Vodacom Business Nigeria wants Internet in classrooms

Vodacom Business Nigeria is projecting that classrooms in Nigeria would one day be run with Internet facilities, and will become a learning place.

According to Vodacom, today, assignments are completed online and uploaded through classroom portals. Posting of grades and results are al so done online.

It stressed that in the near future, group projects will be completed through collaborative software, and students will use cloud storage instead of flash drives or paper to store their work. Teachers, parents, students and administrators will communicate through social media platforms designed specifically for education or for a school. All this will be made possible through the power of the Internet.

Speaking at the Total School Support Exhibition (TOSSE) programme recently, Senior Manager, Product Portfolio, Vodacom Business Nigeria, Funke Atanda, said: “Teachers need to embrace the Internet and they need to be computer literate because laptops and other educational technology will eliminate the use of paper.

As the Internet and computers become more accessible and cheaper; instead of teachers copying hand-outs and exams to give to students, they will be pushed online to students.”

She added that the role of the teacher will change from instructor to guide, maintaining that the responsibility now lies with teachers to become tech savvy and ready for not only future classrooms but future learners.

According to Atanda, not only will the instructive methods change in classrooms of the future but the classroom layout will too. Students will sit side- by-side and not behind or in-front of each other; a more appropriate design for students to collaborate and not compete with each other. Classwork and assignments will also be based on shared efforts and not individual efforts, resulting in an environment where students will innovate, critique, challenge the status quo, code and invent new technologies that improve learning and living.

Vodacom Business Nigeria has been at the forefront of creating reliable and affordable connectivity solution for corporates and schools.