Open online tutoring: deepen the active exploration of "double reduction"
Guo Jie (Principal of Beijing Huiwen Middle School)
The Beijing Municipal Education Commission recently released the "Beijing Middle School Teachers' Open Online Tutoring Plan (Trial)."
Starting from January 1 next year, the scope of implementation of open online tutoring for middle school teachers in Beijing will be extended to the whole city, and more than 330,000 junior high school students in 646 schools in the city will be able to receive online tutoring for free.
Online tutoring subjects include nine subjects including Chinese, mathematics, English, ethics and rule of law, physics, chemistry, biology, history, and geography. The tutoring time is 18:00-21:00 from Monday to Friday of each semester specified by the school calendar ( In principle, holidays, winter and summer vacations are not included).
After the implementation of the "double reduction" policy, online and offline off-campus subject training for students in the compulsory education stage was strictly prohibited. The education department and all sectors of society have strictly supervised the "double reduction" work, and the "double reduction" has initially achieved positive results.
In this context, Beijing’s open online tutoring program for middle school teachers has expanded the scope of implementation to provide free online subject tutoring for junior high school students in the city, which may make people feel that it is a kind of "extramural subject training" in disguise.
In this regard, the relevant person in charge of the Beijing Municipal Education Commission clearly stated that open online tutoring is not "online supplementary lessons", nor does it organize students to go online to carry out simple repetitive learning. It is a public resource that matches with the school's supply and provides personalized for junior high school students. , Differentiated characteristic classification coaching.
The reason why open online tutoring is not "out-of-school tutoring" in disguised form is that the plan did not start after the implementation of the "double reduction" policy and does not itself have the purpose of providing a "disguised form" of forbidden extra-school tutoring.
According to reports, the plan launched the first phase of the pilot in Tongzhou District in November 2016, and the second and third phases of pilots were launched in several other districts in March 2018 and October 2019. The first three phases of the pilot were generally effective. , Which promotes the balanced development of inter-regional education and becomes an integral part of basic public education services.
Now, the scope of implementation of the plan has been extended to the entire city, which coincides with the full implementation and integration of the "double reduction" policy, and it should become an active exploration to further deepen the "double reduction" policy.
The reason why open online tutoring is not "online make-up" is that the plan provides online tutoring for junior high school students. It is not a repetition or "supplement" of school teaching content, but is tailored to the specific situation of each student and matches the actual situation of the student. Personalized and differentiated counseling on demand.
The relevant person in charge of the Beijing Municipal Education Commission believes that after the implementation of the "double reduction" policy, 90% of students' Q&A and counseling needs can be resolved in the school. I hope that parents and students will view online counseling rationally and use the services provided by the platform scientifically when there is a need.
Open online tutoring responds to the individualized and differentiated tutoring needs of students, but it does not provide subject tutoring that "insufficient in class and extracurricular supplements" or "others have to make up, and I must make up", so it will not lead to new "education" "Anxiety" and "education involution".
The reason why open online tutoring is not a disguised "out-of-school subject tutoring" or a simple "online make-up lesson" is that the program is not only a personalized, differentiated and classified tutoring for junior high school students, but also a promotion of teacher improvement The "growth plan" of one's own quality and the level of education and teaching is an educational development plan that promotes teaching and learning, and enhances the effectiveness of basic public education services.
The implementation of an open online tutoring program gives students the autonomy to choose teachers and courses, and gives parents and society the right to supervise teachers' online tutoring, as well as the right to evaluate the effectiveness of the plan's implementation.
At the same time, education departments can monitor and evaluate teachers' teaching behavior, tutoring process, and quality through technical means such as big data analysis.
The above-mentioned aspects will only be considered as public education service government projects. If it is a variety of supplementary courses in the past, including extracurricular tutoring, it will not be particularly concerned.
In order to prevent open online tutoring from becoming “extra-school tutoring” and “online make-up lessons”, the plan not only clarified the functional positioning in terms of project nature, implementation principles, and development directions, but also clarified the implementation rules, technical control, and performance evaluation. specific measure.
For example, strictly control the time of online tutoring (only 18:00-21:00 per semester as stipulated in the school calendar) to prevent online tutoring from becoming holiday, winter and summer vacation make-up classes; strictly control the duration of a single tutoring for students ( No more than 30 minutes). If students rely too much on online tutoring or even indulge in online tutoring, the system will trigger an alarm.
Teachers obtain corresponding labor income through online tutoring, but the open online tutoring plan does not provide pure material incentives to prevent teachers from weakening the primary responsibility of classroom teaching in schools due to online tutoring.
During the implementation of the open online tutoring program, it is also necessary to prevent some deformation or alienation.
For example, schools and teachers should be prevented from deliberately guiding students to choose tutoring courses for certain time periods and certain subjects, or to choose tutoring courses for certain teachers, so that online tutoring becomes a de facto intensive extracurricular tutoring.
If this happens, it obviously violates the "double reduction" policy.
The education department shall use technical means such as big data analysis to timely monitor and contain the above-mentioned abnormal situations.
It can be expected that the open online tutoring program launched by Beijing will have a demonstrative driving effect in some other places.
Where financial conditions are good, the government can purchase services to provide students with free online tutoring services, while where financial conditions are poor, it is possible to transfer part or all of the cost of online tutoring services to the parents of students.
This situation must also be avoided.
Relevant localities should do what they can and do their best to increase investment in basic public education services in accordance with the law, and resolutely prevent the financial burden of parents from increasing the financial burden of parents in the deepening of the "double reduction" education reform.