More Religious Educators Take on Challenge of Social Media
From as far north as Laoag, Ilocos Norte and as far south as Tagum, Davao, twenty Religion teachers came to the Communication Foundation for Asia to attend the workshop on Social Media on February 3-5, 2010. This follows a similar workshop conducted by the CFA Training Team just two weeks earlier at the University of San Carlos in Cebu. This time, the three-day workshop was held at the CFA Computer Laboratory in Sta. Mesa.
Facilitated by Fr. Stephen Cuyos, MSC, the workshop was divided into three parts. The first day focused on the use of audio-video sharing to proclaim the Word by using internet resources such as YouTube and other sites that are more religious in content. Participants also tried hands-on exercises in creating visuals such as photo-stories and comics through the internet, which excited the participants as they had the chance to download and upload creative materials and create accounts for specific sites.
The second day took up the use of social networks such as Facebook, Friendster, Yahoo, Google and Multiply, which carries security risks but can be very effective and useful in connecting with more people and developing collaborative office and classroom sharing of online resources. The last activity in the afternoon was filled with laughter and fun as participants tried some online educational games with religious content. Mr. Leody Corpuz, from Ilagan, Isabela believed that this type of instructional media would elicit more productive classroom discussions, which he was eager to incorporate in his lectures on his return to the province.
The third day was an introduction to the use of Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) as an alternative to proprietary commercial software. The practicality and the efficiency of FOSS and the principles behind its conception were explained. The last afternoon was spent on a short tutorial on multimedia presentations using Impress, a free/open source software office application, which gave the teachers a chance to download backgrounds, videos, pictures and styles, to create their own presentation and upload them using slide-sharing sites.
During the three-day seminar workshop, the educators were able to explore the richness of web resources. They also learned about security risks and responsibility in using the internet. They discovered that these online resources and tools can enrich their catechetical instruction and elicit more active participation from their students. Some participants also mentioned the possibility of integrating projects and activities with other curricular subjects using social media.
At the closing session, Ms. Leticia Taberdo of the East Asian Pastoral Institute (EAPI) at Ateneo de Manila spoke on behalf of the participants, expressing her delight and gratitude for the opportunity to take part in the seminar. She believed that the real challenge of the seminar is not in clicking the mouse and learning new media resources online. She declared that the real challenge is to use this social media as a catechetical tool to impart values.
The seminar-workshop on Social Media is part of a training series for catechists and religious educators funded by the Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). The next workshop at CFA is set on June 1-4, 2010 and will be on Gospel Storytelling. In the next few months, other workshops will also be conducted in the provinces by CFA’s “Flying Team” of media trainers.
