CHILDREN
E LEARNING ONLY FAVOURS THE ELITIST. CRY THE BELOVED EDUCATION.
BY DR MASIMBA MAVAZA
With some quotations from CLAYTON SHERENI
The pandemic COVID 19 has been said to be colour blind, to be class blind and respects no Political or social bounds. It’s effects are supposed to be felt by every one. This is only true as far as infection is concerned. But seriously COVID-19 roared and its ripple effects has been felt by the poor. It has changed many lives negatively forever.
While it is true that access to education is a fundamental human right but this has been seriously compromised by the Covid-19 pandemic which has forced schools to close for over 10 months now, with examination classes sitting under stringent conditions. Students from the poor families who had hoped to break the circle of poverty through education have been hit right in the groins by the unrelenting CORONA virus.
On numerous occasions, government tried to reopen schools, colleges and universities but this backfired after Covid-19 positive cases spiked.
This forced authorities at various educational institutions to explore digital solutions to the delivery of syllabus to try and cover the gap.
Exam classes were allowed to sit physically as government expected a return to normal, or possibly the end of the pandemic in early 2021.
In the past, soldiers were deployed to teach in some schools after teachers embarked on a protracted strike in 2008. This resulted in a high failure rate, forcing government to allow even those that failed to attain at least five Ordinary Level passes to proceed to Advanced Level under the condition that they would supplement while doing their ‘A’ levels simultaneously.
The repercussions were to be seen in 2010 when the lowest ‘A’ level pass rate of 14.44 percent was recorded, as if to remind authorities that there are no shortcuts in times of crisis.
Pupils who sit for their ‘O’ level examinations in times of crisis and their ‘A’ levels during under friendlier conditions will always experience the contradictions.
Kudakwashe Kumbirai, a pupil who sat for his ‘A’ level examinations this year, said he did not enjoy the exam experience.
“My ‘O’ level exam experience was a bit perfect but that was not the case when I sat for my ‘A’ level exams due to insufficient preparations. I feel going into tertiary education will present its own challenges yet again, and many students are not ready for it,” said Kumbirai.
Recently, the Zimbabwe School Examinations Council (Zimsec) released the 2020 grade seven examination results showing that a very low 37.11 percent had been achieved; some 9.79 percent shy of the 46.9 percent recorded in 2019.
Government, in partnership with United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (Unicef), introduced primary school radio programs in June 2020 but the effects of this has not been fully tested amid claims that listenership has dropped due to youths’ preoccupation with social media.
In what seemed like a repeat of the 2008 educational crisis, 88 primary schools countrywide recorded a zero percent pass rate and schools in rural areas were the most affected.
In an interview with TellZim, Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (Artuz) president Obert Masaraure attributed the dismal 2020 grade seven results to many factors including the ‘neglect of rural education’.
“Artuz blames government for imposing examinations on unprepared learners who missed out on receiving formal instruction because of the Covid-19 disruptions.The examination board was also ill prepared for the exams and failed to properly handle the examination process. The Zimsec chaos might have contributed to the poor pass rate.
“However rural education is suffering from years of neglect, poor planning and mismanagement. The infrastructure is inadequate and dilapidated. Most schools have no laboratories, libraries, internet connection, electricity and basic ICT gadgets,” said Masaraure.
The union is advocating for a rural education fund aimed at improving educational facilities in the rural areas.
Masaraure called on the government to improve the welfare of rural teachers for the betterment of results in these schools.
“We propose an education equalization fund for infrastructure development in rural schools, rural retention and attraction allowance to attract and retain best teachers in rural schools. In the immediate, we are mobilizing citizens to draft an education charter for Zimbabwe and this is under our #SaveOurEducationZw campaign,”Masaraure said.
“Prospects of a brighter future can come if students retake the public exams. We should be cognizant of the fact that not all would do so mainly because of financial constraints and life will take its course for the unfortunate,” said Zimudzi.
Many schools have resorted to E Learning however E-Learning has presented major challenges
One of the major challenges of eLearning is that the learners are unaware of effectiveness of eLearning. They might feel that eLearning is not as effective as classroom training and that the trainees would miss the opportunity of face-to-face interaction. But the major problem is the affordability of the gadgets like phones laptops or computers not withstanding the connectivity problems.
When schools adopted e-Learning approach many things need to have been changed and the education system, the student and the teacher must recognise this. e-Learning has many definitions.The convergence of the Internet and Learning, or Internet-enabled learning. The use of network technologies to create, foster, deliver and facilitate learning, anytime and anywhere. The delivery of individualised, comprehensive, dynamic learning content in real time, aiding the development of communities of knowledge, linking learners and practitioners with experts.
e-Learning, if designed and delivered correctly is and does all of these things but in many cases the emphasis is put on the E-and not the LEARNING part of the word. inherently e-Learning is about Learning. This will require many paradigm shifts in many different quarters. All these requirements fall into two categories: support and financial issues and pedagogical and methodological issues. The latter issues include the creation of different learning environments, pedagogical changes and the creation and adoption of relevant learning and teaching materials. The challenge is also to adopt strategies such that as many learners as possible have access to such environments, pedagogies and materials.
Schools and colleges, while looking at the introduction of such new normal , must also look at different delivery methods. There will be a variety of audiences and with present situation and future technology education will obviously not be confined to the physical classroom. The audiences will consist of students within the education system but will also consist of those on the periphery of the system and indeed those outside the system. It is unlikely that traditional didactic teaching methods, nor even perhaps full time education, will be entirely suitable for everyone and more progressive approaches and different timetabling arrangements will be required. Digital Distance Learning has become a major factor in any solution. Recent experiences in e-Learning suggest that a blended approach is most suitable. The role of the teacher is no less important, in fact it is probably more important now. In the areas of multimedia and games, teachers will be required more and more to adopt the role of facilitator rather than the role of knowledge expert. They must encourage innovation and creativity.
The new technologies will provide a variety of online learning approaches not previously available. These will include online face-to-face situations between teacher and student, live e-Learning-self paced online learning, live demonstrations online, collaboration online, synchronous and asynchronous tutoring, discussion groups and the development of communities of practice as well as simple knowledge acquisition. All of these methods require changes in teacher, student and classroom organisation. The management of these changes is another major challenge to Zimbabwean education.
The poor families have failed to acquire the tools of education in this pandemic.
The difficulties faced by the poor does not reflect the failures of the government. It just proves how difficult tertiary institutions leaders are to consider E-Learning and online exams in our present circumstances as a country with expensive internet access, poor connectivity and electricity shortages. Section 27 of the national constitution mandates that all students be given a fair and equal opportunity to education, E-Learning alone is elitist and exclusive, but can not be controlled. The pandemic has made changes to so many things in the world. Most economies have crumbled under the cruel jaws of CORONA virus.
It is widely recognised that learners do not all learn in the same way and they do not even learn the same things in the same way.
Individual learners have a variety of learning approaches and use these approaches in varying degrees in different learning situations, e.g. visual, auditory or kinesthetic. A good learning environment must also allow for the construction of knowledge, the constructivist approach and, more specifically, social constructivism. Any learning materials that are produced for the e-Learning environment must reflect these differences and this underpinning theoretical perspective. Consequently good learning materials must be in several formats and foster and encourage collaboration and co-operation. Learners must be able to choose their own personal approach and have the opportunity to engage in discourse with others and collaborate and cooperate in the learning environment just as they would in the normal classroom.
When developing the e-Learning materials for the multimedia/games courses Synergy should go through three phases. The biggest problems we had in ZIMBABWE is that the ministry of education failed to take charge of the E Learning programme. It was left in the hands of private people who saw an opportunity of making money living the poor deprived and socially bruised.
Consideration of the different learning approaches such as drill and practice, constructivism social constructivism (social activities, communities of practice and common knowledge).
Development of different types of materials which consisted of :
Temporal models (movies and demonstrations)
Spatial models (graphics, 2D models, 3D models)
Process models (interactivity, mimicry) These models include pictures, graphics, diagrams, text, learner interaction, step-by-step activities, demonstrations, simulations, sound/speech and learning as well as assessment tasks. This needs a government hand and not to leave this in the hands of the few gluttons who only saw money in the already vulnerable students.
The issue and challenges for teachers and the Zimbabwean education system during COVID 19!would appear to be how best to fill the skills gap, adopting a long-term approach and a decisive leadership skills by the ministry. The solution must in itself make use the new technologies of multimedia and games. The ministry of education must consider introducing courses and curricula in the relevant fields that are engaging, accredited and have an international value, develop new pedagogies that are suitable for and make optimum use of the new technologies and use innovative and creative learning resources produced by the new technologies.
Every student regardless of class has faced these problems which are Technical issues,Distractions and time management.Staying motivated.Understanding course expectations.Lack of in-person interaction. Connectivity challenges and many more. In the absence of a proper ministerial directive and supervision most schools ended up giving students crumps.
Regardless of the grade and the role the student plays, it is imperative to keep the students up-to-date on the new products, policies and procedures to make them remain competitive. But, when you consider some of the factors such as the cost, schedule allotted and training the students who are geographically spread out, you would realize how difficult it is to impart training. So this needs the whole ministry to put their hands on the deck. An eLearning program through which the students can take up training at their own pace and in the controlled time could be a solution to these problems. But not to forget, eLearning comes with lots of challenges that have to be addressed while delivering the online training. These problems needs the involvement of the ministry.
At the moment the ministry of education is only visible when giving contradicting messages on school opening dates.
The major challenge in the E Learning is lack of awareness.
One of the major challenges of eLearning is that the students or the learners are unaware of effectiveness of eLearning. They might feel that eLearning is not as effective as classroom training and that the trainees would miss the opportunity of face-to-face interaction but they need to be made aware. The ministry must promote eLearning: Promoting eLearning could be an effective way to initiate an eLearning program. Arrange for the marketing campaign and use it as a base for creating awareness to the masses. They would quickly accept eLearning once they get to know what eLearning is all about and how it could be beneficial to them.
Motivating learners is one of the common challenges faced by the eLearning developers. When you deploy the course and leave the learners to their devices, chances are that the learners may not take up the eLearning course effectively as they would do in classroom training. Hence the challenge is – how can you motivate your students and present a good learning experience to them? If the ministry takes this as a national programme those who are stake holders will participate with pride.
One of the common challenges in eLearning could be to evaluate whether the programme has the intended impact on the learners. How do you determine that your programme is attaining its goal of meeting the learning requirements. This was never done and many students suffered for the lack of action by the ministry.
Now, when the learner is onboard with the eLearning course, it is time that the content of the course needs to be focused on. A well designed course depends upon the content of the course. Most of the time, the content received from the client is unstructured and difficult to comprehend. You may receive content which does not contain enough information to be covered under a certain period. It is sad that authorities are being irresponsible and going against the dictates of the constitution.
University students have had their own disappointments in 2020 also they have been grossly affected by lack of face to face learning but have been conducting ‘eLearning’.
Universities across the country have been conducting lessons online and some were using the Google classroom which has caused all sorts of problems for lecturers and students due to its ‘complex’ nurture.
Last year, universities had to force final year students to seat for examinations although they had not conducted proper face to face lectures, with E-Learning processes presenting their own challenges.
Many institutions of tertiary learning are blamed for producing ‘half-baked’ graduates even during normal times, and it appears more of the half-baked graduates are coming, with the current crop of final year students faced with a possible uphill task of online exams.
Great Zimbabwe University (GZU) has recently conducted a mock online exam to gauge preparedness for the possible online exams in case the lockdown gets extended beyond February 15, 2021.
GZU Student Representative Council (SRC) president Tapiwa Takavarasha said more had to be done before making online learning the main platform for delivery of course materials for the satisfaction of both parties.
“If the lecturers are not able to use Google classrooms, how then do we expect the generality of the students to cope up with the online learning? Online learning is definitely the way to go but we need another alternative besides Google classroom so that students, lecturers and the administrative staff are comfortable
“I know quality has been affected by E-Learning since the majority faces access challenges. We will wait and see how results of the mock exams will pay out,” said Takavarasha.
In all this no one is ever considering that there are students in rural areas where network is a problem. Those from the poor families can not afford the gadgets. Even if they can have the gadgets there is no network to support the connectivity.
Unless the government gets involved fully CORONA will present the nation with uneducated graduates. Imagine that E learning student in charge of your own heart surgery
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