Printed textbooks in South Africa could soon be a thing of the past if Sunward Park High School is anything to go by.
This Gauteng school has made a full conversion from physical textbooks to an e-learning environment, leading the revolution into an easier teaching and a more efficient schooling system. It is most befitting that it is in the month that South Africa celebrates it’s Human Rights Day that those in attendance got to experience how 1 200 pupils, from Grade 8 to 12, use tablet computers for their learning.
The Basic Education Deputy Minister Enver Surty launched this revolutionary initiative in Boksburg on 18 March in partnership with Modern Information Business (MIB).
The required e-textbooks were made available as PDF downloads with support from Macmillan and Maskew Miller Longman, giving teachers and pupils the ability to log onto a massive portal that contains all the books on all the subjects in all the grades, as well as access to all materials they need.
Vivian Naidoo, with the intention of using information communication and technologies (ICT) in education to empower South African communities, started MIB 16 years ago. The company provides solutions to different sectors of the market, within both the private and public schools. MIB so far has managed to set up more than 500 maths, science and computer labs in Southern Africa and is working on another 600.
Zakhele Sibeko, a Sunward Park teacher, says that innovation of this kind is what pupils in this country need to be adequately prepared for further studies at tertiary level.
“It makes life easier for us as well as the pupils. All the information we need can be accessed easily from the educational portal provided” he says.
Sibeko adds that as teachers, their passion is to impart skills and knowledge to pupils. “Through these tablets, pupils now can explore different sources, download various information of the same content that has been taught in class, and even can explore more learning resources through the portal,” he says.
Faith Makgoba, a Sunward Park pupil, says that pupils could not be happier for the load that’s been taken off their shoulders – literally and figuratively. She says the launch of e-textbooks in the classroom has made the learning experience that much easier and more enjoyable, adding that the initiative also had relieved them from the heavy school bag they used to carry to school every day.
“We now can access previous question papers, which will help us with our exam preparations as well as general learning. We no longer are limited to the resources provided at the school since the tablets enable us to access all e-learning material from the portal,” the pupil concluded.
“Teachers need to embrace technology in teaching to make the ICT work. The Department of Basic Education already has digitised all our learning materials and this material is accessible from the Thutong portal to all pupils and teachers in schools,” says Surty.
