Is education TV Obsolete? Claudio de Moura Castro

Transcription

1 Is education TV Obsolete? Claudio de Moura Castro

2 Choice of technology Newest technology = Best technologies? Best for rich countries = best for others? Computers vs. Television? For whom? Is television a better choice for poorer countries?

3 From technology to education Early development of TV and computers rich countries had all students in decent schools Most efforts were to improve already good schools Computers overwhlelmed TV Sophisticated uses, requiring sophisticated teachers

4 Economics of teaching with machiness Variable costs higher: 1 h classroom 1h preparation 1 h classroom 5 h written materials 1 h interactive CD 300 hours preparation Technology requires more students to justify With many thousand students, TV is cheaper than computers Telecurso: 30 million US$ 3 UD$ per student

5 Image technologies less reading skills required E-learning = reading via internet For long courses, requires 10 years of schooling, at least elitist, for the few Television can reach millions, visual language is familiar to all

6 Pilot projects work fine, but Computers show beautiful results in small experiments But when scaled up, results are mediocre School culture conflicts with the optimal uses of computers

7 Why technology? In wealthy countries to enhance an already good education Students from developing countries tend to continue the research of their advisors Sad result: attempts to adopt expensive solutions that require sophisticated teachers Logo, research, constructivist solutions

8 Developing countries have different problems Technology to compensate bad quality, poor training of teachers and inadequate coverage Easy to use software is out of fashion Very modest results of computers Contrast with effective use of TV

9 Why not TV? Rich countries: narrow out of school clientele does not justify expensive production what is done is cheap Success in pre-school and edutainment Developing countries: two are big, have lots of out-of-school youth and have export-quality TV Brazil and Mexico Outstanding results, best in the world, inexpensive (= cheap education)

10 Telesecundaria Live TV (junior high school level) Most are in rural areas Schools have parabolic dishes Over one million students Lively image, clear, delivers content Very good books After 20 of TV, another 45 with local instructor

11 Telesecundaria Instructors have higher education, but not necessarily teacher certificates Good academic results, cheaper than regular education Different bureaucracy, does not mix Being exported to Central America, with support of IDB

12 Telecurso 2000 Suceeded in 95 a previous version, already 19 years old, new version coming Produced and funded by private sector Globo (via Roberto Marinho Foundation) Federation of industry of São Paulo (30 M US$) Broadcast by Globo and Ed Channels (no use of live TV) Prepares students to take equivalence examinations (= GED in US)

13 Telecurso 2000 After 15 tape, instructor takes over Initially to give junior and high school level education to working adults in factories Progressively migrated to NGOs, churches and a broad clientele Then migrated to regular schools, at the initiative of states Presently enrolls one million, graduated over five million

14 Telecurso 2000 Live and entertaining, clips and soap opera style Emphasis on basic skills and contextualization Over five million watch on TV, with no intention to take the examination

15 Open Universities: e-learning or TV? Brazil missed OU appeal, when it finally got interested e-learning was the rage Many attempts to use it, with moderate success What worked was a combination of: Live TV, via satellite or Internet High performance teacher Paper reading materials LMS platform for interaction Organized classrooms, with or without instructor Possibility of face to face inaugural lecture

16 New developments Aprender a Empreender New program 1-4 th grade, entirely on a soap opera format Program in secondary math including teacher training Ministry of Education has teacher training programs and tapes to enrich classes Many other initiatives along the same lines