The Constant in Education

Winie Z. Alicante

It has been proven by several researches that the single most important factor in the teaching and learning process is the teacher. The teacher significantly affect the learning progress of the students.

Related to the role of the teacher in the educative process is Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development or ZPD. It is the distance between a learner’s actual development level and the learner’s level of potential development. What transcends the learners from their actual development as identified by independent problem solving to their level of potential development is the guidance of more capable peers. The role of guiding the learners to achieve their full potential, or their “level of potential development” as Vygotsky termed it, is definitely played by the teachers. Learning naturally takes place from what is known to what is unknown. Similarly, it starts from guided practice and supervision by a capable adult such as a teacher to independent practice by the learner.

The very essence of teaching and learning is the role played by the teacher. This is why the teacher is the most significant factor in learning. Therefore, learning is greatly dependent on the capacity of the teacher to perform the role. The teacher’s capacity to teach is not the issue in the new normal; but the presence or absence of teaching itself in some of the learning modalities undertaken in this time of pandemic. Online modalities may be criticized to be less efficient and effective than actual classroom instructions; but, the modular option of learning which requires the learner to understand the module and accomplish the learning tasks with minimal or no supervision at all from the teacher may even be worse.

To tackle this issue, the self-learning module or SLM as the name implies is especially designed for independent learning. Moreover, realizing the drawbacks of such modality, some teachers provide online instruction and assistance to learners in their own volition to augment the assistance provided domestically by capable family members.

Both research and personal experiences in the field of education recognize the importance of academic instruction as a means of guided practice to bring about learning. Imperatively, academic interaction between learners and teachers is an inevitable part of effective learning. This does not change, not even in this time of global crisis.

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The author is Secondary School Teacher III at Pulung Santol National High

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