eiMaths has a team of dedicated and passionate educators with over 10 years of experience in designing and delivering mathematics learning programs and materials. They believe that concept is better taught via discovery and constructive learning. Thus, they adopt an active learning style where students learn through the actual practising on their specially curated questions.
eiMaths’ curriculum follows a structured ‘spiral’ learning concept – progressing from shallow to in-depth, focusing on heuristics problem solving techniques by inspiring and building thinking skills. They also engage their students with age-appropriate and fun activities to boost their confidence in mathematics problem solving.
Challenges Before Digitalisation
eiMaths has gone through a steep learning curve on digitalisation. It was an absolute madness for them when they had to halt all physical classes during the pandemic as their main teaching material was hardcopy workbooks and they had no knowledge about technology.
To overcome the problems swiftly, they resorted to using basic tele-communication tools – recording videos with their mobile phone, uploading photos of completed work and communicating through WhatsApp. Shortly after, they included video-conferencing but these methods were not sustainable. It was difficult for them to guide their students effectively and posed a lot of inconvenience for all stakeholders.
It was this moment that they had a serious thought about digitalisation – to have their materials organised in a content library with the option to access them virtually at any time. They considered building an in-house platform but the cost proved to be unrealistic economically. Therefore, they chose to work with solution providers at just a fraction of the cost.
Extending Coverage with Hybrid Learning
eiMaths has a unique mode of lesson delivery where teachers are able to teach a class of mixed-age students from different levels. They provide personalised guidance to each student through their curated IP hardcopy workbooks that focus on Paper 2 challenging sums. They believe that it is more effective to coach in person due to the answer requirements.
This unique style of lesson delivery did not diminish with digitalisation. In fact, it has made eiMaths even more comprehensive. They now cover Paper 1 without over-extending their hardcopy workbooks by adopting a hybrid; to have their students practice on MCQ and short answer questions through the E-learning platform.
With their learning materials being digitised into module packages, students are able to access them remotely in drip-feed format. This fits in perfectly with eiMaths’ style of spiral learning where questions are attempted in a structured and progressive manner. A new module will only be unlocked when the prior has been completed.
And so, hybrid learning has become a permanent setup for eiMaths.
On a typical week, students will attend a physical lesson that teaches Paper 2 and self-practise on Paper 1 questions through the E-learning platform. Results are instant with the auto-marking feature and students are able to review the detailed solutions even in the absence of their teachers. If they face further difficulty, they can consult the teachers during their next physical lesson and this makes learning more productive.
Teachers may also access the E-learning platform at any time to monitor students’ progress, ensuring that they are on task and have not met with any problems.
Identify Learning Gaps
eiMaths takes great pride in their learning materials which are designed according to their unique presentation of modules and topics, the solutions and model drawings. They put in an immense effort to tag their digitised questions to various subcategories and difficulty levels in order for the performance report to be precise and highly accurate.
Data compiled from the students’ weekly practice provides an overview of their results, strengths and weaknesses. There are no general assumptions like before. With the detailed performance report, students have a better understanding of their own learning progress, while teachers can also provide extra guidance on the weaknesses to bridge learning gaps and help them attain a perfect score. Apart from individual reports, it also provides them with group analysis reports with overview of each level.
Overseas Business Opportunities
With their lesson materials digitised, eiMaths has the option to expand and reach out to overseas children who can make an online purchase of their module packages and learn about the renowned Singapore Math from a distance.
eiMaths’ overseas partners in the Middle East (Oman and Dubai) and the United States (Oklahoma) have also benefited from their digitalisation, extending the comprehensiveness and personalised hybrid learning experience to their local students through the unified E-learning platform.
Conclusion
Digitalisation has made eiMaths more resilient and they have successfully transformed into one that leverages technology to amplify the effectiveness of their ‘spiral learning’. Their willingness to try has also opened doors to more business opportunities that they did not think would be possible in the past.
The current hybrid learning environment has also provided a more complete learning experience and the assurance of continuous learning for their students.