Guest blog by
Phuti Ragophala ,Principal of Pula Madibogo Primary school in Mankweng Circuit
,Capricorn District, Limpopo Province, South Africa
A.
How did I use technological tools and food production projects to enhance
teaching and learning as a way of supporting the 21st centaury
skills building and fighting poverty within and outside the school community
Learning Activity titled” Planting seeds! Changing lives!
I am an educator who does not follow the prescribed teaching
preparations from the textbooks. I would only get a theme for that week, scan
what the textbook is saying and explore more from websites, search google, downloading
applications ,my experience and learners inputs for more class work , projects
and homework
As such my approaches differ every year. It depends on the kind of learners I am
teaching. My school is amongst schools
that has many orphans, child headed families, ill healthy learners due to malnutrition, dependency on
government grants , unemployed parents and poverty.
The combined negative impacts, mentioned above, lead to lack
of interest in education by both parents and learners. It was in this
context that the school began to explore
holistic solution that will benefit both parents, community members and learners
The core of problem solving was to relook at the role of the
school in the community. We felt that the school could be used as a hub of
service delivery with benefits beyond reading and writing.
Thus this lead to the idea of developing a model which took
the following perspectives in to account:
1.
School
environment: The school is an
extension of home environment and should therefore be safe, clean ,green,
secured and lively
2.
Social
perspective: The kind of backgrounds that learners come from has
negative impact in their education as their level of affordability is limited
by poverty and unemployment of parents. As such the school does what it can to
uplift impoverished learners who cannot afford school uniform, lunch and other
educational needs
3.
Spiritual
perspectives: The scale of diseases like HIV/AIDS cannot be under
estimated as they leave many untold stories in their wake. In addition, to
regularly collecting condolence money for bereaved families, the school has
structures in place for dealing with traumatized
learners, especially orphans
4. Academic perspectives: To me, learning is in a sense a sum total of the
above mentioned three factors where
academic perspective will automatically fall in. In this case, the main
aim is to nurture and win the learners hearts as compared to academic
achievements which is regarded as an ideal situation where learners get on with
their school work as soon as they get in class and don’t have to worry about
other issues. The model is more about
personal development and equipping learners with the survival skills than academic
Redefining the role of the school in the community , has
shown many benefits both within and outside the school environment hence the
following food projects:
·
School
backyard Food security projects :Planting of mealies, vegetables, fruit
and herbal medicines with the help of Food and Trees for Africa(securing food
production methods)
·
Indigenous
medicines using herbs from the school garden: Various herbs are planted
to augment more knowledge on medicinal making , to make ointments for head
sores and fungi , to equip learners with survival skills and to assist them to
pave their future careers at an early age. Production is sold on line.Visit their
website: www.pulaointment.wozaonline.co.za
and www.pulamadibogoprimary.co.za
·
Information
Technology project: The usage of
IT tools
in class, in the rural areas , is still taken as the field of the elite
learners. We are teaching the mobile and
E- generation which is competent in using the IT tools. It’s for us educators
to incorporate IT tools with teaching and learning. e.g learning a poem on a
YOU Tube is much faster that on a text book. “Teaching is like hunting birds.
You need to shoot where they are going. You shoot where they are, you are
likely to miss” Traditional way of teaching has no room in this era.
The EMS lesson on
Sectors of economy about food production was successful and more fun because of
the following:
·
Learners were provided with opportunity for high
order thinking by given a chance to be farmers (provoked their critical
thinking and problem solving and innovative skills)
·
They were also given chance to connect with the
real world challenges like poverty and diseases.(Global awareness and civic literacy
where their lesson went beyond the classroom and touch the lives of the community
members)
·
They were also given chance to share innovative
skills with community members, peers and amongst themselves using E mails, what
app and celphones(collaboration, knowledge building and ICT for learning)
·
They presented their projects using over head
projector, laptop and screen as compared to chalk and chalkboard
method(Communication, feedback and sharing)
·
Innovation was in both teaching and learning
. How I used
technology to support the 21st centaury skill building in my class
The usage of IT tools
cut across all the learning areas with the purpose of transforming education through
technological tools for better teaching and learning.
Through the support
from Coca Cares, School net and Netday(Penduka) I attended various IT workshops,
facilitated Teach a Teacher project, mentored neighboring schools
,learners and community members
where I gained a lot of experience and
acquired more IT skills and in turn implement them in my class. I only worked with 30 learners .
I did theory in class, practical in the garden and IT skills
acquirement in the mini computer lab available in school. Most
of the time I engaged learners on Saturdays to use computers. Programmes like
window movie maker, power point, songsmith, paint and You Tube were used by
learners to present the projects.
I also downloaded various applications to present, assess and summarize the lessons
and it was fun every day in my class. Learners created their emails, whats app,
facebook and Popeyes for story telling ,communication and knowledge sharing and reporting their
progress to me and their parents
Attached find learners work. For more information visit my
learning project with this link:
C. Tangible
difference made by IT and PIL project
Ever since I started with IT projects in schools the
following were observed:
·
Educators got inspired in using IT tools to
enhance teaching and learning. e.g schedules, learners progress reports, SAMS,
using on line Encyclopedia, have E mails, face book and twit for knowledge building and fun
·
Neighboring schools educators, community members
and learners become inclined in using the school mini computer lab as such the
school became a hub of IT skill acquirement beyond every thing
·
Parents , staff and community members are
conducted through laptops and overhead projector projecting information on
screen for every body to access information
·
School messages ,code of conducts and other
community information is displayed on an electronic board for accessibility by
community members
·
School websites, news letters, brochures and
school page are developed to market the school
·
Limpopo ICT educators is a page developed by an
ICT educators to disseminate , share and encourage dialogue in educational
matters
·
I groomed one community member to be our school
admin clerk through “Teach A teacher” IT project
D. Challenges
encountered during the creation of PIL learning activity
·
Very limited IT
resources denied many learners to learn more as such only a handful
could access the tools through
Principals laptop and only eight PC
·
Usage of
3g Modem to teach learners was so stressful in such that funds get
depleted quickly before the end of what you want to achieve.
·
The school has no budget for IT lessons hence
the “no fee school” status
·
Continuous load shedding during the weekends
impacted negatively during our lessons
·
Lack of financial, moral and technical support
from high echelons
·
But nonetheless I learnt that passion is the key
irrespective of limitations and
stumbling blocks
E. Way forward
My wish is to see all South African schools
becoming the E- schools by 2022 as per E- Education policy advocated by department of Education. This can only be achieved if all the” hot
spots” like churches, schools,
restaurants, beer hall, cinemas etc, can be E-wired and wifi
for every body to access information, encourage voluntary study to
youth and connect Globally.
The tried and tested chalkboard method
should give way to a classroom loaded with electronic gadgets as we enter the
digital age of E- Learning. We must teach learners in the way they want learn
not I the way we want them to learn.
E.
Conclusion
Whatever the future holds, the soul of
teaching profession will forever remain relevant to changing lives! As Nikos
Kazantzakis, a Greek philosopher said” Ideal
teachers are those who use themselves
as bridges over which they invite their students to cross, then having
facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse ,encouraging them to create
bridges of their own”
Thank you
Phuti Ragophala(School Principal)
