Teledom smartens learning in Nigeria with Smart Classroom Technology

Smart Classroom

By Prince Osuagwu
The Nigerian education sector is set to receive a boost as one of Nigeria’s technology companies, Teledom International Limited, introduces Smart Classroom teaching system. The technology was exhibited at the recently concluded West African ICT conference, WAFICT Expo 2012 in Lagos Nigeria.
Chief Executive Officer, of the company, Dr. Emmanuel Ekuwem, described the technology as an to the teachers in thinking smart, teaching smart, creating smart and innovating smart. He said that for the students, it makes learning is smart, exciting and great fun.
The systems involves the networking of  students’ desktop or laptop systems in the class to the touch-screen sympodium which transfers whatever the teacher writes to an interactive whiteboard in front of the class. What the teacher writes is recorded centrally in the sympodium server as well as in each of the students’ desktop or laptop computers.
In the past couple of years, the education sector in Nigeria had been described as experiencing declining standards. Teachers have complained about the lack of basic infrastructure and conducive or enabling environment for effective teaching amongst other challenges.
However, experts have noted that an average Nigerian child, if exposed to the type of learning environment his counterparts in developed countries have access to else, would perform better that what obtains today. Apart from the incessant breaks in the school system due to industrial disputes between teachers and the government, the classrooms in an average Nigerian school lack modern equipment and teaching aids to make learning a pleasure and excitement.
Ekuwem maintains that with the introduction of the smart classroom, a large part of the challenges has been dealt with. He said; “With the smart classroom system, the teacher fully engages the students’ attention as the multi-media equipment bombards the students’ senses for higher stimulation”.
He continued; “It allows the teacher to produce and modify resources quickly and easily, permits real times access to internet-based information and resources and allows access to a wide range of information in different formats”.
 The technology enables easy revision through recorded lectures for date-and-time-specific playback on laptops, PCs, and DVD players. With the recorded class sessions for future playback, complacency on the part of teachers is eradicated, resulting in reasonable improvements in the method of teaching and quality of what is taught.
“Besides, the automation of the learning process which smart classroom brings makes the model teacher to keep teaching forever as the recorded materials can be relied upon even in the absence of the teacher”.