In a 2013 article in the St.Lucia Star, I lamented the fact that the global education system was the least evolved sector on the planet. I noted that while a surgeon from the eighteenth century would be completely lost in a modern operating theatre, the same would not be true for a school teacher as she’d waltz into the classroom, grab the Scheme and Record Book, chalk and duster in hand ready to teach. Every sector has evolved and keeps evolving. Even the agriculture sector has seen some major changes and evolution over the years but the education sector is yet to follow in any significant degree. Could you therefore imagine how much more advancements those other sectors would have enjoyed if the education system had already taken its ‘booster shots’ to become more effective and efficient at imparting knowledge?
One of the major shortcomings of the current education system is the fact that it frustrates and discourages the gifted child on one hand, and on the other leaves the slower learner behind. Instructions are transmitted in a one-size fits all manner and if the child does not get it, the class moves on and the child is left behind. The deck of cards collapses on him as he continues to miss out on foundation concepts and instructions. If education is supposed to be the solution to poverty and the basis for societal development and growth, then no one should be left behind. Getting everyone educated, therefore, must be the goal. It benefits no one when people are not educated. Everyone needs to know about the world that they live in and how it works! The preponderance of ignorance will only put us all at risk as this pandemic has so delightfully shown! What would be your fate if you stop breathing and everyone in your company is clueless about the benefits of CPR? But that is not the crux of the problem. What is really disturbing is the fact there has been accessible technology out there for some time now to put an end to those shortcomings, yet the situation is allowed to persist.
Now that Covid-19 has shut the classroom doors with no date in sight for their re-opening, an excellent opportunity presents itself for the change to be made. Why wait to return to the classroom? Just get moving with the creation of a new and improved education system! From where I stand, the urgency of now has never been more apparent. We are moving into an era where education will dictate who lives and who dies. It is already self evident. The uneducated will not fare as well as their predecessors. Our leaders must do what is right, and now is the time. We know it can be done. And yes, we can do it. It doesn’t require rocket science or quantum mechanics – simply the harnessing of already accessible and readily proliferated information systems technologies into an Automated Online Learning System (AOLS) where instruction is ‘pulled’ by the students’ and not ‘pushed’ by the teacher.
While I have not done an exhaustive review of the entire education system, you will concur that the following is a very practical model on which such a system can be developed. First, the entire K-12 curriculum will need to be broken down into basic nuggets of learning in their requisite sequences and dependencies and presented in well designed and narrated Multimedia Instruction Packages (MIPs). These will consist of videos, audios, charts, texts, animated graphics and quizzes, exercises and other appropriate electronic learning tools. The MIPs will then be stored on the AOLS from which they could be accessed by the students in both an online and offline mode at any time of day.
The offline Mode will serve students without ‘always on’ internet access. Importantly, multiple versions of the MIPs will be created in varying designs and narrated by different voices to facilitate children with varying abilities and challenges. Surely there is no reason why the gifted child should waste time going through a 3 minute MIP when a 1 minute version would have sufficed. It is all about providing each child which the best approximation of the ‘size that fits him’ and options from which the same concept can be learnt. We recognize also that there can be multiple methods of teaching a concept and so learning would be more effective if the student is exposed to as many of them as is possible. Also the tone of a presenter’s voice may work with some students and be completely distracting to others.
Second, after completing a series of MIPs, It will be the student’s decision to request an exam on those MIPs when he/she is ready and not at the whim of the school teacher or Ministry of Education. To prevent any corruption of the system, the student will take two tests, one through the OALS and another in person at the nearest Examination Centre. In other words, a child, after completing say 15 math MIPs, takes the OALS exams online and then applies for the in-person final exam, all happening through the OALS. Policy will determine the minimum number of completed MIPs that would be required for the school to accept a request for final exams. The student’s progress will be recorded on the OALS as he/she moves from one level (Grade) to another after having successfully completing the final exams for the related MIPs.
Third, despite the fact that the MIPs would have been designed ‘for dummies’ and would carry multiple versions from different presenters, we recognize the real possibility that some students may require one-on-one assistance or may want to ask specific questions. Such assistance can be solicited by the student or driven by the OALS’s triggers in the case of the former. To facilitate quality control and MIPs upgrades, such assistance will be recorded and conducted through the OALS’s Video Conferencing Module (VCM).
Yes, you got it right. This will truly revolutionize learning in a very big way. An entire book can be written on the benefits accruable to societies where such a learning system is introduced. However, in this article we will only discuss the more salient benefits. Foremost, students will be able to complete their studies at their own pace, leaving no child behind and frustrating no gifted child. Second, students will get to re-run MIPs as often as they please without the fear of frustrating a school teacher who does not want to be constantly repeating herself.
Third, the quality of instruction will be consistently high across the school population completely removing elitism within the system as every student, regardless of their geographical location, class or wealth will be exposed to the same high quality of education and attending the same Virtual School. That is because every MIP will undergo quality assurance before being made available to the students, something that is virtually impossible under the present system despite its best efforts. Teacher absenteeism, personality, delinquency and biases are only a few of the real distractions to learning that students continue to suffer under the present system which will not feature in this AOLS.
Four, the cost of learning will be drastically reduced for the student as he will only be required to purchase a laptop, printer/scanner and internet access. The cost of uniforms and daily commute to school will become savings. All learning materials will be pulled from the AOLS at no cost to the student.
Five, unavoidable student absenteeism will no longer set back a student’s learning which opens the door for so many opportunities for families in particular. Parents can better arrange family vacations, overseas trips etc. Child labour can be refined from its current sinister leaning to something harmless as say ‘child life skills training’. From the perspective of the International Labour Organization, the evil of child labour lies with the loss of the child’s education caused by his/her absence from school. There is no problem with child labour if the child’s education is not compromised.
Six, the proposed model places very little demand on teachers for retooling. It will not be as demanding on teachers as is the case with the current Online Distributed Learning taking place around the globe. But, even where those challenges don’t exist, the Online Distributed Learning is nothing more than a glamorized image of the status quo carrying with it the same shortcomings mentioned earlier.
Seven, it is this author’s firm conviction that the competition that would be created among students to move from one level to another would cause them to finish their studies much quicker. Not many students will want to lag too far behind their friends. If that prediction stands, then curriculum managers will be able to input more content into the curriculum which will be especially welcomed as new discoveries are coming out at a much faster rate.
Eight, this model is fully Covid-19 compliant. Students would only have to report to school (examination centre) in person to take ‘final’ examinations which will be well scheduled and organized in keeping with Covid-19 prevention protocols.
While you ponder some possible disadvantages; we will examine some of the infrastructural changes that would come with such a system. The school’s plant will no longer be used as classrooms but will be converted to Examination centres and Call centres and Laboratories. The role of the School Teacher will be changed from pushing instruction in a classroom to include the following: man the call centres to take individual questions from students and to provide one-on-one assistance. Develop content for the maintenance of the MIPs. Create examination questions. Mark and invigilate examinations. Supervise the laboratories among other duties incidental to the new paradigm. From the student’s perspective, the parents would now have to become more involved in their children’s education to provide the necessary supervision, whether themselves or a delegate. The school and government, by extension, will no longer have to grapple with students’ discipline and interpersonal issues. Those will be remitted to where they organically and naturally belong – with the parents.
Regarding disadvantages, only one comes to mind; the loss of social interaction among students. It’s not certain that the few minutes of breaks at school really fosters team work, group dynamics and the other social skills that those interactions are expected to foster. As we have indicated, those matters truly belong with the parents who can lead a return to the old days where such skills were nurtured at the local community levels via groups such as boy scouts, girl guides, and the churches and youth and sports organizations. Parents are much better placed to lead that change than the school or the government.
