The teaching of Information Technology amongst public basic schools since the wake of the new world ‘Technological World’ has become a play for successive governments as year-in and year-out they pay lip service to equip schools with computers.
It is a fact that Information Technology has come to stay and policy implementors irrespective of the challenges must fine-tune the sector with assessable tools like other countries.
For instance, in some parts of Japan, pupils no longer carry books to school rather, they use tablets and other technological gadgets to study.
But in the Upper East Region, in every 10 public basic schools, only 1 out of the number has a desktop computer for the teaching of Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) subject.
In a visit to some of the schools by our reporter, Moses Apiah, he noted that teaching the subject does not only bring pain to teachers alone, but to the learners as well, as some usually struggle to understand what they have been taught.
An ICT teacher said anytime he enters the classroom to teach ICT, his students usually ask him, “sir, when are you going to show us a real computer aside from the books.”
These and other comments he said, “don’t only make me sad, but it keeps me wondering when stakeholders in the sector will begin seeing the need to prioritize the teaching and learning of ICT at various basic schools”.
“The teaching of ICT is more practical than theory,” he said, adding that policy implementors should wake up from their slumber and invest more in ICT as they do in science and its related courses.
Basic school pupils in public schools in the Upper East region, largely, do not only know what a computer is. They often struggled to differentiate a television set from a desktop computer.
A pupil in one of the Junior High Schools in Winkogo in the Talensi District of the Upper East Region, when asked, when was the last time he saw a computer, quickly answered, “this morning from the house.” When probed further, he said every evening they (family) usually watch the news and movies on it. He was referring to the television set in his house.
Meanwhile, the said student is in his second year and left with a year to write the BECE, yet, still struggles to differentiate a computer from a television set.
Irrespective of the precarious nature of the problem, some residents in the region are making efforts to help minimize it through the provision and demonstration of ICT tools in deprived schools.
The Assembly member for the Winkogo electoral area, Edward Akolgo Azuah as part of efforts to bridge the gap has donated five desktop computers to some five selected schools in his area. The initiative though he said was little, the lucky schools were more than happy to have had one.
Speaking to the media after the donation, he appealed to the government and other stakeholders in education to come to the aid of the children to uplift their spirits in the world of Information Technology.
Appreciating the gesture, a pupil says he will from now onwards never dodge ICT lessons in school again.
He however called on other bodies to come to their aid to equip their knowledge in the sector.
Source: A1radioonline.com|101.1 MHz|Moses Apiah|Winkogo|Ghana
