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Families enjoy Goducate Academy’s Virtual Family Fun Day

Is it possible to do a family challenge without competitors seeing each other physically? Certainly, going by APIIS (Asia Pacific Institute of International Studies) Goducate Academy’s Family Fun Day held virtually on March 27.

Families were grouped into the following teams—Yellow Bees (Nursery Class), Blue Dolphins (Kindergarten Class), and the Red Tigers (Elementary Class).  Ten exciting challenges were given to each team, and distributed to the families within the team. Challenges included Egg Eating, Cookie Eating, Ball Catch, Tissue Relay, Tomato Relay, Coin Relay, Bottle Flipping, Longest I Love You, Paper Folding, and Cup Pyramid. If a team had fewer than 10 families, some of the families would take on more than one challenge.

Every family did the challenge according to the rules given. Families had been given sample videos of the challenge, so that they clearly understood what to do. Then each family recorded the video and submitted it, without cuts or any editing, to Goducate Academy. The team at Goducate Academy compiled the family challenge videos and edited them to see which family finished first.

A virtual cheering was also recorded by every family, and the videos of their cheers were compiled and made into one exciting cheering video.

On Family Fun Day everybody sat down, relaxed, and enjoyed watching the compilation of the creative videos they had submitted, and in which they were celebrities.

A virtual Family Fun Day is thus no different from a face-to-face one in that families can enjoy themselves and bond together whether they are taking part in an actual or a virtual Family Fun Day.

Our guest writer is Rebecca Depalubos, one of our Goducate staff.

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How APIIS Goducate Academy videos teach mothers and children

Filipino mothers in the 21st century are not the same as those in the 1800’s, who only stayed at home and took care of their children. Present-day mothers pursue a career as well as manage their household. Thus APIIS (Asia Pacific Institute of International Studies) Goducate Academy designed an education system for children that busy mothers can apply. For the Goducate Academy team, the system involves the production of quality and interesting videos that the mother can play any time of the day and let her child watch it while she is busy working.

Moreover, the videos stimulate of love of learning in the child. Student M, for example, who is in the Rev Up class (a nursery-level class) likes playing games on iPad and did not want to go to school. His mother has reported that since being enrolled in APIIS Goducate Academy, her son is showing some changes. The once unmotivated child now loves watching educational videos, enjoys tracing lines, and is always excited to join the online class.

Student S, whose family lives in Thailand, has also improved with the Rev Up class. Her mother reported that at the age of two, S could only utter two words: “mama” and “papa”. The doctor told them that if their daughter could not talk at the age of three, they must bring her to a speech pathologist. After S joined the Rev Up class at age 4, her mother noticed that she became excited and interested in her lessons. She even reminds her mother “I have class mom”. Rev Up lesson videos, such as mountain-climbing adventures, give S the opportunity to learn new songs and words. She can sing almost all the songs that she has been taught. When her mother wanted to enroll her in a school in Thailand, S refused to go because she likes her current Goducate Academy online class.

Another kind of video that the Goducate Academy produces is the Parent Guide Video, which directs parents on how to teach their children. It includes instructions on some specific tasks that the child has to accomplish for the week – for example, household chores such as sweeping the floor, washing plates, tidying the bed, and folding clothes. The video also teaches a mother how to train her child to be independent and responsible by doing things all by himself or herself, such as brushing teeth, combing hair, and changing clothes. The children enjoy learning these tasks from their mothers, so the learning sessions become a good bonding time for mother and child.

P’s mother tells us that the videos are easy to access and the Parent Guide Video reminds her what to do next for her son’s lesson whenever she becomes busy at work and forgets what tasks her son has to finish for the week. The Parent Guide Video shows the tasks that the parent has to accomplish in a week. The video explains in English every task that the parent needs do to from Day 1-Day 5 or Monday to Friday.

Another parent has testified that the learning materials are great, they are not stressful, and her child is happily watching the videos.

The APIIS Goducate Academy team is thus creating more interactive and engaging videos that would help millions of Filipino children whose mothers can help to give them the best education and life that they deserve.

*Our Guest writer is Rebecca Depalubos, a Goducate staff.

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Plans for expanding program of APIIS-Goducate Academy

APIIS(Asia-Pacific Institute of International Studies)-Goducate Academy has transitioned online and officially opened in August 2021 as one of the Philippines’ Department of Education’s accredited schools. All the Academy’s educational and training platforms have now been adapted virtually. This Academy evolved from Goducate’s Sabah program, which was started 12 years ago to provide education to stateless Filipino children in Sabah. Mothers in Sabah who had received some school education were taught how to home-school their children (see blog https://www.goducate.org/reaching-poor-unschooled-children-in-sabah/ dated  July 30, 2010) and had moved on to using technology to teach (see blog  https://www.goducate.org/goducate-sabah-uses-technology-to-train-mothers-to-teach/ dated July 31, 2020 and https://www.goducate.org/more-online-training-for-goducate-teachers-and-students-in-sabah/ dated March 5, 2021).

The Sabah program was introduced in the Philippines because the Covid-19 pandemic interrupted schooling. The two programs—namely, the Kindergarten program and the Rev Up tutorials—will continue until the end of the academic year in July 2022. Moving forward this year, we will collaborate with the parents to transition from a structured curriculum to a creative self-paced and learner-centered curriculum. Moreover, we will retain and innovate our Rev Up tutorials to supplement the needs of the Filipino learners in Mathematics and English.

As we look beyond the global pandemic and its disruptive effects on the educational system, we believe that studio video and audio productions, digital educational models and parent-assisted online distance-learning are the best way to go. With these in mind, we will be recruiting and forming a solid team of video editors, graphic designers and animators in order to produce the projected 240 videos for songs, main lessons and supplemental lessons. There is a need for upgrading and upskilling as we face the staggering demands of online education. Our target is to produce attractive, educational and engaging videos that will make a positive impact on every Filipino child’s learning journey.

For now, our Rev Up classes (Tutorial classes) aged 6-9 years old are getting more exciting as we hold weekly online classes for parents and provide them with videos and a checklist to guide them in the facilitation of their child’s learning. Parents can also access all the lesson materials, including our creative videos, on our Google Site. We also have Rev Up preparatory class for learners aged 3-4 years. The parents are grateful for this class since they are not able to find this kind of class in other schools. The lesson videos are very creative and exciting. Among the many fun-filled learning videos are letters of the alphabet being fished, numbers shown through bananas being picked, and colors of cars demonstrated in a riding adventure.

We firmly believe in partnering with parents to bring out the best in their children through the finest 21st century education, which is why we hold events such as STAR (Sharing, Thanksgiving, Appreciation and Rewarding) Sundays (see blog https://www.goducate.org/goducate-academy-starts-star-sundays/ dated Nov 26, 2021) as well as Virtual Home Visits. The backbone of this educational system is the relationship that APIIS-Goducate Academy has with the parents. A case that indicates the popularity of our program is that of a Filipino family in Thailand that has taken part in our Home Visitation program. The parents had planned to enroll their child in a Thai School, but the child insisted on studying in APIIS-Goducate Academy because she really loves our videos. The mother told us that the girl repeatedly sings her favorite line in the theme song—-that is, “we strive for excellence in Goducate Academy…”  Such enthusiasm encourages APIIS-Goducate Academy to strive to fulfill its dream of reaching millions of Filipino homes!

*Our guest writers are Iris Gwyn Abibiason and Pamela Kaye Dingal, APIIS-Goducate Academy teachers.