDeleteHi Lobzen
ReplyDeleteI think our group is in need of females like you, who have been ICT coordinators' for a longer a period. In your profile you also mentioned that you have been involved in doing presentations on the e-maturity draft on e-learning, therefore, you happen to be the right educator to empower the community of educators out there who are still computer illiterate.
Since one of your characters is that of being energetic, you need to show evidence of that by publishing more.
See ya!!
Interesting opinion and advocacy initiates. I am happy that you are doing a lot of it in your own spaces and ways. We have a chance to be change agents in the school and wider community.
ReplyDeleteI am proud of you as a community in the sharing of ideas and encouraging each other to go a be active and grow the crop of digital natives as we prepare our young ones (learners) to be better prepared for the 21st century kind of life. That is why I like the gender-biased look at the ICT offered by Mofudi, compulsory exposure through IT or CAT for each learner. If the primary schools can provide more exposure to ICT for learners, the high schools would not have too much pressure to provide computer literacy. They would possibly be able to offer CAT or IT for some since computers are always going to b fewer than expected in each school.
That's my bit
Jerry for now
Yes, it is true our society is Technologically orientated so it is upon us to have a positive attitude and be willing to learn change is here!
ReplyDelete