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A Test On Self-reliance
There’s no better time to discuss this subject – self-reliance – than now that a health crisis is fiercely challenging the indomitability of the human spirit. As I emphasized in a previous essay, humans have always been the apex predator. Then came COVID-19. These microbes predate on us and suddenly we are made to play an unfamiliar role – that of the prey. Much to our chagrin, we have become the game of these microscopic parasites.
The coronavirus has put us to a battery of tests. We miserably flunked the first one – the test of preparedness. We were not ready when this deadly pestilence came. The statistics on infections and deaths clearly show that. Not that nobody saw this current pandemic happening. Many did but the alarms they sounded were either not loud enough or fell on deaf ears. We are now paying the price of our unpreparedness. We now have to bear the consequences of our complacency.
The next test is adaptation. COVID-19 is also testing our ability to adapt. This we cannot afford to fail. To adapt is the only option we have now, at least until we have both cure and vaccine against the deadly pathogen. If we won’t, we perish.
Surviving the pandemic is the goal of adaptation. It is a personal responsibility. Each individual has to make a choice – take all the necessary precautions or naively say “come what may.” There are people who chose not to follow science-based protocols set by the authorities to prevent possible infection. Should they get infected, they only have themselves to blame. God forbid that in their stubbornness and ignorance, other people, particularly their loved ones, would also suffer.
Surviving means not only avoiding getting infected but staying afloat in the dire conditions created by the onslaught of the deadly virus. It is not only a matter of steering away from the deadly path of this infectious disease but also coping to the situations that emerged from its trail of destruction.
Overcoming the difficulties and challenges we are now facing because of the pandemic require all forms of toughness – physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual (for those who, like me, believe in God). We may also need all the help we could get during these times.
But what if nobody would help? What if we only have ourselves to rely upon in order to survive? Can we shift our gear to self-reliance if we need to?
That’s the next test and perhaps the most crucial – the test on self-reliance.
When governments of affected countries had to implement extreme measures including declaring lockdowns, all socio-political and economic activities grinded to a halt. People were forced to stay at home and couldn’t go to work to earn a living. Many got worried, particularly the breadwinners, because they had mouths to feed and bills to pay. Lucky were the citizens of some countries who were given economic assistance by their governments. Some governments don’t have the capability to do the same. Luckier were those who live in very rich countries whose pockets are very deep. But were the dole outs provided by those holding the reins of government sufficient? Are the financial resources of even the wealthiest among nations unlimited that no matter how long it will take for the COVID-19 threats to dissipate they would be able to provide the needs of their people?
The next question we have to answer is – “Are we supposed to just rely on the relief package that our respective governments would provide?” Here’s another – “Are we going to put our fate and that of our families in the hands of other people when situations like the current health crisis occurs?”
What if the coffers of our governments run dry? What if the usually generous countries would decide not to send aids to other countries because they would want to prioritize the needs of their own citizens? What if the philanthropists and their charitable organizations have nothing more to give? What if we have no friends, relatives, and loved ones who would (and could) give us the assistance we need? What if we only have ourselves to rely upon because everyone else have their own problems and concerns?
Yes, when COVID-19 cases started to go down some countries lifted (or eased down) their quarantine measures, economic activities resumed, although in a limited scale only. But as soon as that happened, as soon as more people and more people ventured out of their houses and started moving to and fro for whatever reasons, statistics on infections and deaths started to surge again.
So, in light of the aforementioned, what should the governments of concerned countries be doing? Would they choose to preserve the lives of their citizens or resuscitate their dying economies? Should our leaders choose the former, we go back to square one. We go back to being confined in our homes and not capable of earning a living. We go back to relying solely on the support from our governments. That is, if they still have the resources to distribute to us. But what if they have nothing more to give?
It is our moral obligation to put ourselves in a position that when everything else fail, we can at least have ourselves to rely upon and that we have sufficient resources to draw from come rain or shine. We should be thankful if our government, our neighbors, our friends, or our relatives would offer help during difficult times but it is our duty as a person with dignity to work smart and hard enough to ensure that even without the help from anybody we (and those who rely on us) will survive.
We have all spring, summer, and fall to prepare for the winter. We should not spend the first three seasons just watching the buds in branches of trees become leaves until they become dry and shriveled then fall to the ground. Till the land. Sow the seeds of the kind of crop you want to reap. After the harvest, don’t eat everything. Save some for the winter. Make sure that you saved enough in your barn in case the winter gets longer than usual.
The Price of Unpreparedness
The coronavirus is still wreaking havoc and there are no signs it’s stopping soon. Humanity’s resilience is being tested to the hilt.
The deadly pathogen arrived swiftly and stealthily like the proverbial thief in the night stealing lives and ruining dreams. Like a powerful earthquake, the COVID-19 crisis struck violently and shook the foundations of our socio-political and economic institutions. If the shaking does not stop soon, the said institutions might collapse with us trapped under the rubbles.
The COVID-19 pandemic is an unfolding tragedy affecting the whole world. Pandemics, like other disasters and tragedies, natural or man-made, are inevitable. They happen when they happen. Some of them can be predicted by science, but some are hard (if not impossible) to predict.
Like an earthquake, a pandemic cannot be predicted. We know that both may occur but it is difficult (if not impossible) to predict when or where. All that humanity can do is to prepare in case they do happen. The question we should ask now is – Were we ready when the current health crisis broke out? Unfortunately we were not! The coronavirus caught the world with its pants down.
We were sufficiently warned by scientists and epidemiologists. Papers were published and books were written about the possibility of a pandemic as deadly as the coronavirus occurring. The Swine Flu, Ebola, MERS, and SARS, all happening during the first 20 years of the 21st century were telltale signs that outbreaks of infectious and deadly diseases are happening more frequently. They were all ignored and humanity is now paying the price for not heeding the warnings.
It wasn’t information we lacked but something very basic for surviving calamities (or at least lessen their damage) – preparation.
For earthquakes, we usually conduct earthquake drills to at least learn what we should do should an unpredictable earthquake occurs. What about with pandemics? What preparations did countries put in place for infectious and deadly diseases? With the way the coronavirus events unfolded in different parts of the world, it is accurate to say that not a semblance of preparation was made… except probably in South Korea.
Experts explained that South Korea’s efficient response to the coronavirus crisis was informed by their experiences and the data they gathered from the country’s MERS outbreak in 2015. The National Geographic reported that in the immediate aftermath of the outbreak aforementioned, the country’s lawmakers laid out the legal foundation for a comprehensive strategy for contact tracing. This is crucial in containing the virus and in preventing further spread. They amended an existing law that gave their health authorities the power to collect private data from both confirmed and suspected patients even without warrant. They also built up their diagnostic testing capabilities.
The South Koreans were, somehow, prepared. They had a plan should another MERS occur. Probably, the rest of the world had none. The South Koreans and their leaders knew what to do while the rest of the world was clueless as to how to deal effectively with the pestilence.
The South Koreans learned their lessons from a previous disease outbreak (MERS). This time they were prepared. Conversely, the US and most European countries have seemingly forgotten about the 1918 Spanish flu. Perhaps because that was a century ago. They (and other countries) assumed that just like the Swine Flu, Ebola, MERS, and SARS, any other outbreaks could easily be put under control. They were all wrong. The coronavirus is a testament that “assumption is the mother of all f*** ups.”
Benjamin Franklin once said, “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.” The citizens and leaders of his country learned this the hard way. The US owns the dubious distinction of the country with the most COVID-19 cases and deaths.
The US and other wealthy European nations being rendered seemingly helpless by this deadly pestilence is an irony. The said countries are among the wealthiest in the world (with the US on top). They also have the most advance science and technology and the most number of Nobel Prize winners in Medicine and Chemistry. So, what happened?
The answer is simple – they were not ready for the onslaught of the coronavirus.
The deaths and sufferings we are witnessing in different parts of the world are the price we pay for our unpreparedness.
TEACHING DURING THE PANDEMIC: A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE
(A Personal Essay)
The COVID-19 pandemic is continuously rearranging socio-political and economic structures forcing us to tinker with our existing programs and practices. In order to adapt to the present realities which the virus forced down upon our throats, we are left with no choice but to either modify or completely reconfigure time-tested paradigms that have guided human affairs and activities in the past. Consequently, we are now witnessing a lot of changes in the different spheres of human life – social, political, economic, and what have you. More changes are forthcoming. These changes are inevitable and they are happening rapidly in the national, institutional, and personal levels.
Governments are restructuring in a hurry making all the necessary legislations in response to the ongoing pandemic. Both public and private organizations, from the biggest ones to the smallest, are rewriting their policies and guidelines. They are either amending existing protocols or creating new ones.
All of these changes have to be done because the socio-political and economic wheels have to continue turning. There are basic services and needs that ought to be delivered notwithstanding the COVID-19 situation. Education is among them.
Schools need to find a way to carry out their sacred oath – educate people, particularly the youth.
But we understand that students, academic and non-academic personnel, and school officials should not be rushed back to the campuses and unnecessarily expose them to possible infections. It is almost impossible to implement “social distancing” protocols in campuses where there are hundreds to thousands of students.
Schools in some countries (like South Korea) who are succeeding in flattening their COVID-19 curves have decided to resume academic operations. How are they doing it?
They are doing it online. There’s no other way.
The only platform which schools could use to deliver education to their studentry without putting them unnecessarily at risk is online. Online education is not a new platform. It has been existing for years now. The difference is that it used to be just an alternative done mostly on “one teacher-one student basis.” Now, it’s whole classes, with varying sizes, whose members one teacher should be teaching online all at the same time. It’s a mass online education.
This is the way that the university where I am currently teaching here in South Korea is doing it. The spring semester started on the 3rd week of March (online) and we were supposed to meet our students face-to-face starting the 1st week of April. But that was postponed to after two more weeks after the South Korean government pleaded to extend further the “social distancing” period. Eventually, our university officials deemed it necessary to postpone indefinitely the return of the students to the campus.
When I heard that we’ll be teaching online, I thought immediately that I will be playing a different ballgame the rules of which I am not quite familiar with. I am entering unchartered territory. I have never done a single minute of online teaching in the past. Of course I am using technology in the classroom and I am fond of trying whatever application is available to make my teaching better and appealing to my students who are all digital natives. I also use applications that make my work as a teacher easier. But I never had the opportunity to teach online in the past. Finally, the time has come for me to experience it.
Then came the training day organized to prepare us to play what I called a new ballgame – “online teaching.”
For the first two weeks of the spring semester, we were instructed to prepare videos of our lectures and give our students assignments. We were told to upload the videos and assign the homework using the E-Class provisions of the university’s portal. I asked myself, “Is that it?” That’s how we would be engaging with our students and guide them in the process of learning? Create (and upload) the videos then mark/check assignments. Is that online teaching?
That sounded easy – just create a weekly learning video and give one homework and your work is done. Then you can laugh your way to the ATM during payday, to collect your HARD EARNED dough.
I am not saying that it’s easy to create video presentations. It entails hard work, specially to people like me who had no training in creating videos. But to think that the video we will be uploading to E-Class will replace all the functions we as teachers need to perform in the class is quite disconcerting. I am not saying too that marking/checking the assignments of the students would be easy. It’s just that I am not comfortable giving an assignment based on a particular topic that I did not actually discuss. It’s like evaluating without teaching. As far as I know. That’s not how education works.
At that time, I consoled myself with the thought that that arrangement would only be for two weeks. So, I thought of just exerting extra effort to make up for what I may not be able to discuss to them during the first two weeks.
Until I saw very clear writings on the wall that it may take more than two more weeks before the university would allow classes to be held in the classrooms. True enough, (as I previously mentioned) we were told that we have to carry out online teaching to at least two more weeks until eventually, the university advised us that on-campus classes are postponed indefinitely.
The very first day of (online) classes, I received a call from one of my students. The student asked – “Are we not going to have an online class through Cisco Webex?” It appeared to me that their Korean professors are meeting them online. Otherwise, that student wouldn’t be asking that question.
Aside from the E-Class, the university provides us with another platform to perform our duties as teachers and deliver learning to our students online. That is Cisco Webex, a platform for video conferencing and online meetings. The E-Class have been there long before the COVID-19 crisis happened although it was optional on our (the teachers) part to use it. In the past, I used it rarely to upload course materials and give my students reminders related to our course. Yes, rarely did I use it. The reason being – students check on the E-Class less than rarely. Now, the current situation will force them to do it regularly.
To ensure that my students get the necessary course materials and information, I had an alternative. I created a Kakao chatroom for each of my classes to serve as a conduit between me and them. They would less likely miss anything passed to them through Kakao. The Kakao chatroom for each of my classes is exclusively for members of the class and strictly for the course materials and information I need to pass to them. They could message me in the chatroom only for questions related to our course. I don’t allow them to use it for online socialization.
Now, let me go back to the present concern. As I already explained, the minimum requirement for us is to create weekly learning videos (and the corresponding assignments) based on the contents of the prescribed textbook. We need to cover the contents of a whole unit for the weekly videos we’re creating. Teachers are required to have these videos and assignments uploaded to the E-Class. Meeting our students through Cisco Webex is not mandatory. The university left it to the discretion of expat teachers, like me, whether or not to use it.
Let me go back to that call from my student. Before our conversation ended, I made up my mind. I told the student that starting the 2nd week (and if ever we won’t be allowed to meet in the classroom for a long time), we will regularly meet online.
I figured posting weekly videos and giving them assignments through E-Class is insufficient. I wasn’t comfortable with that arrangement. Thus, even if it is not mandatory, I felt obligated to meet my students online through Cisco Webex.
That night I started watching YouTube videos on how to conduct online classes/meetings using Cisco Webex. I was lucky too to have a friend and colleague who was more than willing to teach me everything he knows about the platform. Like me, he considered just posting videos and giving meaningless assignments a disservice to our students (and I think other expat teachers have realized this also and may have been using the Cisco Webex too). So, he taught me how to use it that night. A couple of hours with him was all I needed.
With the help of my friend-colleague, I invited my students to the Cisco Webex meetings I set. I didn’t wait for the 2nd week of the semester. The day after I made the promise, I started holding classes online.
I did not hide from my students the fact that that was my first time, not only to use the Cisco Webex platform, but to teach online as well. It was exciting but challenging. What carried me through the difficulties and jitters of doing an online class for the first time were my being a natural speaker and the fact that I presented the same things I have been discussing during first days of classes for many years now. So, notwithstanding the minor technical glitches, which I found ways of resolving, my very first online class was fun. There was an element of excitement because I was experiencing something new. Somehow, the monotony of doing the same things in the classroom during regular classes on campus for so many years was suddenly broken.
I requested another session with that same friend and colleague who helped me the previous night and described to him the problems I encountered in my first two online classes. He explained to me what I needed to know and gave me some more tips about using Cisco Webex making me more confident and better-equipped in the next online classes I held.
That brought me back on track. The decision to conduct online classes through Cisco Webex erased the worry that I would be shortchanging my students had I chosen to just create videos of my lectures and upload them to E-Class and do nothing else.
Most of our credit courses are conversational English classes whose primary objective is to develop the speaking skills of our students. Yes, of the four macro language skills, the focal point is speaking. How do we hope to achieve that objective if we would only be providing the students with weekly videos that we assume (with our fingers crossed) that they would watch from beginning to end and try to learn from them? How would the teachers help the students develop that confidence to speak when there’s nobody with them when watching those videos? There would be no interaction at all between students and teachers and between students themselves. With online classes, minimal it may be, there is interaction. I discovered that. I could ask questions and call on specific students to answer. I could make them talk. The speaking activities provided in the book could be carried out. Students who want to earn participation points could actively participate. And with me explaining to them how important is their participation in getting the highest grade they want, I was able to make my online classes a two-way communication channel, and not me delivering a monologue just parroting the contents of the textbook from beginning up to the end of the online class.
Yes, teachers could create the best video presentations but what’s the guarantee that the students would intently watch them from beginning to end and perform the corresponding activities they are being directed to perform. They could play the video in the confines of their bedrooms, leave that room after starting the video to do something else somewhere, then comeback when time expires so the E-Class would give them credit for attendance for watching the video. They could also opt to sleep or watch TV while waiting for the video to finish. The E-Class system is not programmed to detect whether or not the students are in front of the laptop (or any other devices) they are using in the entire duration that the video is being played.
There’s one big challenge teachers face with online teaching – the marking/grading of assignments, quizzes, and tests. How could it be done in a timely and efficient manner?
Actually, the E-Class has functions to cater to the submission of assignments and other graded course requirements and the corresponding marking/grading of the same. I tried to check one of the assignments of my students during the first week of (online) classes. Going through the many steps to open, mark/check, and grade each assignment took very long. With me handling more than 140 students and if each of them, in a particular week, will have an assignment or two, checking them would be time-consuming. It would be better and easier if the students write their assignments using MS Word. The MA Word has the “Insert-Comment” function which can be used conveniently for marking/checking the assignments and other requirements.
So, I asked my students to use MS WORD only when answering their assignments – no HWP, no PDF.
After that, I asked the students to send their assignments to me through email instead of directly answering them in the assignment section of the E-Class. That proved to be a nightmare too. During the first week, my G-mail account was flooded with emails from students and I found it very difficult to organize the assignments of my students and sort them per class.
Then I recalled that my friend-colleague (yes, the same one who helped me learn to use Cisco Webex) sent to me some documents before through Google Drive. I called him and asked if it is possible to share with a person a Google Drive folder/subfolder and both of us (only) could access that folder/subfolder. The answer was yes… and my problem was solved.
I created a Google Drive folder for each of the classes assigned to me this (spring) semester then created individual subfolders for each member of the class. It was tedious but it is the best way I could organize the assignments (and other requirements) of my students. I had to require them to create Gmail accounts so creating (and accessing) the Google Drive folder would be easier. As a result, starting the second week of the semester, they were not sending their assignments to my email anymore. The flood of e-mails in my G-mail account subsided. All they need to do is to open their Google Drive folder and drag and drop to the subfolder we are sharing whatever I require them to submit.
If they want to know their scores and whatever feedback I had for them regarding their assignments, all they need to do is to open the subfolder (we are sharing) in their Google Drive folder. I realized then that I just created an electronic student portfolio.
In my (face-to-face) classes, I require students to maintain a portfolio. I asked them to submit to me a folder (South Korean students call it “file”), with their name, student number, and class code. In those folders, they keep the results of their quizzes, exercises, tests, and other graded activities. I keep in my office those folders and bring them to class when we meet so they could monitor their own performance. It enables them to track their own progress in the course. They can literally determine weekly how many of the 100 grade points they need for the course they already have because at the beginning of each semester I would give my students a grade checklist/guide and transmutation tables and teach them how to compute their own grades. So, I make sure that I mark/check whatever I require them to submit before our next meeting. If I also need to communicate something (related to our course) to specific students, I would insert notes in their individual folders.
With the Google Drive folder/subfolder, my portfolio system just turned digital.
Another reason I consider just posting videos of weekly lecture materials insufficient is this – the way our grading system is designed would require much more than just posting learning videos and giving assignments. Assessment is an integral part of the teaching-learning process. Aside from assignments, which is actually only one of the graded activities that teachers could give for the students to generate their participation points (which is 20% of their final score), there are other forms of assessment that must be done – quizzes (10% of their final score), midterm and final written tests (10%), midterm and final listening tests (10%), and midterm and final speaking tests (20%). That’s a total of 70% of the students’ final score. How would teachers who just uploaded videos of their lectures, and did not teach them, evaluate whether or not course objectives are met and then assess learning through those aforementioned quizzes and the long tests? Will they try to measure the effectiveness of their teaching by creating test items based on the assumption that their students watched their lecture and were responsible enough to understand? Would the results of the quizzes and tests be valid and reliable?
I, and those who have training in pedagogy, those who were really trained and groomed to become teachers and was not just plucked from certain geographical locations in the world to pose as teachers, know the answer to the questions raised in the two preceding paragraphs.
So, after hurdling the first two major obstacles – learning to hold online classes through Cisco Webex platform and marking/grading assignments and other requirements properly – I next tried to figure out how to give those quizzes and tests. Of course, online also. But the challenge is how to make the results of such quizzes and tests valid and reliable given the fact that it would be very easy for the students to open their notes while taking quizzes and tests because I am not there beside them to watch what they are doing.
Easy (but hard) – create test items that require comprehension and analysis. Avoid creating questions or test items whose answers they could easily give by simply glancing at their review guides. The quizzes and tests should prompt the students to apply what they learned and not simply write down in their answer sheets things they have memorized.
I initially thought of giving the quizzes and tests through the Survey Monkey, the online survey tool that I am using whenever I conduct online surveys for my research works. The tool (Survey Monkey) would do the checking and all I need to do is generate a summary report for the scores – the same things I did when I want to get the summary results of the surveys I conducted in the past. But during the 2nd week of classes I had an epiphany that I could actually give quizzes and tests through Cisco Webex but had to require them to immediately drag and drop their answer sheets to their Google Drive folder/subfolder to maintain the integrity of the testing. It’s a process simpler and more practical than what I thought doing through Survey Monkey.
I tried it. I gave my first quiz through Cisco Webex. Through the “shared screen” of the application’s environment, I opened the PowerPoint file that contains the items for my first quiz. I jokingly told myself then that it was something historical – it was my first quiz in the COVID-19 era. I gave them 10 minutes to finish the 10-item vocabulary quiz. That’s the same amount of time we give our students for their quizzes during regular classes. That’s a very long time for my “advance” students but just enough for the “not-so-advance” among them. For the dragging and dropping of the answer sheet to their Google Drive folder, I gave them an additional 3 minutes, although I know that the process of dragging and dropping files to a Google Drive folder could be done in a minute or less. It was a trial of sort, so I was a little bit generous with the time allotment. And yes… it was a success.
Then later on I discovered that things will be easier for me and lesser would be the possibility of cheating on the part of the students if I create my quizzes, tests and exercises using the Google Forms and the add on formLimiter. It saved me a lot of time in the checking/marking. What I consider as the drawback of using the Google Forms is that the students wouldn’t be able to see an actual test (quiz or exercise) paper. They wouldn’t be able to see again the actual questions/items together with their answers (and the corrections to the wrong answers they gave) the way they would be able to should I use the method I previously explained.
With all these experiences, I came to realize that online teaching is still teaching. It’s not some kind of a play that we are using to keep the students entertained while we are waiting for the COVID-19 crisis to dissipate. It should not be treated as a band-aid solution to the problem of not being able to meet the students face-to-face in the campus. We have no way of knowing how soon the pandemic would end. What if the current situation drags on not only for months but years?
It’s obvious that schools will now rely heavily on technology to carry out their sacred oath to educate. Schools need to adapt. They have no choice.
Governments who, in the past, were wise to have invested in improving the information technology capability, including Internet connectivity, of their country’s educational system, will have no problem meeting the demands of “mass online education.” Private schools owners who slowly built up the information technology infrastructure of their schools have just realized how wise was that decision.
If the schools need to adapt, the teachers could do no less. They have to learn to play the new ballgame called “online teaching.” The question is this: “How prepared are teachers to this sudden transition to online learning?”
The truth is, with or without COVID-19, the ability to use technology in the classroom – to apply all available technology resources to education – is something that teachers should have trained themselves to do long time ago. The use of technology has become an integral part of being a 21st century teacher. There’s no way out of it. Schools should have made it a basic requirement for teachers they hire. The ability to create, evaluate, and effectively utilize information, media, and technology are required 21st century skills. Teacher are expected to possess it.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced educational institutions to teach online – to rely heavily on information, media, and technology. What will now happen to teachers who are not adequately equipped for online teaching – who did not bother to acquire the necessary skills and know-how related to it when they had the chance?
M. A. D. L I G A Y A 