Teaching english through mobile phone: bridging teachers and students in distance learning

Abstract

Managing English classes in Bangladesh like many other developing countries is difficult because most of the classrooms are overcrowded. So many learners lag behind as their teachers cannot monitor their progress along with the competencies. To overcome this gap, the privileged groups of students take many other extra supports where as the learners from the underprivileged areas suffer a lot due to the scarcity of the supports outside the classroom. According to the recent report of education ministryon the result of the public exams,the students of rural areas are always far behind the students of urban area. Additional help or private coaching is one of the reasons which make this difference when quality English teacher is a dire need and teaching turns to commercial service rather than professional. Teaching English through mobile can be a supplementary method to first generation learners in remote area who are excluded from regular services of mainstream education. ‘mEducation’ is an intervention of BRAC and BRAC Institute of Languages( BIL) to address of this problem. This study reflects the voices of the beneficiaries and stakeholders of a project that aims to ensure the access and cater the services for inclusion of the outreach children and teachers which is almost free. This study also shows how mEducation includes the excluded community through a very simple feature phone with intellectual minds creating substantial learning network and knowledge transfer.