OLPCorps BrockUniversity South Africa: Difference between revisions
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Grace Peters - Team Leader (specialization in Learning Sciences/Neuroscience/Technology) |
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Emily Bommarito - Drama education lead |
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Scott Taylor - Health sciences lead |
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We are three university students at [Brock University]http://www.brocku.ca/, located in Canada. With the guidance and support of several local South African NGOs, we will deploy 100 XO laptops to Mitchell Heights Primary School in Mitchell’s Plain township of Cape Town, South Africa. This school has been identified as an excellent candidate for the program because of its existing partnerships with Edunova and Khanya, organizations which facilitate ICT implementation in the Western Cape area of South Africa. Teachers Without Borders, another partnering organization, will also have a team facilitating workshops for teachers in the area for several weeks in July. |
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Long-term sustainability of a project such as this is viewed as critical to success of the project; this has long been recognized by the South African organizations and they are willing to assist to achieve this after the team has finished their term of deployment. |
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Give a laptop. Change the world. |
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We are three university students at [http://www.brocku.ca/ Brock University], Canada. With the support of local South African NGOs, we will deploy 100 XO laptops to [http://www.khanya.co.za/schools/khanyaschool.php?emisno=0106490199 Hyacinth Primary School] in Mitchell’s Plain township of Cape Town, RSA. |
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Mitchell's Plain has been zoned as one of the Presidential Nodes to receive special attention and monetary support from the state, NGOs, and private sector owing to the abject poverty of this community. In South Africa, the urban areas are often far worse off than rural areas. To give sustainable support to a school, it must reachable in order for the programme to succeed. |
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Access to digital technologies, however, is limited – particularly to learners who live in the townships. Often computers can only be found in school computer labs which offer limited access to teachers and learners due to the high ratio of students to computers. Inadequate training of teachers for the integration of technology into classroom curricula is also a hurdle many schools face. Thefts and burglaries of computer equipment has also been a considerable problem facing the schools. Often more monies have been spent on securely locking down a computer lab than the cost toward the equipment itself. |
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| ⚫ | Faced with many challenges, the RSA education system has made solid gains in the last decade as it prepares its learners for life in the 21st century. While literacy rates are quite high, the poverty rate of the country is at about 30%. Early digital literacy skills can provide enhanced educational opportunities for learners which can lead to better employment opportunities for learners upon leaving school. |
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The XO offers young students an early entry point to acquiring digital literacy skills. The fact that each child will have their own machine is a huge advantage to the facilitation of the many literacies – numeracy literacy, operational literacy (reading and writing), as well as the potential for multimedia literacies. |
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Access to digital technologies, however, is limited in the townships. Often computers can only be found in school computer labs which offer limited access to teachers and learners due to the high ratio of students to computers. |
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== Working with Children == |
== Working with Children == |
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| ⚫ | Khanya and Edunova have agreed to work with us and support us while we are in the Mitchell’s Plain area. They have a presence already in the selected school and for that reason was it chosen. These organizations recognize that sustainability over time is a necessary component to any successful ICT integration programme. They have been distributing computers and providing training for a number of years now |
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| ⚫ | Teachers Without Borders is another organization |
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Our intention is to use our own backgrounds in drama and health education as we use the XOs as tools in the learning process. The XOs offer activities which will support a variety of literacy skills: Write, Chat, Record, Paint, TamTam Jam, which will also be used as we script, practice and perform. Learners will use the XO as a natural tool to support the learning process. The XO can also be used to document learning through practices of reflection (writing, orally, or visually). Collaboration between learners will emphasized throughout the process. The children will be given an opportunity to voice their creative ideas as well as document them to share with an immediate and global community. |
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Using Scratch and TurtleArt, the students will create games and stories to support and communicate messages about health education to a real audience of their community and other learners around the world. The school has connectivity so the students can reach a global audience. |
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During the month of break, June 20 - July 20, we would like to offer daily computer-drama workshops at the school in order to continue our support of the programme. We will work with Khanya and Edunova to provide additional access to the computer lab and classrooms and offer activities for the learners who attend. |
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| ⚫ | [http://www.khanya.co.za/ Khanya] and [http://www.khanya.co.za/ Edunova] have agreed to work with us and support us while we are in the Mitchell’s Plain area. They have a presence already in the selected school and for that reason was it chosen. These organizations recognize that sustainability over time is a necessary component to any successful ICT integration programme. They have been distributing computers and providing training for a number of years now. |
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== Impact on Children == |
== Impact on Children == |
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Collaboration and communication between students as they use the XOs to construct and create content will be emphasized as an approach to learning. Students will be encouraged to learn from each other through talking and collaboration while they use the XOs. |
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| ⚫ | We would also like to emphasize the theme of global citizenship |
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== Communication == |
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The mother tongue of the learners in this township is primarily Afrikaans; however, the children will have had exposure to English. We will use drama as an approach to our program because the expression of ideas and perspective of emotions can be effectively portrayed without translation. We believe it is a fundamental medium in terms of engaging many different learning styles, regardless of the language. Because of our focus on drama in education, we would like to use the various features of the XO to create and record music both in the local language(s) and in English. We would also like to use the video features to record and exhibit the exploration of individual and collaborative ideas and their applications to learning in the community. |
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== Financial Support once we leave == |
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We are approaching organizations such as churches, schools, theatre groups and university campus groups in order to raise additional monies to support this initiative in the long term. |
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Latest revision as of 15:12, 28 March 2009
OLPCorps_BrockUniversity South Africa
The Team
Grace Peters - Team Leader (specialization in Learning Sciences/Neuroscience/Technology)
Emily Bommarito - Drama education lead
Scott Taylor - Health sciences lead
Introduction
Give a laptop. Change the world.
We are three university students at Brock University, Canada. With the support of local South African NGOs, we will deploy 100 XO laptops to Hyacinth Primary School in Mitchell’s Plain township of Cape Town, RSA.
Mitchell's Plain has been zoned as one of the Presidential Nodes to receive special attention and monetary support from the state, NGOs, and private sector owing to the abject poverty of this community. In South Africa, the urban areas are often far worse off than rural areas. To give sustainable support to a school, it must reachable in order for the programme to succeed.
Faced with many challenges, the RSA education system has made solid gains in the last decade as it prepares its learners for life in the 21st century. While literacy rates are quite high, the poverty rate of the country is at about 30%. Early digital literacy skills can provide enhanced educational opportunities for learners which can lead to better employment opportunities for learners upon leaving school.
Access to digital technologies, however, is limited in the townships. Often computers can only be found in school computer labs which offer limited access to teachers and learners due to the high ratio of students to computers.
Working with Children
Our intention is to use our own backgrounds in drama and health education as we use the XOs as tools in the learning process. The XOs offer activities which will support a variety of literacy skills: Write, Chat, Record, Paint, TamTam Jam, which will also be used as we script, practice and perform. Learners will use the XO as a natural tool to support the learning process. The XO can also be used to document learning through practices of reflection (writing, orally, or visually). Collaboration between learners will emphasized throughout the process. The children will be given an opportunity to voice their creative ideas as well as document them to share with an immediate and global community.
Using Scratch and TurtleArt, the students will create games and stories to support and communicate messages about health education to a real audience of their community and other learners around the world. The school has connectivity so the students can reach a global audience.
During the month of break, June 20 - July 20, we would like to offer daily computer-drama workshops at the school in order to continue our support of the programme. We will work with Khanya and Edunova to provide additional access to the computer lab and classrooms and offer activities for the learners who attend.
Local Partners
Khanya and Edunova have agreed to work with us and support us while we are in the Mitchell’s Plain area. They have a presence already in the selected school and for that reason was it chosen. These organizations recognize that sustainability over time is a necessary component to any successful ICT integration programme. They have been distributing computers and providing training for a number of years now.
Teachers Without Borders Canada is another supporting organization. The mother of one of our team members is leading a team for a second year of four years of workshops for township educators; their team will be present in the area in July '09.
Impact on Children
We would like to ensure that there would be an arts festival where the local community would come and observe the accomplishments of the students.
We would also like to emphasize the theme of global citizenship by introducing them to digital content created by our own students. By sharing videos from our Canadian students we intend to create a lasting relationship between sets of students.
Communication
The mother tongue of the learners in this township is primarily Afrikaans; however, the children will have had exposure to English. We will use drama as an approach to our program because the expression of ideas and perspective of emotions can be effectively portrayed without translation. We believe it is a fundamental medium in terms of engaging many different learning styles, regardless of the language. Because of our focus on drama in education, we would like to use the various features of the XO to create and record music both in the local language(s) and in English. We would also like to use the video features to record and exhibit the exploration of individual and collaborative ideas and their applications to learning in the community.
Financial Support once we leave
We are approaching organizations such as churches, schools, theatre groups and university campus groups in order to raise additional monies to support this initiative in the long term.