User:Ndoiron/Amazon-Map
1. Maps
Computerized maps improve geography skills, help explain environmental issues, and prepare students for work in the many industries which use maps for planning. I have experience creating and teaching mapping activities with the XO laptop. You can watch a short video with Mongolian subtitles about useful web maps: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/mon/lalitesh_katragadda_making_maps_to_fight_disaster_build_economies.html
Science classes could use a mapping activity and the internet to take part in a Citizen Science project - real science which uses volunteers' notes for data.
I have experience developing online mapping websites which work with Google Maps, Microsoft's Bing Maps and ESRI's ArcGIS.
2. Websites
I can develop websites allowing students and teachers from around Mongolia to go online for new information, story-writing contests, or lesson ideas. I have experience building several websites, including a wiki, a social network, environmental maps, a Facebook app, and a text-messaging service.
Ushahidi or CrowdMap platforms
I can also help tell the world about OLPC Mongolia with an English-language blog and participation on wiki.laptop.org ( this wiki website )
3. Literacy
Teaching English is about reading, writing, and storytelling.
I would use programs such as LibriVox.org, International Digital Children's Library ( http://www.read.mn/ ), School Library, and UNESCO to improve students' reading.
Students can write essays and make short books for each other. It is one thing to write an essay, and another to tell a story. Notice how this video tells a story without words. What stories do students have, and how will they tell them?
Also, I would continue work on XO BookReport - a project with members from the US, Sudan, and Uganda - to connect the XO laptops to libraries and students' reading history. We should help students keep track of their reading, collect their book reports, and recommend new information to them. They should win game points when they read a difficult book or recommend a book to a friend.
4. What do you need?
When I visited Uganda, I had new ideas about how to help. Sometimes I would fall asleep thinking, and wake up in the morning with a new project to work on. When I worked together with teachers, I learned from their questions and their own ideas.
I hope the same experience is possible in Mongolia. Already, I hear that we should work on an XO Dock so laptops can be plugged in during class.
