Gatchalian: Removing of classroom decors ‘not meant to curtail teaching style’
Transcript
00:00 days prior to the school opening, of course,
00:02 Vice President and Education Secretary Sara Duterte
00:06 issued an order to remove the decorations in the classrooms.
00:11 She said she wants the students to focus on the teaching of the teacher.
00:17 Do you agree with her directive that we need to clear our classrooms
00:23 with these decorations, with these informational posters?
00:27 Do you agree with her?
00:29 Well, when I visit schools in, for example, in Valenzuela,
00:34 when I visit schools, I do see a lot of things inside the classrooms,
00:39 on the wall, outside of the classroom.
00:43 I find it quite messy, you know, because some of them
00:48 have been put there for a long time.
00:51 And normally I recommend to our principal, at least here in the principal's,
00:55 to make sure that our schools remain clean and neat
01:00 so that it's presentable to our parents and to our teachers.
01:04 So that concept, I do agree.
01:08 We need to make sure that our schools are clean all the time.
01:12 We need to make sure that our schools are neat all the time.
01:16 It's a presentation to our parents as well.
01:18 So I think that order, if I understand that correctly,
01:23 is to remind teachers to constantly make our schools presentable.
01:28 Clean, presentable, and of course, safe for our learners.
01:31 Okay.
01:32 But Senator, there's no study that shows
01:37 that these classrooms that don't have any informational materials
01:42 can help with the learnings of our students.
01:48 So do you think that we really need to put up
01:51 with the simple ABCD or even, especially for our primary schoolers,
01:57 do we really need to remove it?
02:00 But again, my understanding is to make our schools neat and presentable.
02:06 Okay.
02:07 Of course, if it's preschool, you will need ABCD, right?
02:11 ABCD, one, two, three.
02:12 If it's kindergarten, you will need ABC.
02:15 That's a common pedagogy being used by our teachers.
02:20 So my understanding of that directive is to clean
02:25 and to make our schools presentable.
02:28 That's my understanding.
02:31 It's not aimed to curtail the teaching style or the pedagogy of our teachers.