mentor training/ciet

ICT GURUS ARE AT WORK
Ratheesh Kaliyadan

It is a fantastic experience to be together to work for a cause. All of us are teacher trainers or teachers. We are from different parts of the nation. We assembled in a selected venue in our states. For example participants from Kerala assembled in the floor of State Council for Educational Research and Training, Thiruvananthapuram. Resource persons sat in a studio in New Delhi. Together we learned how to use Information Technology for class rooms. Thanks to the satellite facility to video conferencing, we met each other virtually and shared our experiences.

National Council for Educational Research and Training’s Central Institute of Educational Technology provided such an opportunity to learn in video conference mode. The method is not boring lectures. Hands own experience in using technology is the major attraction of the training programme.

Familiarizing various tools of online interaction by operating personally is the strategy adopted in the Mentor co-coordinators for ICT training. Through the training all participants are familiar with various interactive tools like teacher tube, face book, yahoo groups, blog, curriki, pbworks, wikispaces, googledocs etc. Almost all participants have accounts in these platforms now.

The next question is how to use and utilize the platforms. There we need a clear-cut vision. To whom we are working? What are the educational needs for them? How can I create and post materials for our teacher and learner community? These are the questions we have to face.

We are not entertaining practicing rote memory. Assess learner’s rote memory is not an agenda before us. We stand for analysis and application levels of knowledge. To assure it, educational content suitable for such an environment should be developed. It is the next step we have to go forward.

It is sure that Information Communication Technology will provide a different experience to a certain extent. At the same time ICT content should not rule the entire transaction process. At this juncture any ICT content can be considered as a tool to interact with the learners as we use text books and other materials. That is the message lay behind the teacher empowerment programme.