Education is an essential aspect of the society and its people. In these times wherein the education system is in a great deal of challenge, the Department of Education (DepEd) is trying to find ways to address the needs of the students and teachers despite the pandemic. Within the limits of the situation imposed by the COVID -19 health emergency, the DepEd, together with other government agencies look for alternatives to the traditional face-to-face classes to be able to continue the teaching and learning process despite the current situation.
In this notion, the DepEd provided for different learning delivery modalities to be used for the School Year (SY) 2020 - 2021. This aims to cater the different needs of every learner which depends on the restrictions caused by COVID - 19. They can pursue the implementation of these learning modalities that schools can adopt for the continuity of education despite the pandemic. One of it is the Modular Distance Learning System (MDLS) which is designed in particular to the capability and context of each learner or per locality.
In facing the worldwide pandemic, it is a must to face new arenas in which learning can take place—online communities, Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs), Managed Learning Environments, and now the Modular Distance Learning (MDL) Distance Learning. It is a system that involves individualized instruction that allows learners to use self-learning modules (SLMs) in any form, it may be in print or digital, whichever of these two as long it is applicable to the needs of our learners. We can also use other learning materials and other resources, like books and published research that may help our learners. Due to the convergence and accessibility of technology, learners may access different resources in different technology that is provided or available in their household, like computers, tablets, and android phones. The teacher takes the responsibility of monitoring the progress of the learners. The learners may ask assistance from the teacher via e-mail, telephone, text message/instant messaging, etc. Where possible, but not required, the teacher may do home visitation to monitor the progress of the learners, wherein they may coordinate to the guardian or parent of our learners to check the progress of the learner. (Llego, 2020).
The new facets of learning try to cater the different conditions that the learners are about to face in studying during this trying times of pandemic. However, these learning modalities also face challenges in delivering quality education due to certain limitations considering the situation of the learners, their access to the given materials and modality, reading comprehension, their learning environment and even their study habits and student’s focus. It is undeniable that students in public schools are already dealing with difficult situations in tradition classroom and face to face set up that hinders their learning, that even with the teacher alongside it is still hard to grasps new concepts and context. With all of these, modular learning may lead to confinement of education that may affect the academic performance of the learners.