By Rocky
Ngalob
BAGUIO CITY – An independent organization of AP teachers
who launched a free 30-part webinar series for member teachers nationwide are
tackling significant and essential contexts of history from pre-colonial
Philippines to today’s current setting.
“Learning cannot be locked down even for
teachers,” is today’s credo for Aralin Panlipunan (AP) teachers within the
community of Aralin Panlipunan Teach Share (APTS).
Froidelyn Docallas, an
AP teacher of Bakakeng Elementary School here and founder of APTS said they
advocate a harmonious community of AP teachers.
According to her, the 30-part webinar series hopes to boost
the proficiency of their fellow AP teachers in crafting their respective
modules towards the topics anchored on the Department of Education’s (DepEd)
Most Essential Learning Competencies (MELC).
Said free 30-part
webinar series by APTS, in itself, is an expression of the age-old Filipino
values of ‘Bayanihan’ where teachers, in their own volition acting as resource
speakers, share their learnings, research works and expertise to fellow
teachers in need.
In their webinar series
which started last July, you will be greeted with smiles coming from AP
teachers throughout the nation.
All of the webinars lectures were interactive where you get
to see lecturers interact with their fellow teachers candidly.
Exchanges of views are
free flowing and the wisdom being imparted are overflowing.
History subject, in the
current basic educational structure has long been opined, apart from one of the
most boring subjects for students, as a subject boxed within the limits of
memory recall.
Typical mode of
instruction tends to mold students to mere memorization of dates and names.
Significant
socioeconomic and sociopolitical context of history are being left out.
Recognizing the
situation, lecturers framed their lectures in a way that it would ensue
discourse between them and their fellow teachers.
Clash of views ensued
but were all taken responded constructively. Lecturers imparted to their fellow
teacher, not only their usual topics inside their universities, but their also
their personal works, thesis [whether masters or doctorate], office’s research
works, advocacies, and life lessons on history.
They offered their
fellow teachers their works as reference materials for their modules and guided
them to other materials which the latter can use. One lecturer even offered his
signed published book as a prize for the AP teachers who wrote the best
reflection essay.
In between webinar
series, AP teachers interact which each other through their Social Media group.
There, they exchange
reference materials to their fellows. Most of the AP teachers, in keeping up
with the limitations brought about the pandemic, have created their own
educational YouTube channels. Insights from the 30-part webinar were
incorporated therein.
These videos from their
YouTube channels, aside from being easily accessible to students, are being
shared between and among the AP teachers.
According to Dacollas, APTS was just a small group of AP
teachers that started last year. Now, as of this writing, APTS has 18,300
members from different parts of the Philippines.
Teachers may be geographically separated by islands and the
advent COVID – 19 pandemic, but does not mean that they cannot be connected
with each other.
Through the cyber realms of Zoom, conventional teachers are
now at par with their fellow young blooded educators, adopting to the new
normal mode of virtual learning and teaching.
AP teachers are not just
educators. They will play the role of historians, economists and political
scientists. These teachers hold the enormous weight of teaching social studies
particularly on history. How the youth and students, the future administrators
and leaders of the land, view their future will always depend on how they see
and discern the lessons of history.
The 30-part webinar
series was capped by a lecture from Prof. Genardo Lanuza of University of the
Philippines (UP) Diliman on August 23, 2020 with the topic: “Teaching
Strategies; How to develop critical thinking in Social Sciences: The
emancipatory interest of social sciences”.
The rest of the
lecturers, each with their respective topics, who imparted their wisdom were
the following: Prof. Roderick Javar of UP Los Banos, Prof. Francis Gealogo of
Ateneo De Manila University, Jeremy Gerald Clemente, McFarlane Sloan Ramos,
Prof. Kevin Paul Martija of University of Makati, Prof. Arvin D. Campomanes of
UP Manila, Prof. Jan Carlo Punongbayan of UP Diliman, Susan Macabuag of Bantayog
ng mga Bayani, Prof. Roland Simbulan of UP Manila, Prof. Arthur Boquiren of UP
Baguio, Former DSWD Secretary, Prof Judy Taguiwalo of UP Diliman, Erika Jean
Ente of NAPC, Prof. Ferdinand Veridiano of Philippine Science High School –
CAR, Jose Enrique Africa of IBON Foundation, and Prof. Bernadette Neri of UP
Diliman.
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