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01.08.2017 Education

Teachers honoured for employing ICT models

By GNA
Teachers honoured for employing ICT models
01.08.2017 LISTEN

Winkongo (U/E), Aug. 1, GNA -Thirty teachers in basic schools in the Talensi and West Mumprusi Districts in the Upper East and Northern Region respectively, have been honoured for employing Information Communication Technology (ICT) models to teach.

The teachers including Circuit Supervisors, Head teachers and school pupils took home a number of computers and printers among others as their reward and participatory schools that employed the technology were also rewarded.

The Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) with funding support from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF)contracted the Open Learning Exchange (OLE) Ghana to pilot the project dubbed 'Teacher Empowerment Through Support and Technology' in schools in the two districts last year .

Presenting the findings on the outcome of the project, Mr Kofi Essien, the Executive Director of Open Learning Exchange (OLE) Ghana, said the project has contributed significantly to improving teaching and learning.

He said under the model, his outfit deployed digital libraries, focusing attention on the prescribed teaching and learning syllabus and materials of the school and empowered teachers with the technology to teach what they downloaded.

Mr Essien said the use of ICT materials to teach did not only make teaching and learning more practical, but it also afforded the teachers from various schools, the chance to exchange ideas on the platform, on how to effectively teach.

The project targeted 120 teachers from the 20 schools in the two districts but exceeded that target by 240 teachers and also exceeded the 480 pupils by 45 per cent in addition to uploading of more than 500 teaching and learning materials on portal for the teachers to use, he said.

He said apart from the increase in enrolment and retention of the school pupils, the teachers who had large number of pupils were able to teach more effectively by employing the model.

'For instance the audio and visual aids that were uploaded into the portal for teachers to download to teach contributed a lot to addressing the needs of children with special needs and also increased girls' enrolment in schools in the two districts.

He said although the project has ended, the developed portal, teaching content and the teacher Performance Development Platforms created, would sustain the project for a while and appealed to the leadership of the two District Directorates of Education to help contribute to the substance of the project.

The District Directors in charge of the two districts where the project was piloted, Hajia Mase Sulemana and Mrs Stephanie Mosore, lauded the efforts of VSO and SNF for supporting the implementation of the project.

Mr Eric Duorinaah, the Programme Manager of VSO, said education is among the core values of VSO adding that over the years his outfit through a number of partners have implemented various interventions such as Tackling Education Needs Inclusively (TENI).

Ms Avril Abena Kudzi, the Country Director of VSO, said VSO was happy that the project had made a significant impact adding that an external Independent body has been contacted to evaluate the project to help chart the way forward. GNA

By Samuel Akapule, GNA

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