OLPC Pakistan/Atlas School: Difference between revisions
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First day when we came. It was Wednesday.When we came to introduce the OLPC Project to their school, they weren’t expecting us.We introduced the principal & teachers to the project, and we had our first session with them. After 3 days we again went there and in the evening, we handed out the laptops to the Teacher and school children in a special meeting we held with them for that purpose. |
First day when we came. It was Wednesday.When we came to introduce the OLPC Project to their school, they weren’t expecting us.We introduced the principal & teachers to the project, and we had our first session with them. After 3 days we again went there and in the evening, we handed out the laptops to the Teacher and school children in a special meeting we held with them for that purpose. |
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There we found a family Father, Mother and their 15 year old son, they all are teaching in school from last 5 years. |
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=== Children Receiving their Laptops === |
=== Children Receiving their Laptops === |
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== Week 1 March 17-22 == |
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In afternoon on Monday first week, all children were in their classrooms with their laptops charged. Most of them had already tried it at night, and it was a mix of discovering new things and sharing with others what they had already discovered. Teachers kept on teaching, letting children explore their new laptops and encouraging them to do the class work. |
In afternoon on Monday first week, all children were in their classrooms with their laptops charged. Most of them had already tried it at night, and it was a mix of discovering new things and sharing with others what they had already discovered. Teachers kept on teaching, letting children explore their new laptops and encouraging them to do the class work. |
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The first day of our pilot project was full of excitement, Children didn’t know how to control and use the cursor (mouse) in XO when it just not moving in the direction they want. When we were asked by a student to help him, to solve this we tried about 2 or 3 minutes to move the cursor but couldn’t.One student from grade 4 told us to add some chalk (used to write on black board) on touchpad and when we did it works |
The first day of our pilot project was full of excitement, Children didn’t know how to control and use the cursor (mouse) in XO when it just not moving in the direction they want. When we were asked by a student to help him, to solve this we tried about 2 or 3 minutes to move the cursor but couldn’t.One student from grade 4 told us to add some chalk (used to write on black board) on touchpad and when we did it works |
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==Achievements & Observation== |
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=== Technical Issues === |
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Atlas Pilot is going on very well accelerating kid excitement day by day.Children have gotten used to working with OLPC.For the first two weeks kids concentrated on Tam Tam and Video Camera.Now they are using the write activity for learning and how to write a letter.Children are found of using the library to read story books in Farsi and browse through maps. They also discovered Multimedia (Watch & Listen) activity that we had downloaded from the wiki (we di not announce to children) to play Afghanistan national anthem and patriotic songs.All 5th graders have explored e-toys and are helping others kids to use e-toys. Next kids would learn to browse through the OLPC wiki for which we have acquired necessary wireless Internet.The purpose is to give children a good idea of Internet and how it works on XO. |
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===New Idea from a child=== |
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Children didn’t know how to control and use the cursor (mouse) in XO when it just not moving in the direction they want. When we were asked by a student to help him regarding mouse issue, to solve this we tried abut 2 or 3 minutes to move the cursor towards they want to but couldn’t, Here they discovered a new technique. One student from grade 4 told us to add some chalk (used to write on black board) on touchpad and when we did this it works. |
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===Following are the points raised by the teachers=== |
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We gave only 29 XOs to selected students from grade 3 to grade 5, they want that every child in school should have XO. |
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There must be more activities for children for learning and entertainment. |
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From next month school exams will start, for that they want to fix time for XO learning in school. |
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There should be Pashto learning material available on XO( available now). |
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===XO family=== |
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In school there is a family (Father, Wife and their 15 year old son) all serving as teacher, are very excited about XOs. In start father did complaint about his youngest son that he has gone crazy for XO. First day when we gave XO to him, he brought his XO to home and his son took from him. Form that day he didn’t get chance to use. In last week he tried to get back his XO form him. In response his son refused to eat anything and threaten them. Now he spends 24 hour with his Lover(XO) and even sleep with it. |
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There were 4 batteries issues over the weekend as these batteries were not charging. So, we replaced those batteries. and the new ones are working fine. We replaced those batteries from the new machines. |
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===Child of a week=== |
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On Wednesday when we went there for routine visit, one child came to us and told us that he pay 10 Rupees to another child for video recording. We surprised to hear and asked from that special child that how and why did you do this? His replied like a business man and said, I turn on the camera activity and put XO in front of a TV and record video. He charged 10 rupees for video recording. He also offer XO training in 150 Rupees. Wow. |
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Most of the problems were software related as we were running build 406 on B2 machines. |
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Like [[Mesh]] was not working. But when we manually create [[mesh network]], machines do not share [[acitivies]]. We tested Chat and Abiword activity but it was not working. And some times it stuck. Second as there is no [[journal]] activity in those software builds, copying data to usb drive and moving files requires some [[linux]] expertise which the teachers and students are totally unfamiliar.Third camera has the major issues, as we move the courser in the [[screen]] the screen gets deteriorated, after saving the photos the camera doesn't comes to its original state i.e. state to capture pictures again.Fourth Translation cannot be activated as the strings on the [[pootle]] are upgraded accordingly to the new builds and the sugar interface that we are using in 406 is very old.Last issue that we faced was with Etoys application. [[Etoys]] [[application]] was in its early development state when its was shipped with 406 build so it gets stuck most of the time. |
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Revision as of 05:34, 25 April 2008
OLPC has started a Pakistani pilot in Atlas School in Rawalpindi Pir Wadhai. Dr. Habib Khan announced the launching of the pilot project at the Atlas Public School, located in the slums between Rawalpindi and Islamabad.
School : Atlas public school Students : 150 Teachers : 7 Laptops : 27
Many thanks to our Afghan volunteers, Usman Mansour “Ansari” and Sohaib Obaidi “Ebtihaj”, who discovered the school and will be mentoring students and their teacher.
School and background
Atlas public school is located in the Rawalpindi district near Pir Wadhai (Pakistan). It's not far from Islamabad the Capital City of Pakistan. Atlas school located in very populated area and to reach there we passed through a busy road. Childrens living there belongs to poor families. Education has become an important factor for the development of their children. Total numbers of students are 78 from grade 1 to grade 6 and their timing is from 2.00 -5.00 PM.
The area is economically poor and lacks security measures and basic facilities. There are about 100 Afghan refugee children (Grades 1–6),many of them work during the first part of the day to support their families and attend school in the afternoon.
Handing out the Laptops
Teacher first interaction with XO
First day when we came. It was Wednesday.When we came to introduce the OLPC Project to their school, they weren’t expecting us.We introduced the principal & teachers to the project, and we had our first session with them. After 3 days we again went there and in the evening, we handed out the laptops to the Teacher and school children in a special meeting we held with them for that purpose.
Children Receiving their Laptops
Saturday evening, we had set the meeting at 3 PM. We started at 3.30 PM, when more childrens were around. The principal welcomed the OLPC in school and met with our Director Dr Habib Khan. Principal spoke of how honored the school was to be the first one to receive the laptops and to participate in the development of the project in Pakistan. After him, Our Director Dr Habib Khan spoke, explaining the purpose and details of the project.
We handed out the laptops following the school lists. Each child came to the front to receive an XO laptop and to have a photo taken. Everybody was very excited.
In afternoon on Monday first week, all children were in their classrooms with their laptops charged. Most of them had already tried it at night, and it was a mix of discovering new things and sharing with others what they had already discovered. Teachers kept on teaching, letting children explore their new laptops and encouraging them to do the class work.
There we faced language issue because children could only speak Pashto or Dari. Thanks to Dr Habib Khan & our Afghan volunteer ( Usman & Sohaib) for explaining every thing in Pashto.
The first day of our pilot project was full of excitement, Children didn’t know how to control and use the cursor (mouse) in XO when it just not moving in the direction they want. When we were asked by a student to help him, to solve this we tried about 2 or 3 minutes to move the cursor but couldn’t.One student from grade 4 told us to add some chalk (used to write on black board) on touchpad and when we did it works
Achievements & Observation
Atlas Pilot is going on very well accelerating kid excitement day by day.Children have gotten used to working with OLPC.For the first two weeks kids concentrated on Tam Tam and Video Camera.Now they are using the write activity for learning and how to write a letter.Children are found of using the library to read story books in Farsi and browse through maps. They also discovered Multimedia (Watch & Listen) activity that we had downloaded from the wiki (we di not announce to children) to play Afghanistan national anthem and patriotic songs.All 5th graders have explored e-toys and are helping others kids to use e-toys. Next kids would learn to browse through the OLPC wiki for which we have acquired necessary wireless Internet.The purpose is to give children a good idea of Internet and how it works on XO.
New Idea from a child
Children didn’t know how to control and use the cursor (mouse) in XO when it just not moving in the direction they want. When we were asked by a student to help him regarding mouse issue, to solve this we tried abut 2 or 3 minutes to move the cursor towards they want to but couldn’t, Here they discovered a new technique. One student from grade 4 told us to add some chalk (used to write on black board) on touchpad and when we did this it works.
Following are the points raised by the teachers
We gave only 29 XOs to selected students from grade 3 to grade 5, they want that every child in school should have XO. There must be more activities for children for learning and entertainment. From next month school exams will start, for that they want to fix time for XO learning in school. There should be Pashto learning material available on XO( available now).
XO family
In school there is a family (Father, Wife and their 15 year old son) all serving as teacher, are very excited about XOs. In start father did complaint about his youngest son that he has gone crazy for XO. First day when we gave XO to him, he brought his XO to home and his son took from him. Form that day he didn’t get chance to use. In last week he tried to get back his XO form him. In response his son refused to eat anything and threaten them. Now he spends 24 hour with his Lover(XO) and even sleep with it.
Child of a week
On Wednesday when we went there for routine visit, one child came to us and told us that he pay 10 Rupees to another child for video recording. We surprised to hear and asked from that special child that how and why did you do this? His replied like a business man and said, I turn on the camera activity and put XO in front of a TV and record video. He charged 10 rupees for video recording. He also offer XO training in 150 Rupees. Wow.
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