I didn’t see any laptops, interactive whiteboards or Internet broadband access in the classrooms; I guess the most advanced piece of technology I saw in the classes I observed (not many, unfortunately…) was a good old CD-player. I saw a lot of chalk on blackboards and pictures taken from magazines pinned onto the blackboards. I also saw handwritten transparencies (what a shock!!).

When I was there it was late autumn. It was freezing cold outside (at least for my Portuguese standards). But inside the temperature was always nice and warm, so that everybody could relax and focus on learning on not on trying to keep warm, which is the problem in most schools in Portugal, even the ones with a heating system like the school where I worked for the last three years. Yes, there was a heating system. Yes, we all froze during lessons in winter. Yes, Portugal is not even a very cold country. But the limited budget the school struggled with forced the heating to be kept at a minimum…

And then, going back to my German experience, I saw highly motivated teachers and very interested pupils, who knew how to behave and were really interested in what was going on. I saw 12-year-old pupils who were studying at a level (the English language, which is what I teach) that our pupils only reach by the time they are 16 (and often with difficulty).

There was this one 7th grade class that was supposed to be a “bad” one, and they were still way above most 9th grade classes in Portugal in so many aspects. I saw the teacher struggling because he needed to ask the pupils to be quiet (and they immediately were). A recent study has estimated that the average Portuguese teacher spends 15 minutes of a 45 minute lesson keeping discipline…

So, are you still sure President Obama should be looking at Portugal? Do you know what has happened to many of those cheap laptops? They have been pawned or sold, because people need money for necessaries, like food, you know; or they are lying around useless because kids tend to misuse things, and when they get broken, the warranty does not cover misuse, and guess what, many parents have no money to have them fixed.

Although technology helps a lot, and it is a good thing, and as a teacher I not only recognize it but I try to have my pupils use the Internet to find things on their own and such, I don’t think this is the way to go when so many basics have been left unattended for such a long time… Don’t look to Portugal for a sollution. Look at what northern European countries have done long, long ago. Look at their cultures of work, effort and learning. Believe me, there’s a lot more to it than to laptops, interactive whiteboards or broadband Internet access… My school has just been equipped with all that, how amazing, but next winter, the heating system will remain the same, as I’m sure the limited budget will too.

The article’s author is right in acknowledging all the good work that has been made since Socrates took the helm of the Portuguese Caravel into the new undiscovered country of Education. The model of action was spot on, Portugal’s lead in the technological shock culture was needed to shake away the old and make room for the new, and as the article demonstrates by merging the necessity of Education with the natural appeal of discovery that children of all ages display.

Edutainment is a merging of truths. Its true that schools today are a boring example of life and its also true you need to know how to read Encyclopedia Britannica. These are both poles of truth, but one of them is the correct measure of health on a human being and the other is a symptom of something wrong in the way we do things. Peter Pan’s motto of “We never want to grow up” is perhaps right, maybe that reaction is a defense mechanism against the formating society will undoubtedly impose upon them and make them turn into mindless “I told you so”, negative and criticism, yada yada posters and twitter users alike.

Education must change. The existing model is failing in all fronts and must be refactored into the 21st century in order to promote a new sociological framework for all of us to life freely. Education is not a self contained vessel of dusty knowledge made by old beard man inside a room ready to be passed into the next generations. This reductionary vision is what lead to misguided activities within society that try to mine the efforts of governance. Socrates is under attack by those beard man and woman who are trapped in the never-ending cycles of self defeat. In fact, the very presence of these types of cultural currents in the present is a clear proof of the need to change the path of Education for the future to work, because the current examples of persons that mold our society today are forged out of the old system… and are not quite what they were supposed to be.

Its almost as we don’t know how to educate anymore, perhaps we never did. In many ways its astounding that we could create a country in these conditions, but we did. Portugal will always find a way to break away and move into the next step to the right way. Its our way.

As for the U.S., George Lucas’s Education Foundation Edutopia is one working example today of such efforts already underway, and it has some years behind it already, its a remarkable little experiment that is soon to expand into mainstream America. Its not they don’t have examples too. Its that their own governance also mired evolution. This is a chicken and the egg problem gone wrong, the crazy chicken that lays the crazy eggs but someday wakes up and decides to go sane.

Back to Portugal. We must shop the shame, we must stop the Fado of old. Today we can be a flag of truth to the world. We can sail away again into America and show them that the old country still has some tricks left.

We are back at seas.

Prepare you teachers before put Laptopts in the classrooms, otherwise they will be your next problem and the unmotivated ones, not the kids!

there are some examples in this website

http://www.ultimasreportagens.com

It´s name is Parque Escolar.