November 2, 2020 – The Department of Education (DepEd) suggested measures to foster ‘academic ease’ and help teachers and learners who are still adapting to the distance learning set-up.

“The welfare of our teachers and learners remains to be our priority and we will ensure that School Year 2020-2021 will be bearable for all while still promoting effective learning engagement,” Secretary Leonor Magtolis Briones said.

In Memorandum OUCI-2020-307 released on October 30, 2020, Undersecretary for Curriculum and Instruction Diosdado San Antonio outlined ten highly-recommended measures to field units to ensure flexibility in teaching and learning. The policy was also in response to the request of teacher and student groups to ease the components of distance learning implementation.

“The measures suggested are expected to enable the learners and learning facilitators to navigate through the challenges of the new normal in the teaching and learning process and make necessary adjustment throughout the school year,” Undersecretary San Antonio noted.

Some of the measures recommended are the reconsideration of time allotment for the completion and submission of activities by the learners; and the expansion of mental health/socio-emotional well-being support to teachers, learners, and parents through group wellness sessions.

Teachers and learning support aides will also provide additional support to households that are experiencing difficulties in accomplishing Self-Learning Modules (SLMs) or Learning Activity Sheets (LAS) independently.

Schools are also advised to put a premium on instructional management tasks for teachers, such that they should not be burdened with printing and distributing modules.

In addition, schools can also determine activities contained in the first quarter SLMs or LAS that may be declared as optional. Additional enrichment activities in the SLM can be offered to fast learners.

For the succeeding quarters, learning tasks in the SLMs may be streamlined to ensure that activities sufficiently develop learning competencies leading to mastery.

“The need to adjust the assigned tasks for the learners is anchored on the fact that learners have long been disengaged from academic learning since the onset of the pandemic last March 2020,” Usec. San Antonio explained.

San Antonio also added that Regional and Schools Division Offices are authorized to implement other ‘academic ease’ measures appropriate for their respective contexts.

Meanwhile, external stakeholders and partners can also be tapped to provide materials, equipment, and mechanism to help in addressing challenges in the distance and home-based learning.

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