by Gina D. Panagan
Nowadays, the instruction for learners in the public elementary schools have brought learning anxieties to learners and apprehension to their parents. Based on interviews conducted by this writer in the Sablan District, in the School Division of Benguet, most parents fear that their children may not be able to cope with the teaching and learning challenges without the presence and assistance of their teachers. Questions like “Can my child understand the lessons without teacher explanations?” and “How can I assist my child when I am very busy and have forgotten those topics long ago?” are the usual ones we heard.
Yet as provenn through centuries, necessity is the mother of invention including new techniques and strategies. Thus, the Department of Education officials did not just sit and watch helplessly the devastation of Covid-19. They racked their brains for a new learning system that could be implemented amidst the the pandemic threat But for every new thing, new problems, new anxieties and apprehensions. It has to be fine-tuned. And as time goes on the expected anxieties and apprehensions will be greatly reduced as their causes are identified and addressed.
Thus, these apprehensions were expected since modular instruction is being implemented for the first time in Philippine education in public schools. Some secondary private schools in Baguio City have been using it though as their main instructional system for years already.
Fortunately, most teachers understood these problems and have been going out of their way to observe parents’ fears because monitoring and evaluation are the way to “debug” these. There is no other way but for the teachers, who are self-sacrificing enough, to regularly communicate with the parents. Another obective of this is to assuage their worries regarding the “new normal” instruction – modular.
Sooner or later, with constant communication to monitor and evaluate feedbacks, better and more effective strategies will be developed and formulated by the Department of Education to make more effective and workable the modular way of instruction. The natural effect would be less parents’ apprehensions. It is heartening to know and must be spread that the Department of Education is continuously exerting efforts to make the modular instruction more comprehensive, effective, and workable.**
