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Web makes learning easy for deaf students - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos
Lalain Darunday, 21, of Corella, Bohol, is hearing-impaired. When she was in Grade 5, she chose to drop out of school because she could not understand anything being taught in class. This was also the case from Grades 1 to 4 but her teachers kept passing her anyway.
Her ability to learn changed when a school for the hearing-impaired opened in Tagbilaran City many years ago. She happily returned to school and went back to Grade One.
Last March, she completed high school. And because months before graduation her school introduced Internet-based teaching methods, she is excited to go to college and take up Computer Technology.
Dioscora Ramos is a maverick educator. Her name means “God’s heart,” and that she has. After majoring in Math in both her BS and MA degrees in Secondary Education, she pursued masteral units in Special Education (Sped) at Cebu State College (now Cebu Normal University) while teaching at the first high school for the hearing-impaired in Cebu City, which she started.
Darunday’s and Ramos’ paths crossed at the Tagbilaran High School for the Hearing-Impaired. Darunday would travel 45 minutes each way every school day between her home in Corella (a 6th-class municipality known primarily as the home of the Philippine tarsier, the world’s smallest primate) and the Sped school in Tagbilaran. She really wanted to learn and Ramos had the passion and heart to teach her and others like her.
Visual teaching approach
Ramos’ approach to teaching the hearing-impaired had to be visual. For PE, she would dance in front of her students to demonstrate the types of dances. Teaching them first aid, she play-acted the part of an injured person, mastering the art of pretending to bang her head.
In November 2009, Ramos’ teaching method changed when she was selected by the Cebu-based Coalition for Better Education as one of the teachers who would undergo a six-day intensive training dubbed Global Filipino Teachers (GFT) under Globe Telecom.
GFT is a holistic training program that enables teachers to integrate information and communication technology (ICT) into their lesson plans and teaching strategies. It was launched on Sept. 25, 2009, under the Globe Bridging Communities (Globe BridgeCom) program, a corporate social responsibility (CSR) project started in 2002 to harness the power of broadband and mobile technologies in order to enhance public education.
“I liked the programs introduced to us in GFT,” Ramos said. “I’m trying my best now so that all my subjects use the Internet.” She cited the dances as an example. “My students now watch the dances through the Internet where before I used to be the one dancing in front of them.”
Vivid gestures
Darunday, for her part, used vivid gestures and sign language to affirm what her teacher said. With other mentors acting as interpreters, she signed: “For first aid we used to have to act out the things we had to do for a wound when the head was banged.” She motioned hitting her head and even grimaced to show pain. “Now we’re using the Internet, so now we can see the pictures,” she beamed.
Teaching using the Internet also gives Ramos some relief. “On my part, it’s lighter work,” she said.
“As for my students, they enjoy using the Internet. They discover things because they themselves open the websites. I give them topics, for example, addition of integers. I encourage them to go to other websites, then they could compare what they had researched and share this with each other.”
Online connection
Each student at Tagbilaran High School for the Hearing-Impaired has a Facebook account, according to Ramos. “They communicate with other students in other countries and their former schoolmates using the cam frog.”
The school’s alumni now include three scholars at De La Salle College of St. Benilde, and two who are in California and one in Australia. Being connected online has enabled them to keep in touch and continue learning from each other.
Darunday has now set higher goals for herself.
“I want to learn more about computers. There are many things to learn through the computer. I want to enroll in Computer Technology at Cebu Technological University,” she signed when asked what she wanted to do next.
Her teacher’s GFT training led Darunday to discover the wonders of computers and the Internet. She knows nothing can stop her anymore.
“With computers I understand,” she said.
Lalain Darunday, 21, of Corella, Bohol, is hearing-impaired. When she was in Grade 5, she chose to drop out of school because she could not understand anything being taught in class. This was also the case from Grades 1 to 4 but her teachers kept passing her anyway.
Her ability to learn changed when a school for the hearing-impaired opened in Tagbilaran City many years ago. She happily returned to school and went back to Grade One.
Last March, she completed high school. And because months before graduation her school introduced Internet-based teaching methods, she is excited to go to college and take up Computer Technology.
Dioscora Ramos is a maverick educator. Her name means “God’s heart,” and that she has. After majoring in Math in both her BS and MA degrees in Secondary Education, she pursued masteral units in Special Education (Sped) at Cebu State College (now Cebu Normal University) while teaching at the first high school for the hearing-impaired in Cebu City, which she started.
Darunday’s and Ramos’ paths crossed at the Tagbilaran High School for the Hearing-Impaired. Darunday would travel 45 minutes each way every school day between her home in Corella (a 6th-class municipality known primarily as the home of the Philippine tarsier, the world’s smallest primate) and the Sped school in Tagbilaran. She really wanted to learn and Ramos had the passion and heart to teach her and others like her.
Visual teaching approach
Ramos’ approach to teaching the hearing-impaired had to be visual. For PE, she would dance in front of her students to demonstrate the types of dances. Teaching them first aid, she play-acted the part of an injured person, mastering the art of pretending to bang her head.
In November 2009, Ramos’ teaching method changed when she was selected by the Cebu-based Coalition for Better Education as one of the teachers who would undergo a six-day intensive training dubbed Global Filipino Teachers (GFT) under Globe Telecom.
GFT is a holistic training program that enables teachers to integrate information and communication technology (ICT) into their lesson plans and teaching strategies. It was launched on Sept. 25, 2009, under the Globe Bridging Communities (Globe BridgeCom) program, a corporate social responsibility (CSR) project started in 2002 to harness the power of broadband and mobile technologies in order to enhance public education.
“I liked the programs introduced to us in GFT,” Ramos said. “I’m trying my best now so that all my subjects use the Internet.” She cited the dances as an example. “My students now watch the dances through the Internet where before I used to be the one dancing in front of them.”
Vivid gestures
Darunday, for her part, used vivid gestures and sign language to affirm what her teacher said. With other mentors acting as interpreters, she signed: “For first aid we used to have to act out the things we had to do for a wound when the head was banged.” She motioned hitting her head and even grimaced to show pain. “Now we’re using the Internet, so now we can see the pictures,” she beamed.
Teaching using the Internet also gives Ramos some relief. “On my part, it’s lighter work,” she said.
“As for my students, they enjoy using the Internet. They discover things because they themselves open the websites. I give them topics, for example, addition of integers. I encourage them to go to other websites, then they could compare what they had researched and share this with each other.”
Online connection
Each student at Tagbilaran High School for the Hearing-Impaired has a Facebook account, according to Ramos. “They communicate with other students in other countries and their former schoolmates using the cam frog.”
The school’s alumni now include three scholars at De La Salle College of St. Benilde, and two who are in California and one in Australia. Being connected online has enabled them to keep in touch and continue learning from each other.
Darunday has now set higher goals for herself.
“I want to learn more about computers. There are many things to learn through the computer. I want to enroll in Computer Technology at Cebu Technological University,” she signed when asked what she wanted to do next.
Her teacher’s GFT training led Darunday to discover the wonders of computers and the Internet. She knows nothing can stop her anymore.
“With computers I understand,” she said.
