Free education funds will buy kids' tablet PCs

Free education funds will buy kids' tablet PCs

Worawat says e-content won't replace textbooks

The Education Ministry will allocate 6 billion baht a year from the annual budget for free education to finance the Pheu Thai Party's "one tablet computer, one student" policy, says minister Worawat Ua-apinyakul.

Mr Worawat said the state budget supporting the free education scheme comes to 70 billion baht a year.
The government will use around 10% of the budget for the tablet computer allocation scheme.
Most of the funds reserved for the tablet PC project are usually used for free textbooks and free student uniforms, he said in an exclusive interview with the Bangkok Post.
"This will not affect students and the overall free education scheme because some textbooks will be replaced by e-content study via the allocated tablets while uniforms do not need to be changed [to new ones] every year," he said.
With that portion of the free education budget being used, there was no need to ask for more funds to get the tablet PC policy under way.
Mr Worawat said he wants to deliver the Android computer devices to all 10 million students from Pathom 1 (Grade 1) to Mathayom 6 (Grade 12) levels countrywide. Implementation will require around 20 billion baht.
Still, the tablets would be gradually introduced based on the readiness of content and infrastructure.
"And the tablets will be with the students when they pass to higher classes. For now, students will learn via 'the teacher tablets'," he said.
As for the internet infrastructure necessary to use the tablets, at first the Office of Higher Education Commission's (Ohec) Inter-University Network or Uninet will be shared with schools.
The content for study is the responsibility of the Ohec and the Office of Basic Education Commission (Obec).
"Without content development, the delivery of the tablets will not be implemented," he said.
"The tablets will not completely replace textbooks. They will act like calculators that help the students to calculate faster," he said.
But the tablet PCs will be not handed out to all schools at once. It depended on the readiness of schools, students, and teachers.
In another development, Mr Worawat said the Education Ministry's eight basic subjects for the Basic Education Curriculum would be revised based on the needs of different school areas.
The 2008 Basic Education Curriculum, under the Obec, was developed from the 2001 Basic Education Curriculum, consisting of eight basic subjects of Thai language, mathematics, science, health and physical education, art and music, career and technology, foreign languages, and social studies, religion and culture.
These were for teaching students from Pathom 1 Grade 1 to Mathayom 6.
"The core curriculum still consists of eight basic subjects but the content of each subject will be adjusted differently in accordance with the students in each area," said the minister.
Changing the content of the eight basic subjects was the responsibility of the Ohec and the Office of Vocational Education Commission (Ovec) working together with the Obec.
Across the country, there are around 184 universities and 600 vocational colleges which will look after schools in their provinces by helping design the school curriculum to be more in line with each school area.
Private universities would also be asked for assistance in designing the school curriculum.
The minister said that in the past, the curriculum for students from different levels of primary and secondary basic education, and university and vocational education were unrelated as each organisation designed its own curriculum.
"This time we need to work out how to organise the education curriculum to connect all students together and be in accordance with their areas," he said.
Under the new basic education curriculum, children will also be screened for their potential from the primary level before entering into each cluster of, for example, creativity, commerce and industry depending on the students' interests and talent before moving onto the secondary level.
"That idea would allow children to learn what they like in the hope of luring them back to class and learning again," he said.