The need for technological deployment in teaching pedagogies in meeting the challenges of 21 century education was the thrust of the maiden international conference by the Lagos State University of Education (LASUED).
The three-day conference by the University’s College of Languages and Communication Arts Education (COLCAED), was entitled: ‘Language, Literature, Communication and Education in a Changing World: Innovations, Challenges and the Future’.
It was held at the Epe campus of the university, featuring participants from the academia who shared ideas and compared notes. At the conference, scholars all agreed that tertiary institutions particularly in Africa must acknowledge the significance of technology as an indispensable tool for effective learning.
The keynote speaker and a professor of Linguistics at University of Ibadan, Francis Egbokhare, noted that gone were those days when knowledge dissemination was strictly restricted to the classroom. He said that today, there are legions of online learners who only attend virtual classes from many institutions across the world, adding that one could hardly draw a line between such people and those who attend conventional institutions.
While praising COLCAED for the theme, Egbokhare said LASUED as a new institution, could leverage on this opportunity to unleash her great potential.
He said: ‘You (LASUED) need to invest in e-learning in order to broaden the scope of those that can take your courses.
In that way, people will not have to relocate on your campus to learn. And you can as well do micro credentially. What that means basically is that a lot of skill training that compels people to leave their jobs will no longer be there. Moreover, technology reduces training cost because it upscales the number of people who can participate. I enjoin you to operate a university without walls which simply means a tech-based institution. With this, you will have more students that will not only generate revenue (for LASUED), but also broaden the scope of the digital revolution that is taking place globally.’
Egbokhare said with open-source technology, many poorly funded public institutions in Nigeria and beyond may no longer have to bother as they can leverage open-source technology which takes away the financial cost that comes with acquiring technology tools.
‘There is open-source technology and open-source software which is meant for people to develop things freely and access high quality contents online that are in open-source format. Therefore the absence of funding is no longer a big excuse. So I’ll advise that you start with open-source and you can then begin to create your own proprietary materials. For instance, if you go to the Commonwealth of Learning platform, you will find millions of resources that you can not only use but also adapt. The second thing is AI (Artificial Intelligence). There are some free AI tools you can use to create the frames for developing your course materials,’ he added.
Meanwhile, the Guest Speaker Jane Setter, a Professor Phonetics at the University of Reading, United Kingdom who spoke on the topic: ‘English Pronunciation for a Global World’, said the importance of pronunciation could not be underestimated
In her virtual lecture, Setter said pronunciation contributes to success in other aspects such as speaking, listening, vocabulary learning and reading.
Setter argued that a learner could be intelligent, yet unable to retain a non-native speaker accent. She therefore advocated that a learner’s inability to retain a native speaker accent should not be a benchmark for appraising his or her intellectual level.
The Vice Chancellor of LASUED Prof Bidemi Bilkis Lafiaji-Okuneye, who was represented by the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Administration) Prof. Morudeen Adeniyi Shittu, stressed the university’s readiness to implement whatever resolutions that evolved from the conference.
He said: ‘Whatever the outcome of this conference, we are going to work towards its realisation. The management will work with the various presentations and I can assure you the communique arising from this conference shall be implemented to the letter.
‘If you look at other universities, they have faculty of Arts, and Humanities. But here in LASUED, Humanities is separate from the Languages. Here, we want to use language to connect to other aspects of knowledge, so we can collaborate and become one.’
Chairman Local Organising Committee of the conference Prof. Kikelomo Adeniyi said: ‘We observe that there has been deployment of technology in language, literature and communication. We therefore feel that as a teacher training institution, we need to keep people abreast of modern trends and ameliorate challenges associated with the use of these technologies.
Dean of COLCAED Prof Ojetunde Cecilia Folasade said teachers should be trained to use technology.
‘Besides, students should be better motivated to use these tools beyond social media. Students should also understand that technologies can help improve learning, as well as advancement in knowledge,’ she added.
A participant Dr Ganiu Bamgbose of the Lagos State University(LASU) noted that the fascinating thing about the conference is the different pedagogical interventions on how language, literature and communication can be better taught especially in the 21st century using technology.