Grade 1 teachers’ training on MFAT
IT IS said that Kinder to Grade 3 is the foundation of basic education in the elementary level. Therefore, they need to be well-founded to have strong footing in terms of physical, communication skills, accurate knowledge, and as well as development as a whole well-being. In line with these, Benguet division office of the Department of Education with Department of Budget and Management allotted budget for a seminar entitled “Division Training of Grade 1 Teachers on the Multi-factored Assessment tool (MFAT)”. Five participants in each district attended the seminar including Buguias district.
This training aims to equip grade 1 teachers to use the MFAT tool, prepare the MFAT tool and utilize the tool result as bases of providing appropriate interventions. Multi-Factored Assessment Tool is a screening tool intended to gather learner’s strength, needs, and learning styles. It also covers the learner’s development characters that includes physical-motor, social-emotional, language and intellectual cognitive. The assessment result is use by the teacher for instructional planning and interventions. This will be done one-time assessment to grade 1 learners enrolled in a regular schools in July. It further identifies the advance and Learner’s with Special Educational Needs (LSENs).
In conducting the MFAT, teachers should be consistent in assessing to actually determine the needs of each pupil. Learners today have diverse background so Developmentally Appropriate Practice (DAP) is firmly carried out. This includes age-appropriate, individual appropriate and culturally appropriate. Development teaching desires that we approach children from where they are and not from what we think they ought to be. Teachers’ additional work because it consume 120 minutes per child not included in the regular class hours. But if the teacher does this with a heart, it helps the children and as well as their parents to develop the center of K to 12 curriculums really ready and potentially become competitive citizen. It benefits also the teacher to easily determine what instructions to create for the prosperity of teaching and learning process. Indeed, the saying “My Teacher, My Hero” will be true to the pupils if all teachers will do their job professionally.