Dong Nai Department of Education and Training: Adapting quickly to COVID-19

​Dong Nai is one of the first localities in the country to review and teach new knowledge on TV after deciding to suspend students from school due to COVID-19 epidemic.

*First time teaching on television

Ms. Nguyen Thi Thuy, a teacher at Tam Phuoc 2 Primary School (Tam Phuoc Ward, Bien Hoa City) is one of the teachers invited to participate in the recording of student review sessions. Asked about her feelings, she shared: “Sitting teaching in front of many cameras facing is quite pressure and suspense. When the students watch on TV, the lesson only takes 45 minutes but to accomplish this, most teachers have to try very hard.”

Since the Department of Education and Training collaborated with Dong Nai Radio – Television to record and broadcast new study and review programs, Ms. Thuy has arranged 3 motorbike trips every week from Tam Phuoc Ward to the station to record the lessons. Ms. Thuy said that in order to have student review sessions, she had to discuss with many teachers in the Professional Council of the Department of Education and Training. After agreeing on the content and methodology, she began to compose and prepare additional presentation content for the computer illustration.

According to Ms. Thuy, when the students watch on television, the lesson only takes 45 minutes but it takes 70 minutes to complete the recording, because in addition to preparing all the content before going into the studio, the teacher also makeup to be more ‘photogenic’. They were told by the director that there is a lot to do when filming, in which the most difficult thing is how to maintain a natural appearance like in class.

As for Ms. Bui Thi Minh Giao, 9th grade Literature teacher at Nguyen Binh Khiem Secondary School (Thanh Binh Ward, Bien Hoa City) said: “Under the pressure of the director and the studio lighting, I always had to calm down to ensure the content of the lesson, while maintaining the natural expression as if I was giving lessons to students in class. Despite my long-term teaching experience, sometimes the director still requires some of the videos to be re-recorded”.

*More creativity in difficulty

With complicated movements of the Covid-19 epidemic, the Department of Education and Training decided to prioritize students in grades 9 and 12 to study new knowledge for the second term instead of just reviewing the first term knowledge as before. Mr. Tran Dinh Vinh, Head of Operation Department 1 (Department of Education and Training) said: “Students in grades 9 and 12 are at a very important time, in which students in grade 9 will have to complete the junior high school program to consider graduation and entrance exam into grade 10; While students in grade 12 also need to finish the program early to focus on reviewing the national high school graduation exam and college & university entrance exam in 2020. Therefore, teaching new knowledge on television is a timely and effective solution initially. If the latter just combines direct teaching combined with online teaching, it will be very good, helping students have more effective study skills.”

Due to the recording to serve students in the whole province to review and learn new knowledge on television, from February 17 to the present day, the two main studios of the radio are lit up, operating at full capacity from 7 pm to dusk. The Radio has mobilized the maximum manpower for the studios such as image director, film recorder, audio technology, computer, editor, etc. On average each studio needs about 6-8 people to handle different tasks and almost no breaks.

According to the Board of Directors of Dong Nai Radio and Television Station, it is a responsibility to join the province's education and training sector in teaching and learning through television as a responsibility, and the Radio also learned a lot of good experience in this new way of doing things.

Meanwhile, Tran Hung Dao Secondary School in Bien Hoa City, soon after realizing that many students had to be absent from school for a long time because of the Covid-19 epidemic, the school quickly implemented online teaching online with the support of VNPT. Most students participate in online learning online and teachers have invested in recording experiments and then uploaded them to YouTube for students to research. And by looking at the online materials that they have learned beforehand, teachers then will teach them more online, and ask them to do more assignments on the VNEDU system.

By Xuan Phong