GNAT official urges GES to give classrooms a facelift

A top official of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) on Thursday tasked the Ghana Education Service (GES) to give classrooms a facelift to meet the standards of the contemporary times.

The Service should also provide all schools with computer rooms where children will play and learn from “the myriad of opportunities provided by Information and Communication Technology (ICT).

Mr John Nyoagbe, Deputy General Secretary of GNAT, responsible for Education and Professional Development, made the call at the close of a three-day ICT training workshop in Cape Coast for 38 basic school teachers in the Central Region.

He said, where necessary, classrooms should be provided with projectors for power point presentations adding that Ghana could not afford to lag behind in ICT.

The training workshop was jointly sponsored by GNAT and Dream Oval, a computer firm, to offer basic school teachers skills in ICT to enable them to teach the subject with ease.

Mr Nyoagbe said apart from the health problems associated with the use of white chalk, it was imperative that all teachers were given the requisite training in ICT for them to be better equipped to deliver adequately in the classrooms.

“Countries poorer than Ghana such as Togo, Benin and India have with the right political commitment provided for greater internet connectivity and more varied computer applications than we have done in this country,” he said.

Mr Nyoabge said the 21st century had ceased to present computer as a status symbol but a basic tool for education, entertainment, healthcare and media work among others and therefore the situation where teachers and schools lacked the requisite ICT tools should be a thing of the past.

Mr Ephraim Donkoh, an official of the GES in Cape Coast, said the lack of ICT equipment coupled with lack of ICT training among teachers, particularly in the rural areas, was disturbing but added that “we should not throw our hands in despair and leave things to fate”.

He said teachers should upgrade themselves and endeavour to teach children since the subject had been introduced at the basic level.

Mr Derrydean Dadzie, Chief Executive Officer of Dream Oval Company, said the training had equipped the participants with the core knowledge on the use of computers and urged them to take full advantage to further upgrade themselves.