Teachers without computer or ICT skills have been challenged to pursue training privately to fit in the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC).
Prof Charles Ong’ondo, Director Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD), advised that teachers without basic computer skills should be proactive to pursue skills through the readily available online courses and avoid waiting until the government provides them through in-service courses.
The challenge by Professor Ong’ondo comes after it emerged that millions of tablets distributed to various schools remain idle because majority of teachers lack skills to use them to teach.
Education institutions across board, the KICD director said, need to fully adopt ICT-based teaching and learning to avoid being left behind.
While expressing surprise that some lecturers in some universities still use hard copy notes, Prof Ong’ondo warned that within the next five years, some universities will face what he termed as an ‘education tsunami’.
“Watch this space! Within the next five years, lecturers using notes will be swept by an educational tsunami once the CBC learners reach that level,” warned Prof Ong’ondo.
Universities lecturers, Prof Ong’ondo said, risk facing aggression or even being chased out of lecture halls in case they were found to be using paper notes.
Teachers from various parts of the country said that apart from lacking skills, they fear being surcharged in case the tablets got damaged.
“The tablets have remained in the stores because teachers had been intimidated by ministry authorities that in case the gadgets got damaged they would be surcharged,” said a teacher from Migori.
However, most teachers who had been reskilled on ICT, it has emerged, have been hesitant to pass the skills to colleagues as required by the government, majority quoting lack of time due to heavy workloads.
Ministry of information officials revealed that they had launched successful programmes to reskill and retool teachers in primary and secondary schools in ICT skills in the wake of widespread adoption of virtual learning, but gaps still exist.
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By Robert Nyagah
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