Action Research Context and Rationale on The impact of the Integration of Digitization as a Supplementary Instructional Learning Materials in Addressing Not-Mastered Competency in Mathematics in the New Normal Context

More than 1.5 billion students and young learners globally are affected by school and university closures due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic. Schools have remained closed for weeks, and no one knows for certain when we will come out of the lockdowns, as the pandemic shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon. In the Philippines, the Covid-19 crisis has affected about 27 million learners, 1 million teachers and non-teaching staff, as well as the families of learners. The Department of Education (DepEd) recently announced that classes for the next school year would begin on Aug. 24, 2020, but there will be no physical return to school. DepEd is offering schools a menu of alternative learning methods that includes online learning and offline methods, such as take-home readings and activities (Jess Obana, 2020).

There are countless reasons why technology plays a key role to learning. With the use of technology, it would be easier for the teachers to provide their learners a meaningful education despite not having physical interaction. On account of the new way of learning by means of modules, researchers tend to develop digitized learning instructional materials that will be useful for both parents and pupils to understand comprehensively the topics given.

It is important to acknowledge that students are already interested and engaged in using technology, this creates many amazing opportunities for schools and teachers to benefit from integrating some forms of technology in the classroom and to make teaching and learning more effective (Pano Savvidis, 2020).

Due to the sudden shift from physical to modular or online learning, teachers are struggling on how to handle a class without face to face interaction, same as the learners and parents on how will they be able to learn at their own pace. Community are now forced to adopt digital applications. And so, Bilay Elementary School will also conform to this type of adjustments where there are 205 learners enrolled in pure modular as their learning modality based on the survey. During the conduct of Parent’s Orientation on school learning modality and other related concerns, parents made known their concerns particularly on how they will able to teach their children while at home specially those who are at the primary level and considering the educational background of the parents in writing, reading and understanding the concept of module. Parents asked for the digitization of instructional learning materials to serve as their aid in teaching their children at home. It is a challenge on the part of the teachers on how to address the said concern by giving comprehensive learnings to learners and yet promote quality education amidst pandemic.