The officials also told us today that this symposium was organized out of a continuing, real-time assessment of the distance learning initiative. Here's what the representatives had to say about how the Ministry is attempting to adapt to whatever challenge the virtual learning environment may present:
Darlene Lozano - Education Officer, Belize District Education Center
"Belize like other countries, we're feeling our way. We're finding out what works. So, what has happened so far is that we had a survey previously. Remember, we had some online lessons and so forth. We gave newspaper activities, 2 weeks at a time. So, they had a survey, and we got feedback from teachers and parents, and students at the upper level as to some of those issues. Based on those issues, we're working on ironing it out. We're trying to relieve the problem. What happens is that district education centers, we support schools. We get concerns from parents. We get the concerns from teachers, and well as for our Belize district, we will be doing a survey and a focus group to find out some of the issues, and how best we can help. Based on that we will be doing some training for teachers in online learning, in preparing teaching modules, so that they can best help the students. So, instead of giving out maybe 25 pages of a worksheet, you would get a module with an explanation of the content, how long the child should work on the activity. The activity may not be a written activity and so, I also want to say at this time to parents, everything children don't need to write. They can count stones in the yard. They're still counting. They're still developing the skill. So, you don't have to cut out pictures, and have them count things around Count how many cups [are] in the basin to wash. So, we will be supporting through getting feedback from parents."
