Teacher's Corner: Education Trends and Issues in the World Today

This month in the Teacher’s Corner, we will explore four educational approaches designed to

provide students more opportunities to apply, analyze, evaluate, and create in the classroom.

This week, learn how to incorporate the 21st Century Skills into the English language classroom.

Teaching is a dynamic profession. It changes year to year depending on the classes we teach

and the students we have. However, the world of education has remained largely the same for

the last one hundred years. Our classrooms are still teacher-centered. In the teacher-centered

classroom, the role of the teacher is to deliver information to students and test the students on

their ability to remember and understand that information. The students are passive learners

who understand and remember information, but do not analyze, apply, evaluate, or create

information.

Many educators are beginning to argue that this approach to teaching is now outdated. They

argue schools need to change to meet the increasingly technology-based and globalized world

in which our students will live and work in the future. This globalized world requires students

do more than understand and remember facts. It requires them to apply, analyze, evaluate, and

create new ideas and products.

Some educators argue that our current classroom approach only serves the most basic learning:

understanding and remembering. In Bloom’s Taxonomy, the skills ofunderstanding and

remembering are the foundation of learning. However, above these skills are the more active

forms of learning: applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating.

Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning: How do we assist students develop the top four skills? Photo

Credit: Artellia/Shutterstock  

It is these higher order skills that are shaping current educational trends. Educators are asking

how we can better integrate the higher order skills of Bloom’s Taxonomy into our classroom. 

This will better prepare our students for a world where information is everywhere, and what we

do with that information will decide our future success in our careers.

In this month’s Teacher’s Corner, we will explore four educational approaches that are working

toward a more complete use of Bloom’s Taxonomy in the classroom. These approaches are

designed to provide students more opportunities to apply, analyze, evaluate, and create in the

classroom. The educational trends we will explore are:

Trend 1 – 21st Century Skills

Trend 2 – Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)

Trend 3 – Digital Game Based Learning (DGBL)

Trend 4 – Makerspaces

The goal for each trend in this month’s Teacher’s Corner is to provide a basic overview of these

educational trends and provide resources to help you learn more, week-by-week. With this,
teachers will be able to discover the trend that best fits their classroom context and implement

these ideas over time. Each of these trends uses the iterative design approach. In iterative

design, changes are made, tested, and evaluated in the real world. As teachers, this means

trying out new ideas in class, seeing how well they worked, and then making changes to

improve our idea. The more improvements we make, the better the activity becomes. If we

want our students to be creative in the classroom, we must serve as an example, so check out

this month’s Teacher’s Corner for ideas on how to apply, analyze, evaluate, and create the

classroom of the future.

2.What are the current issues in education in the philippines?

Even before COVID-19 struck and caused problems for millions of families, the country’s

financial status is one of the top factors that add to the growing education issues in the

Philippines. Furthermore, more children, youth, and adults can’t get a leg up and are thus left

behind due to unfair access to learning.

Moving forward, such issues can lead to worse long-term effects. Now, we’ll delve deep into

the current status and how we can take part in social efforts to help fight these key concerns of

our country.

Crisis in Philippine Education: How is It Really?

Filipinos from rich households or living in cities and developed towns have more access to

private schools. In contrast, less favored groups are more bound to deal with lack of

classrooms, teachers, and means to sustain topnotch learning.

A 2018 study found that a sample number of 15-year-old Filipino students ranked last in

reading comprehension out of 79 countries. They also ranked 78th in science and math. One

key insight from this study is it implies those tested mostly came from public schools. Hence,

the crisis also lies in the fact that a lot of Filipinos can’t read or do simple math.

Indeed, it’s clear that there is a class divide between rich and poor students in the country.

Though this is the case, less developed states can focus on learning if it’s covered in their top

concerns. However, the Philippines doesn’t invest on topnotch learning as compared to its

neighbor countries. In fact, many public schools lack computers and other tools despite the

digital age. Further, a shortfall in the number of public school teachers is also one of the top

issues in the country due to their being among the lowest-paid state workers. Aside from that,

more than 3 million children, youth, and adults remain unenrolled since the school shutdown.

It goes without saying that having this constant crisis has its long-term effects. These include

mis- and disinformation, poor decision-making, and other social concerns.

The Education System in the Philippines

Due to COVID-19, education issues in the Philippines have increased and received new

challenges that worsened the current state of the country. With the sudden events brought

about by the health crisis, distance learning modes via the internet or TV broadcasts were
ordered. Further, a blended learning program was launched in October 2020, which involves

online classes, printouts, and lessons broadcast on TV and social platforms. Thus, the new

learning pathways rely on students and teachers having access to the internet.

This yet brings another issue in the current system. Millions of Filipinos don’t have access to

computers and other digital tools at home to make their blended learning worthwhile. Hence,

the value of tech in learning affects many students. Parents’ and guardians’ top concerns with

this are:

•Money for mobile load

•Lack of gadget

•Poor internet signal

•Students’ struggle to focus and learn online

•Parents’ lack of knowledge of their kids’ lessons

It’s key to note that equipped schools have more chances to use various ways to deal with the

new concerns for remote learning. This further shows the contrasts in resources and training

for both K-12 and tertiary level both for private and public schools.
One more thing that can happen is that schools may not be able to impart the most basic skills

needed. To add, the current status can affect how tertiary education aims to impart the respect

for and duty to knowledge and critical outlook. Before, teachers handled 40 to 60 students.

With the current online setup, the quality of learning can be compromised if the class reaches

70 to 80 students.

Data on Students that Have Missed School due to COVID-19

Of the world’s student population, 89% or 1.52 billion are the children and youth out of school

due to COVID-19 closures. In the Philippines, close to 4 million students were not able to enroll

for this school year, as per the DepEd. With this, the number of out-of-school youth (OSY)

continues to grow, making it a serious issue needing to be checked to avoid worse problems in

the long run.

List of Issues When it Comes to the Philippines’ Education System

For a brief rundown, let’s list the top education issues in the Philippines:

•Quality – The results of the 2014 National Achievement Test (NAT) and the National Career

Assessment Examination (NCAE) show that there had been a drop in the status of primary and

secondary education.

•Budget – The country remains to have one of the lowest budget allotments to learning among

ASEAN countries.Cost – There still is a big contrast in learning efforts across various social

groups due to the issue of money—having education as a status symbol.

•OSY – The growing rate of OSY becomes daunting due to the adverse effects of COVID-19.
•Mismatch – There is a large sum of people who are jobless or underpaid due to a large

mismatch between training and actual jobs.

•Social divide – There is no fair learning access in the country.

•Lack of resources – Large-scale shortfalls in classrooms, teachers, and other tools to sustain

sound learning also make up a big issue.

All these add to the big picture of the current system’s growing concerns. Being informed with

these is a great first step to know where we can come in and help in our own ways. Before we

talk about how you can take part in various efforts to help address these issues, let’s first talk

about what quality education is and how we can achieve it.

What Quality Education Means

Now, how do we really define this? For VVOB, it is one that provides all learners with what they

need to become economically productive that help lead them to holistic development and

sustainable lifestyles. Further, it leads to peaceful and democratic societies and strengthens

one’s well-being.

VVOB also lists its 6 dimensions:

√Equity

√Contextualization and Relevance

√Child-friendly Teaching and Learning

√Sustainability

√Balanced Approach

√Learning Outcomes

Aside from these, it’s also key to set our vision to reach such standards. Read on!

Vision for a Quality Education

Of course, any country would want to build and keep a standard vision for its learning system:

one that promotes cultural diversity; is free from bias; offers a safe space and respect for

human rights; and forms traits, skills, and talent among others.

With the country’s efforts to address the growing concerns, one key program that is set to

come out is the free required education from TESDA with efforts to focus on honing skills,

including technical and vocational ones. Also, OSY will be covered in the grants of the CHED.

Students must not take learning for granted. In times of crises and sudden changes, having

access to education should be valued. Aside from the fact that it is a main human right, it also

impacts the other human rights that we have. Besides, the UN says that when learning systems

break, having a sustained state will be far from happening.

How Childhope KalyEskwela Program Deals with Changes

The country rolled out its efforts to help respond to new and sudden changes in learning due to

the effects of COVID-19 measures. Here are some of the key ones we can note:

√Continuous learning – Since the future of a state lies on how good the learning system is, the

country’s vision for the youth is to adopt new learning paths despite the ongoing threat of

COVID-19.

√Action plans – These include boosting the use of special funds to help schools make modules,

worksheets, and study guides approved by the DepEd. Also, LGUs and schools can acquire

digital tools to help learners as needed.

Now, even with the global health crisis, Childhope Philippines remains true to its cause to help

street children:

√Mobile learning – The program provides topnotch access to street children to new learning

methods such as non-formal education.

√Access to tools – This is to give out sets of school supplies to help street kids attend and be

ready for their remote learning.

√Online learning sessions – These are about Skills for Life, Life Skill Life Goal Planning, Gender

Sensitivity, Teenage Pregnancy and Adolescent Reproductive Health.

You may also check out our other programs and projects to see how we help street children

fulfill their right to education. You can be a part of these efforts! Read on to know how.

Shed a Light of Hope for Street Children to Reach Their Dreams

Building a system that empowers the youth means helping them reach their full potential.

During these times, they need aid from those who can help uphold the rights of the less

privileged. These include kids in the streets and their right to attain quality education.

You may hold the power to change lives, one child at a time. Donate or volunteer, and help us

help street kids learn and reach their dreams and bring a sense of hope and change toward a

bright future. You may also contact us for more details. We’d love to hear from you! With our

aim to reach more people who can help, we’re also in social media! Check out our Facebook

page to see latest news on our projects in force.

3. What are some current trends in education? Cite 2 & explain.