As many as 7.6 million children can benefit from Knowledge Channel’s return on air. Image: Courtesy of the Knowledge Channel Foundation
MANILA, Philippines — The Knowledge Channel has offered the government ready-to-share video lessons to students, as the Philippines is set to shift to distance learning amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.
In a statement, Knowledge Channel Foundation Inc. (KFCI) director for operations Edric Calma said that the channel’s video lessons may reach 7.6 million students.
The Department of Education previously said that it has expected 28 million students to enroll for the upcoming school year 2020-2021.
“Knowledge Channel is prepared to work with the government. We have created and acquired more than a thousand video lessons, all based on the K-12 curriculum of the DepEdand and these are ready for use,” Calma said.
The KFCI official added that it has “developed into video format 50 percent of essential learning competencies (MELC) that DepEd requires to be taught for the school year, and that KCFI can easily develop the remaining 50 percent.”
“The most essential learning competencies are the minimum curriculum-prescribed skills that students must acquire,” he said.
He also stressed that under the “21st-century curriculum” of the education department, it is all about “understanding and creating designs, systems and processes, unlike in the past when students were just required to memorize.”
“Subjects like mathematics and the sciences involve an understanding of processes, and they need to be visually illustrated for kids to understand,” he said, adding “with this kind of curriculum, we need TV,” he explained.
In a Senate basic education committee hearing last June 25, Education Undersecretary Diosdado San Antonio said that only 40 percent of public school teachers nationwide had been trained for distance learning or online learning.
National Council for Children’s Television council member Alice Panares said that the government is faced with a “nearly impossible” task of training the country’s 900,000 teachers for the new method.
Classes are slated to open on August 24. 2020.
With this, Panares suggested that the Knowledge Channel might be tapped for the onset of the distance learning program.
“While the teachers are being trained, why not tap first the lessons of Knowledge Channel since it already has existing materials,” she said.
But the Knowledge Channel, which is owned by ABS-CBN, is currently off the air due to the cease and desist order by the National Telecommunications Commission.
It was previously available through SKYcable, SKYdirect, ABS-CBN TVplus, as well as other cable and direct to home satellite TV providers.
“We believe that learning must continue for all and that no child should be left behind,” KFCI president and executive director Rina Lopez Bautista appealed.
“We appeal to our lawmakers and the Filipino people to recognize ABS-CBN’s contributions to education and that ABS-CBN is granted a new franchise so that we can again reach the children no matter where they are in the Philippines. The Knowledge Channel Foundation continues, and will be working to continue to be in the service of Filipino children,” she added. [ac]