March 28, 2024

The Ifugao State University (IFSU) and the Department of Education-Ifugao are capacitating teacher-representatives of secondary public schools to create contextualized learning modules through the Ifugao Indigenous Knowledge Educators Training Program (IIKETP).
Contextualization of learning modules is one of DepEd’s thrusts of interfacing national competencies with those at the community level to maximize learning. This necessitates teachers to facilitate lessons that learners can relate easily by integrating local conditions and culture in the learning process.
Orientation among IFSU mentors and teacher-trainees was conducted last June 23 and 26. Succeeding trainings will be done on a flexible mode considering the risks of exposure to the Covid-19 virus.
IFSU lent them tablets for online learning while at home. Lectures and digitized learning were also stored in the gadgets for the teacher-trainees to study.
DepEd-Ifugao Indigenous Peoples Education coordinator Herminia L. Hoggang said contextualization of learning modules in basic education will provide opportunities for learners to study their community’s way of life. She said the outputs will be mainstreamed for teachers who share the same learners’ circumstances to maximize in their alternative delivery mode when classes resume.
IFSU’s Ifugao Rice Terraces as Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System Center Director Eulalie D. Dulnuan said learning indigenous knowledge systems is timely and adaptive of the current condition we are in.
“From the economic, cultural to its psychological impacts, indigenous knowledge systems can give us other perspectives on how to deal with the impacts of the Covid-19. Integrating this time-tested community knowledge and systems in the basic education learning modules can make a difference,” Dulnuan said.
Resource persons from DepEd-Ifugao, in their lecture, cited the inculcation of linggop in the contextualization of learning modules. Linggop is an Ifugao word for mental wellness brought about by a feeling of contentment with oneself, and harmonious relationship with the community and the environment.
IFSU Vice President for Academic Affairs and one of the mentors Dr. Nancy Ann P. Gonzales encouraged the participants to deliver contextualized modules in different learning areas.
The IIKETP is an offshoot of the Center for Taiwan-Philippines Indigenous and Local Knowledge, and Sustainable Studies launched on July 12, 2019 at IFSU with the National Chengchi University of Taiwan, University of California Los Angeles, and the University of Hawaii at Manoa as project collaborators.
This year’s batch consists of 20 public school teachers in Ifugao. The first batch of trainees graduated on Feb. 6 and produced 14 learning modules. – Faith B. Napudo and Jude C. Baggo