"How to transform educational system to face next Covid crisis"
статья

"How to transform educational system to face next Covid crisis"

        We can only speculate about what may happen in the future and how we can respond appropriately and reasonably to a particular challenge. Faced with a situation of self-isolation, due to the threat of being infected with a dangerous infection, the educational system of our country solved the problem by means of process of distant learning.

        The educational system is quite flexible  by itself, and it has proven this, there are tools and resources that will help the system transform. However, there are circumstances that have nothing to do with education, but have a great impact on participants in the educational process. Forced distance learning, caused by a dangerous infection, required certain challenges and sacrifices from the teacher community. Problems in the organization of the educational process that arose due to self-isolation were not so easily solved, because they depended on the personal life situation of each student. The task of the school as an administrative place is to involve all students in the educational process, and the fact, that 2\3 of the number of students are present on-line classes, has revealed the problem of providing students with the necessary equipment. It becomes clear that there is a problem - to provide all students with equal opportunities and means to obtain a good education. This problem was solved by schools themselves, as the infection situation developed, distributing tablets and laptops to students in need. Thus, if parents cannot provide their children with necessary equipment the state must do it considering various ways; subsidy, laptop or something else.

        Every experienced and practicing teacher who really wants his students to master, develop and form, knows how, and by which means, to develop a strategy of student achievements. Everyone knows that the teaching profession implies constant self-education both in terms of subjects and in terms of mastering modern information technologies, which many teachers have demonstrated in order to avoid interruptions in the learning process, to establish contact with students as quickly as possible and help children cope with the current situation. As it turned out, our children mastered information technology only at the level of games, and for many of them there were obstacles in mastering the keyboard or sending homework to the teacher via email. This means that the curriculum of extracurricular activities should include a small course on basic computer literacy, teach how to use the keyboard and send e-mail. I will definitely organize such classes for my 6th graders. I will take on this work and responsibility, because I am interested in the education of my students, in the full sense of this word. It happens very often, the parents of such students themselves do not have sufficient computer skills and time to help.

        The pandemic forces educators, parents, and students to think critically, solve problems, be creative, communicate, collaborate, and be flexible. This period was favorable for children who were organized for training by their parents, as they managed to improve their overall educational results. However, in my practice, there were cases when a child, being a successful excellent student at school, could not organize his\her learning process at home without the severe control of their parents, who had to work during a period of self-isolation.  Thus, there is a need to prepare children psychologically for such challenges of life, when they must be responsible for their education themselves, send tasks on time, monitor the schedule and form of their classes, attend online lessons, behave with dignity in the Internet space. Confronting such seemingly simple tasks, the education system should act as a system of interaction between the state, teachers, parents and students.

        Therefore, the school day of a modern student can be divided into two parts - regular and extracurricular classes, where children would have the opportunity to consult specialists and develop practical skills in different areas of their educational life within the same educational institution.

 School teacher of English Yelena Tishechkova.