Teaching Technologies
Those working in the edtech will know there is a huge market in the USA. However, this may not always be the case. Growing economies such as India, China and Malaysia are ready to embrace the world of digital and this includes digital education. So what is happening with edtech in Asia?
This post involves their team visiting Hong Kong, Singapore and China and just shows the number of companies and conferences that have been set up to supply the current interests for edtech in Asia. It will be interesting to see if, as the economies of these countries grow, what will happen to the education market in reaction to this capital growth. With over 4.4 billion people, Asia will certainly have a need to educate but is there the technical and investment opportunities that have been seen in other parts of the world in favor of edtech? Maybe more traditional, papers based methods will be retained.
Most of the reviews on TopTenTeacher have been on resources and websites based on UK curriculum but it is interesting to see if the Asian equivalent differs. Is the model the same as the UK? Are there huge obvious differences? Is one better or another? What follows is a brief description of 3 edtech products in a first attempt to try and answer some of these questions.
‘Used in 1 in 3 primary schools in Singapore’
A bold and impressive statement, for this online maths resources which seems to mostly be providing worksheets for students to print off and complete off-line. Resources provided for primary 1 to 6 (Singapore curriculum) with great detail given into what will be included in each year group. Many topics seem to be similar to those students in the UK study at lower secondary level. By investigating more it is clear to see that if you subscribe, you get a lot more: Detailed video lessons, step by step solutions and what looks to be a good product if you are willing to pay for it. KooBits is fully aligned with the curriculum but only available to schools and not for individual users.