The Department of Education is monitoring and might withdraw self-learning modules depending on the gravity of errors.
Education Secretary Leonor Briones, during the “Handang Isip, Handa Bukas” virtual press briefing, said that the agency is currently monitoring the reported errors in the modules distributed to students for distance and blended learning this school year.
“Depending on the gravity (of the content), issuing errata might not be enough, we might withdraw these materials,” Briones said.
DepEd Undersecretary for Curriculum and Instruction Diosdado San Antonio said 41 errors have so far been found in modules – 27 locally developed errors; 11 from unknown sources; and three from Central Office (CO)-quality assured SLMs.
San Antonio said that errors reported and verified by DepEd range “from factual errors to grammar or syntax” – 20 factual errors; seven computational errors; two format (font or illustration) errors, four printing errors (color), sorting of pages, and spelling or punctuation; three typographical errors; and one error on grammar or syntax.
To eradicate SLM errors, San Antonio said that DepEd has launched various initiatives such as the “error watch” under Undersecretary for Administration Alain Pascua and the creation of a joint Central Office-Regional Office-Schools Division Office Technical Working Group (TWG) of SLM Conformance Reviewers.
“We will also engage third party expert SLM conformance reviewers which will be composed of academe and volunteers,” San Antonio said.
San Antonio said SLMs are reviewed for content (intellectual property rights compliance, learning competencies, instructional design and organization, instructional quality, assessment, and readability); language (coherence and clarity of thought, grammar and syntax, spelling and punctuation, and consistency in style); and design and layout (physical attributes, design and layout, typographical organization, and visuals).
DepEd Undersecretary and chief of staff Atty. Nepomuceno Malaluan assured that they are tightening the review of learning materials. “We are committed to immediately rectify them,” he added.
Malaluan urged the public to continuously report to DepEd errors found in the modules. “Reports will be easier to identify if there are markers because tracing is more complicated since the sources of errors are decentralized.”