Source: AsiaOne
DEFORESTATION in the Amazon rainforest, army fitness training - even gangsters - can all help prepare students for their examinations.Lesson ideas and activities based on newspaper articles about these subjects, among others, have been compiled in a handbook for secondary school teachers: Using Newspapers In Your Classroom.
The 36-page publication is the first of its kind produced by The Straits Times (ST), and features ready-to-use ideas covering 10 areas, including critical thinking and analysis, examination preparation, values education and multi-literacy.
It was created by the team which produces its weekly magazines for schools, with lesson activities developed by education consultant Sonia Sng. It will be distributed free to teachers whose schools subscribe to the broadsheet and secondary school publication IN.
Teachers who attended workshops and forums organised by ST had asked for ideas on how its content could be turned into puzzles, worksheets or debates.
Ms Bertha Henson, supervising editor of ST's schools publications, said: 'We thought we could put all the ideas together into a teacher's companion.
'This can be a template to use with either The Straits Times or IN to teach the English language and current affairs.'
Teachers who had a preview said the ideas kept in line with key areas of the curriculum and exam preparation. They said the ideas dispensed with a challenge they face: how to keep their resources current.
With little time between receiving the news and the start of lessons, teachers do not always have time to come up with activities, said Ms Poongkodi Jayabala Krishnan, 35, head of English and Literature at Pei Hua Secondary School.
One idea, to develop students' reading and listening skills by creating a podcast encyclopedia from newspaper articles, especially impressed her. 'I have never seen newspapers in that light,' she said.
Mr Abdulattif Abdullah, 42, who heads the English language department at Bukit Batok Secondary School, said the book 'puts in a very structured way all the possibilities and insights that we can get out of the papers'.
Mrs Sng, 38, a former teacher, hoped the book would expose people to the learning possibilities within 'the daily buffet that is the newspaper'.
Breaking and unfolding news stories, she adds, are 'a fresh supply of content every morning. It's a non-stop flow'.