1,000 multimedia schools start journey today
The country's 1,000 multimedia schools will formally start a journey today, as Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is to inaugurate the teacher-led content development and technology based classrooms to bring about a change in the century-old traditional teacher centred learning system.
Talking to the teachers and students of four schools through video conference from the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), Sheikh Hasina will inaugurate multimedia classrooms at 500 secondary schools and 500 primary schools of the country.
Using the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model, the multimedia classrooms have been launched at 1,000 schools to support the education ministry's initiative to set up 20,500 multimedia classrooms by the end of the next year, officials said.
“The introduction of multimedia classrooms and teacher-led content development will bring about a radical change in teaching and learning”, said Nazrul Islam Khan, national project director of Support to Digital Bangladesh (A2I).
Textbooks can be explained in more friendly ways through pictures, animations, and videos in multimedia classrooms, using the information and communications technology (ICT), he said.
Multimedia teaching, which is unique among developing countries, is also having a major impact on teachers as well, he added.
Sources close to A2I of the PMO said that before going to formal inauguration, teachers had been provided extensive training for digital contents development, and accordingly they were applying the technique using the ICT to give lessons to students.
Over 5,000 trained teachers are now engaged in lead content development for multimedia classrooms of secondary schools across the country.
NI Khan said the training increased teacher's skills and facilitates the use of their creativity in preparing and delivering lessons. The initiative is also increasing their confidence level, he added.
“The multimedia classroom is a unique model to follow for its cost-effectiveness”, Senior Consultant of Support to Digital Bangladesh Programme Faruq Ahmed said.
There will be a change in the learning system if multimedia classrooms are established, he said, and each student could benefit from the laptop, projector and professionally-trained teachers.
UNDP financed Support to Digital Bangladesh (A2I), while Banglalink and Intel Corporation, a reputed multinational semiconductor chip maker company, are providing support to set up the multimedia classrooms.
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