School children throughout the country will receive national textbooks to enhance their learning in Mathematics and Science through assistance from the Japanese Government.
Yesterday, Tuesday March 01, the Ambassador to Japan, H.E Nobuyuki Watanabe handed over National Textbooks for Mathematics and Science and Tablet devices to the Department of Education.
Secretary for Education, Dr. Uke Kombra received the educational gifts on behalf of the Minister for Education, Jimmy Uguro, who was unable to attend.
The National Textbooks development project known as the Project for Improving the Quality of Mathematics and Science Education or QUIS-ME was launched in 2016, funded by the JICA and Japanese Government including technical assistance.
These digital textbooks will be used by schoolchildren from grades 3 to 6. Chief Advisor to the National Textbook Development project, Akinori Ito explains.
“The Department of Education introduced and implemented the Standards Based Curriculum in 2014, to improve the quality of education. In the National Education Plan, English, Mathematics and Science were designated as priority subjects, and the development of National Textbooks for Mathematics and Science was decided,” Mr Ito said.
In 2016, the QUIS-ME project by the Department of Education and JICA was launched.
“Eleven Japanese experts were assigned to support the development of the Textbooks and teacher’s manuals for Grade 3 to Grade 6. We have been working with excellent counterparts as Curriculum officers and textbook writers from the Curriculum Development Division.”
He said all textbook contents and lesson plans were trialed and validated through mock teaching with pilot teachers. The books were verified and the curriculum panel conducted a strict finalization process.
The results were high-quality national textbooks and teacher’s manuals were developed for PNG students and teachers.
The Textbooks and Teacher’s Manuals were completed in December 2019 and during the 2018 APEC meeting, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan, Mr Kono and then Minister for Trade and Foreign Affairs, Rimbink Pato signed the Exchange Notes for the project for the textbook printing and distribution.
Mr Ito said there are 1,840,000 books now available to each child and 80, 000 teachers’ manuals. The Three provinces selected for trial of the project to receive the Tablet devices and the National Text Books, are the National Capital District, Central and Manus.
NCD and Central will receive 400 tablets each and Manus to get 250 tablets. He said the provinces would decide which schools they would select for the trial run of the project.