2 June 2007
FutureSchools Will Develop Students Holistically
- We thank Mr Jason Chiam Chiah Sern (“Spare a thought for students from the low-income group”, Today, 28/5) and Mr Jeffrey Goh Kwee Meng (“The great outdoors a better tool than virtual possibilities”, Today, 28/5) for their views on the FutureSchools@Singapore initiative.
- As we prepare our students for the future, our education system needs to stay relevant and responsive to the rapid social, economic and technological changes in the new economy. The FutureSchools will lead the way in developing innovative teaching approaches that leverage on Information and Communications Technology (ICT) to enhance teaching and learning. The experiences of these schools will be shared with other schools and the successful practices can be adapted to enhance the learning of their students.
- The focus of FutureSchools is not on ICT use for its own sake, but on providing our teachers and students with the appropriate ICT-based environments and tools to bring about more engaged learning. The schools will also stay focused on the Ministry of Education (MOE)'s goal of providing students with holistic education. We agree with Mr Goh that the outdoors can provide rich learning experiences for students. The programmes of FutureSchools will provide students with many opportunities for learning outside the classroom, e.g. through Physical Education lessons, Co-Curricular Activities, camps and overseas exchange programmes.
- We appreciate Mr Chiam's concern about the needs of students from low income families and wish to assure him that MOE has in place various financial assistance schemes to help these needy students. We also work with the Infocomm Development Authority to help students from low-income families to acquire desktop computers or laptops through its NEU PC Plus Programme.
- We agree with Mr Chiam's view that teachers must be adequately equipped to use ICT for teaching. Teachers in our schools undergo continuous professional development throughout their career and are kept abreast with developments in ICT. They also go through specific training to acquire the necessary skills to employ ICT in their lessons. MOE will work closely with the FutureSchools to develop professional development programmes to enable their teachers to deliver their proposed FutureSchool programmes effectively.
Dr Koh Thiam Seng
Director, Educational Technology
Ministry of Education
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