On Teaching with ICT

By Jamal Elabiad

Recently, I was a member of a committee whose job was testing the competence of two novice teachers of English. The committee consisted of the supervisor and two teachers, myself included. This is the first time I have been selected for this duty.

Soon after receiving the invite from the delegation of the ministry of education, I started gathering information on how to judge whether a teacher is competent or not. My sources were Mr. Google and some English language teaching ( ELT) books I xeroxed when I was a teacher trainee at Meknes pedagogic center.

The topic that took the lion’s share of my preparation time was the circumstances under which teachers can deliver a lesson employing information and communications technology (ICT), for a slew of teachers, to my knowledge, made use of ICT only on the day of the competence test, or when they were asked by their supervisors to present a lesson in the presence of their colleagues. By the way, ICT includes virtually any device that can access, present, manipulate and communicate words, sounds and images to enable us to create meaning.

Before going into details, it’s noteworthy that ICT is not a top priority yet for those in charge of the Moroccan education system due to the fact that the bulk of Moroccan schools are deprived of Informatics teachers though they were provided with the necessary equipment such as computers. To solve the problem, some teachers at the school where I teach volunteer from time to time to teach students the ABC of Informatics.

After reading a number of articles, I came to the conclusion that ICT is a form of going beyond the textbook ( GBT). In other words, teachers can produce their own materials if their objectives will not be achieved using the textbook materials, or if they want to teach their students things the textbook doesn’t cover.

Accidentally, one of the teachers utilised an overhead projection device and a laptop to present a vocabulary lesson. Frankly, the teacher managed to meet his objectives. And self-confidence, American-like pronunciation, and the use of humour and praises are among the things I liked most about the teacher.

One of the questions I asked the teacher during discussion of the lesson was what was your rationale behind teaching with ICT? The reason the teacher gave was unconvincing and had nothing to do with GBT.

Had I been the teacher, I would have simply used the textbook materials, for the latter are similar to the ones prepared by the teacher.

I wish the teacher we tested is not among the teachers who think ICT is only for taking competence tests or giving demo lessons!

On Gagging Independent Journalists

By Jamal Elabiad

The attacks independent journalists in Morocco have recently been exposed to grabbed the headlines in many widely-read newspapers, including Le Monde, El Pais, Al-Quds Al- Arabi, and The New York Times.

The attacks on independent journalists in Morocco constitute a serious deterioration of press freedom is the common denominator between those headlines. That means imprisoning and fining unaffiliated journalists dealt another blow to the image of the North African monarchy around the world. The question that must be raised here is who lies behind the attacks against critical journalism in Morocco?

"We don't have anyone in particular whom we can address; we know that the judiciary is not independent, and is subject to certain instructions. This makes us question the source of these instructions. When things become unclear, the last resort we have is to speak to the king to let him know that there are parties that are dragging the country downward," the managing editor of the Arabic weekly Al Michaal, Idriss Chahtane said in an interview with Magharebia. Idriss Chahtane was lately sentenced to a year in jail for a report on the health of the king.

The parties Driss Chahatane hinted at are those whose interests and privileges will be in danger if the North African monarchy becomes a place of democracy, freedom of expression, human rights, and equality before the law.

They invariably use taboo subjects for Moroccan journalists as pretexts to serve and protect their interests. A slew of journalists, for instance, were sent to prison simply because their articles about the royal family were deliberately misinterpreted by those to whom independent journalists are a serious threat. More to the point, the judiciary is among the strategic sectors those “lobbies” manipulate in Morocco, and it’s the weapon whereby they force independent journalists to keep mum.

Never before has the publishing of an article or a book led to the overthrowing of a king or president. But, as far as some historical books is concerned, it was those who a president or king blindly trusted that staged coups against him. By this I mean those “ lobbies” pose a major threat not only to the image of Morocco through gagging independent journalism, but to the stability of the country as well!

“Although those invisible hands can pick all the flowers , they can’t stop the advance of spring,” said a Moroccan human right activist when asked to comment upon the recent attacks on Moroccan independent journalists.