KAWA ICT in education training report for West Nile

KISUBI ASSOCIATED WRITERS AGENCY

ICT IN EDUCATION REPORT FOR WEST NILE REGION A one Day Seminar for School administrators at Nebbi town Secondary school, Mvara SS, Nyangilia SS and Aringa SS. 21-29 Sept, 2015 Moses Wamanga

2015

WWW.KAWA.MOES.UG

Introduction The Minister of Education and Sports Hon. Jessica Alupo launched the National Continuous Professional Development (CPD) in ICT training. This is a national program that targets all teachers beginning with administrators (Head Teachers, deputies, directors of Studies and chairpersons of Management Committees).

To deliver this program, KAWA partners with the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Sports & Makerere University Business School.

In responding to the resolutions the elearning Uganda 2015 conference that took place at Makerere University Business School where the headteachers wanted ICT training to be taken to the grass root, the West Nile region was considered first.

Planning basing on the theme “taking action to enrich tomorrow”, the management of KAWA sent Moses Wamanga on 15th August on the regional situational analysis survey in this region covering the districts of Nebbi, Zombo, Arua, Maracha, Koboko, Yumbe, Moyo and Adjumani.

Figure 1: KAWA officials Moses Wamanga and Dr. Sylvester Rwaka Adyeri meeting Mr. Alex Ocunga, the District Education Officer of Zombo

Figure 2: Discussing the training strategy with the DEO of Koboko in his office

DEO introducing Dr. SR Adyeri to the Deputy CAO of Koboko

Meetings were held with the District Education Officers of Zombo, Nebbi, Yumbe, and Arua the Education Secretary of the Catholic secretariat at Nebbi, the education Minister of the Alur Kingdom, Inspectors of Schools and ASSHU district chairpersons.

Figure 3: Posing in the Vice Chairman LC V and the DEO in the office of the District Chair.

Figure 4: Moses reporting to the radio to explain the CPD programme

Discussing the implementation plan Mrs Flavia Osoa, the DEO of Maracha in her office

West Nile ASSHU Chairman receiving Moses at Mvara SS in Arua

It was agreed that we hold a one day sensitization seminar as an introduction to ICT in Education to be attended three officials per school, namely the Headteacher, a deputy or Director of studies and a member of the school management committee. After this, training will be held in the secondary schools computer labs for a period of five months.

This program is intended to help schools to achieve their educational goals more efficiently and in doing so saving time while increasing productivity in the classroom.

The workshop was held on a cost sharing model between Ministry of Education and Sports, KAWA, Host Schools, and the participating schools. i. ii. iii. iv.

The Ministry of Education and Sports provided the circular permitting KAWA to use computers in schools and provided policy guidelines.

KAWA training materials, technical support and pedagogical training and was overall in-charge of the workshop.

Nebbi Town SS, Mvara SS, Nyangilia SS and Aringa SS hosted the workshop, provided technical services, projectors, furniture, generator and computers including making arrangements for meals.

Each participating school was responsible for providing transport to and from the workshop venue, accommodation for its administrator. A contribution of twenty thousand shillings (20,000/=) was paid per participant to cater for the expenses of the facilitators for meals which included tea, soda, water and lunch.

The workshop was attended by 53-Nebbi and Zombo, 89-Arua, 63-Koboko, and 23-Yumbe School administrators some of which were Head teachers and others Deputy Head teachers.

The workshop was facilitated by 3 facilitators and these included Moses Wamanga (lead facilitator), Nicholas Kugonza of KAWA Uganda (co-facilitator), Stephen Mundua (registration).

The programme went as follows;

Time 8:00:9:00 AM

Activity Arrival and registration.

Individual introductions: Name, Department and Participants Workshop expectations Opening Remarks Headteacher

• •

Welcome remarks by the Host Head teacher Opening Speeches on ICT (Recorded Video) by: o Hon. Jessica Alupo o Professor Wasswa Balunywa o Permanent Secretary o Professor Baryamureeba

Open Discussion and Way forward

10:45-11:00 AM 11:00AM-1:30PM

Stephen Mundua

• 9:00 -10:30 AM

10:30-10:45AM

By Whom

HEALTH BREAK Traditional view of our Education system

Nicholas Kugonza

Participants LUMAKA RESTAURANT Moses Wamanga

ICT and You 1:30 -2:20pm

LUNCH

LUMAKA RESTAURANT

2:00-3:00PM

Kugonza Nicholas

3:00-4:00PM

Introduction to offline education digital content. (a) Mobile phones (b) Cloud (d) PDF (e) Discs Introduction to Continuous Professional Development.

4:00-4:20PM

CLOSURE

DEO

Moses Wamanga

Session 1: Introductions, Expectations and fears for the Workshop.

(Session was facilitated by Nicholas Kugonza) Participants were requested introduce themselves giving theirs names, schools, expectations from the workshop and their fears for the workshop.

Participants’ expectations: The participants’ expectations included: •

To acquire more knowledge and information that will help them in teaching.

• • • • • • • • • •

To acquire more knowledge on ICT. To learn more and become computer wizards To learn computers can connect them to donors to support their communities To acquire new ideas regarding the use of ICT in administration.

Acquire more knowledge regarding ICT products that can support their schools.

To get increased knowledge of ICT in order to be able to help other teachers.

To network and make more friends for collaboration.

To get emails of the other participants.

To interact with other members for administration purposes.

To integrate ICT in the day to day teaching and administration.

Participants’ fears: The participants’ fears included: • • • • • •

Some of them travelled long distances the workshop should cater for that Not enough time to cover all the planned activities since participants were commuting and hence may not come in time.

The participants not implementing what they have learnt after the workshop because of the costs involved.

Some participants not being familiar with some of the technology.

The workshop being expensive for some of the participants from far who had to cater for their own accommodation.

Power interruptions.

Review of workshop objectives:

Nicholas took participants through the workshop objectives.

The one day Workshop had a number of objectives which include: 1. To reflect on the current Uganda educational system and how national and global changes are impacting or likely to impact on the Uganda educational system.

2. To share with members the new opportunities brought by mobile technology in Education.

3. Provide participants with an exposition of how ICT can be used to enhance teaching and learning as well as school management.

4. Introduce participants to offline education digital content.

5. To brainstorm the challenges schools are facing in providing quality education, how Continuous Teacher Professional development (CTPD) can help in addressing some of the challenge.

Session 2: Speeches: Welcome remarks by the Host Head teacher In general opening remarks were made by the Deputy headteacher Nebbi Town SS, the ASSHU chairman and headmaster Mvara SS, the Headmaster Nyangilia SS, the DEO Koboko and the DEO of Yumbe. All welcomed all the participants to seminar. Recognized the role KAWA is playing in training headteachers all over the country especially in West Nile region.

They reminded the participants of the importance of technology, that those who are not willing to learn will become irrelevant.

Assurance was given to all headteachers that their schools will all that do all that is possible to support the rest of the disadvantaged communities to learn suing some of the facilities in the school.

Hon. Maj (Rtd) Dr Jessica Alupo The Minister of Education and Sports Hon. Jessica Alupo launched the National Continuous Professional Development (CPD) in ICT training. This is a national program that targets all teachers beginning with administrators (Head Teachers, deputies, directors of Studies and chairpersons of Management Committees).

All the videos can be watched on KAWA TV on this website www.kawauganda.blogspot o o o

Professor Wasswa Balunywa Permanent Secretary, Dr. Rose Nassali Lukwago Professor Venansius Baryamureeba

Open Discussion and Way forward Following the message of the Ministry officials and the professors, members resolved that it was important for them to enroll for the courses in ICT following the earlier message given by KAWA led facilitator, Moses Wamanga. It was agreed that the elearning course offered by Makerere University Business School and KAWA starts in December 2015.

Session 3: Technology as a Means for Offering Professional Development by Moses Wamanga Teacher professional development is absolutely essential if technology provided to schools is to be used effectively.

Simply put, spending scarce resources on informational technology hardware and software without financing teacher professional development as well is wasteful.

Educational technology is not, and never will be, transformative on its own—it requires teachers who can integrate technology into the curriculum and use it to improve student learning.

In other words, computers cannot replace teachers—teachers are the key to whether technology is used appropriately and effectively.

That said, designing and implementing successful teacher professional development programs in the application of technology is neither easy nor inexpensive. There are more cases of inadequate and ineffective training programs than there are success stories.

Moreover, success stories are not automatically transferable to other situations, and the total body of experience and knowledge in this field is in its infancy. While some people may know more than others in this area, there are few if any true “experts.”

This calls for humility, innovation, a willingness not to fail, ongoing evaluation, sharing of both positive and negative experiences, and constant revision of teacher professional development programs related to technology.

Teachers remain the gatekeepers for students’ access to educational opportunities afforded by technology: they cannot and should not be ignored. Moreover, providing technical skills training to teachers in the use of technology is not enough. Teachers also need professional development in the pedagogical application of those skills to improve teaching and learning.

ICTs also can enable in-service teacher professional development at a distance, asynchronous learning, and individualized training opportunities.

Finally, ICTs can overcome teachers’ isolation, breaking down their classroom walls and connecting them to colleagues, mentors, curriculum experts, and the global teacher community.

Session 4: Traditional view of our Education system In an interactive format, Moses Wamanga who facilitated this session asked the participants to describe the main features of the education system of Uganda. He told them that Research has proven that institutional education in Uganda is still bent on providing just facts to the students and tests them to find out how many facts they can reproduce.

In summary it was resolved that it is characterized by: • • • • • • • •

Teaching facts with little or no skills Teacher-centredness Students reproducing knowledge The curriculum is fragmented Examination oriented system.

Emphasis on deficit model of the student.

Lower Order Thinking Skills (LOTS) Places too much emphasis on exams and not on discussions and peer cooperation among students.

He shared with them the success story of schools in Norway. From grades two through seven, learners are introduced to maths, English, Norwegian, science, religion, esthetics and gymnastics, complemented by geography, history and social studies in the fifth grade.

Figure 5: Moses Wamanga discussing more about the traditional view of education

Headteachers at Mvara SS, Arua

No official grades are given at this level, however; the teacher often writes a comment –analysis and sometimes an unofficial grade on tests.

Our educational system stresses children with exams from the start. Even at nursery children go through a rigorous test to secure standard one space. The system seeks to identify intelligent and nonintelligent pupils early on even before the children develop their talents.

Session 4: ICT and You The facilitator asked the participants what they understood by ICT. Told that the main goal of this presentation is to familiarize the participants with the terminology and concepts related to the use of ICT (Information and Communication Technology)

Figure 6: Hands session was provided for a short time due to shortage of computer and the time limit

What is ICT? Is defined as ‘electronic means of capturing, processing, storing, communicating information. ICTs are based on digital information and comprise computer hardware, software and networks.

To sum up, ICT is an all encompassing term that includes the full gamut of electronic tools by means of which we gather, record and store information, and by means of which we exchange and distribute information to others.

Certainly, it is difficult to imagine how any modern society could continue to function without ICT. In that sense, ICT ushered in a revolution: there can be no going back to the old ways.

Why intergrate ICT in education • ICT is about how the modern world works; there are many potential benefits of using ICT in education; and ICT makes education more accessible.

• ICT improves the quality of education.

• ICT provides tools for effective and efficient management.

• ICT is itself a proper subject of education

Figure 7: Mr. Andama, the ASSHU Chairman, West Nile region and Headmaster Mvara SS stressing the need for training if technology provided to schools is to be used effectively.

Figure 8: Headteachers from Koboko District listening to the speeches made by the Minister, Permanent Secretary and other education officials.

Benefits of ICT in Education: • enhances the teaching of many pupils.

• easy access to information e.g. through the Internet • cuts down the costs of stationery.

• motivating and exciting for both learners and educators.

• stores and saves information in a simpler way.

• brings reality into the class i.e. virtual reality.

• Learners get information on their own from the Internet.

• helps in administration by making communication quicker and cheaper.

• enhances collaborative learning whereby learners can interact and learn with learners abroad.

• saves transportation costs for example In case of geography instead of the students going for the field work, one can just take a photo of the vegetation using a digital camera and take for the study.

• In administration, it helps in monitoring accounts using the accounting packages.

• helps in school management system with the use of the data base.

• Learners acquire marketable skills.

• helps in the assessment and analysis of the learners’ performance.

• opens up new opportunities for both the learners and teachers for professional development.

• Keeping learners information and school staff information.

• Printing examination papers, assignments and school reports.

What are the challenges in integrating ICT in education?

Although there are numerous potential benefits to integrating ICT in education, there are many issues and challenges to be faced, and these obstacles differ depending on the context.

Activity: State the challenges and obstacles you may face in integrating ICT in education.

This presentation calls upon each of you therefore to embrace this new technology.

Figure 9: First ICT sensetization meeting at Nyangilia SS in Koboko District facilitated by KAWA

Deputy headteacher of Aringa SS in Yumbe moving a vote of thanks

Session 6: Introduction to KAWA offline education digital content.

This presentation covered some of the resolutions of elearning Uganda about training, inspiring and empowering Ugandan teachers to create their own digital content instead of depending on the imported resources. It was an opportunity for KAWA to proudly show what the teachers have been able to create.

Figure 10: KAWA offline interactive platform created Ugandan teachers

Moses shared with the participants the challenges of teaching subjects like geography where teachers teach about what they have never seen like coral reefs, New York, Amsterdam and Canadian prairies among others.

He also demonstrated how content can be created and shared on: Mobile phones, Cloud, blogs, PDF, and Discs

Session 7: Introduction to the government certified Continuous Professional Development Training in ICT. This presentation was meant to familiarize the educators with different platforms and devices used in e-learning and how they could be beneficial in the learning process. E-learning, or electronic learning, is a widely used term in business, industry and education.

The presenter introduced participants to an eLearning platform that provides notes, videos and presentations to make learning easy for you anytime anywhere. Whenever you have access try as much as possible to explore the whole course content and communicate to the course facilitators and lecturers as much as possible.

The platform for CPD that will lead to a certificate in integration of Technology in the teaching and learning process was shown to the members.

It has been endorsed and supported by key technology Champions such as Professor Venansius Baryamureeba of Uganda Technology and Management University (UTAMU), Professor Wasswa Balunywa of Makerere University Business School, the National Headteachers Associations of Secondary and Primary Schools, District Education Officers, Ministry of Education and Sports, represented Dr. Rose Nassali Lukwago, the Permanent secretary and the Rt.Hon. Jessica Alupo, Minister of Education as you can seen in the video in the morning.

On completion of the 5 months course, each participant will get an accredited government recognized Certificate from Makerere University Business School that will open a new door of opportunities.

This is a wonderful invitation to YOU to join the ICT world and embrace the new pattern of development in education. You are important. Do not make yourself a minus in the 21st century world.

Conclusion: One of the participating headteachers from Zombo district who moved a vote of thanks said “There is a need to reform our learning institutions to make education a pleasurable experience without necessarily focusing on exams. We now have enough justification to leverage the advances in information technology and revolutionize how children learn”.

All members agreed that change in our educational systems is imperative to meet the demands of the future.

Outcomes/ Benefits • • • •

Managed to create awareness on the available courses offered by KAWA Covered 70% of the schools in north western region through the participants Created a relationship with the educators in the region.

Publicized the ICT policy

Challenges: • • •

The place was far from the offices of Kawa and therefore required the field workers to sleep over the places of training.

Some areas participants were not well sensitized in that they did not satisfy the workshop requirements like payments of attendance.

Language barrier in terms of communication to service providers.

NO 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

NAME Ngabyai Alfred Odokocan Larvey Bidukomit Onegiu Jimmy Jupatho Albert Oloya Jamtho Celsi Onegi Salvatore George Elon Embe Tholony Jalawure George Oyikunyiwga Jenny Ociburu George Dtera Hillary Kumakech Benson Parmu Tuzinde Jesus Onegiv Innocent Cekecan Albert Meswa Jatho Wilfred Imamut Judith Kumakech David

SCHOOL P/S Pagwaya Ossi Ngele Jukia Paceru Ogusi Goli Mixed Kei Nanrwooho Oriino Acinera Oguta Agwok Oguta Agwok Ringe Memorial Koch Kinju Pamunya

TELEPHONE 0772974151 0782071230 0791866612 0773244474 0757450715 0777374052 0773394439 0772860271 0774491628 0752951503 0784848727 0774421300 0777456200 0750370930 0782847501 0776511235 0772386228 0774334441

E-MAIL alfredngabi@gmaqil.com bidukomitlarvey@yahoo.com onegiujimmy@gmail.com

19

Offungi Willys Onen

Aor

0783649659

Offungi.willy@yahoo.com

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53

Dhugira Dorothy

Nebbi Town SS

0772309263

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