[IAEP] Commenst for an Oceania project

[Martin Sevior]

Dear Ian,

Thank you for very interesting two posts.

On behalf of the abiword community I invite speakers of Marovo and
other Pacific Island languages to contact us on the abiword-dev
mailing lists (see http://www.abisource.com/developers/) so that we
can explain how to make a Marovo translation of AbiWord and Write.

Best Regards,

Martin Sevior

On Sun, May 15, 2011 at 1:28 PM, Ian Thomson <IanT at spc.int> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> In the Pacific Ocean, we have a list serve for educationalists. There have
> been some posts about the article from Australia about their Governments
> “struggles” with introducing laptops into secondary schools.
>
> These posts have prompted the Principle of Patuake College (in the outer
> islands of Solomon Islands) to make the following two posts about the OLPC
> project we have there.
>
> You may have seen the evaluation by the Australian Council of Education
> Research that was conducted some time ago on this project. Here are some
> recent views about what is happening.
>
> PS. NOPERS are people who subscribe to the list serve, called NOPE
>
> I am Brian Bird (Principal of Patukae College - Marovo Lagoon, Solomon
> islands). Patukae College is one of the schools piloting the OLPC project in
> the Solomons. I welcomed the article published yesterday. It helps to point
> out the challenges we all face in introducing laptops into classroom, to
> some extent not fully utilised and realised  for their desired or intended
> purpose. I have also appreciated views and comments surfaced from other
> fellow nopers. I would like to think of the article as a beacon that shows
> pathway for the schools, teachers, students, parents but more so for each
> island country governments to see beyond just equipping schools with laptops
> as some nopers have said they are just tools needing humans to make them
> work.
>
> It is always a positive initiative to have ICT introduced in schools but it
> seriously requires innovation on the part of island states governments who
> are responsible of generating and regulating policies, to institute a
> mechanism that would allow the use of ICT in classroom compatible with the
> national curriculums. Unless this is realised ICT in classroom would remain
> a challenge for teachers.
>
> For my country Solomon Islands, it needs to collaborate how ICT should be
> used to help implement the national curriculum. Only then would teachers
> deploy the intended use of this vital and useful technology.
>
>
>
> Brian Bird
>
> Let me add something raw and home based to my previous article to nopers
> yesterday. Patukae CHS is one of the OLPC projects project in the Solomon.
> While it is true that technology does not in itself responsible for driving
> change, it is a tool that can be used to drive change in learning and in
> commitment to learn. In Patukae College for instance which is one of the
> pilots in the OLPC project we accepted OLPCs as tools and we invested
> efforts to make them work. We ran training programme for teachers, and
> students, and we provided back-up support to both teachers and students and
> the results have been quite exciting. Student literacy rates have gone up.
> The overall academic performance of students with laptops had increased and
> we have seen increase in school pass rates since the introduction of
> laptops. The attitudes of students with laptops have changed; they are more
> active in their learning objectives. Parents have also becoming more engaged
> in their children’s learning and some of them have even improved their own
> English literacy through the use of the reading and pronunciation tools in
> the OLPC.
>
> We at Patukae College have definitely found the OLPC very useful. They have
> pushed the boundaries of Education, they have given teachers more option and
> ideas, and it has enabled students to learn in a different way.  To make it
> work we took its vision, drive and commitment, and a belief that used
> properly, this tool can make the difference our rural schools are looking
> for.
>
>  It is very easy to knock technology on the head, very easy to question its
> legitimacy, its usefulness, but let us not forget that we who can
> communicate are the lucky ones, we have the opportunity to have computers,
> they have helped us. For the first time similar opportunities are given to
> children in the rural areas at Patukae and they are now realising the same
> opportunities that some of us have been taking for granted.
>
> In elevating this ICT innovation to another height, Patukae CHS in
> collaboration with most of the leading Primary Schools in Marovo Lagoon
> started a project last year through UNESCO which has launched a Marovo Wiki
> educator program that can globally accessed.
>
> http://wikieducator.org/Patukae_College/OER_Reef_and_Rainforest_wiki_in_Marovo_Language
>
> Teachers from  these schools were brought together to learn wiki skills to
> enable them use the skills in devising lessons both in English and in Marovo
> vernacular with the aim that most of these lessons should be uploaded to the
> Marovo Wiki/Wiki educator online.
>
>  This is ICT in action right in the classroom and our teachers and students
> used the OLPC to make this work. With the introduction of OLPC into its
> classroom, Patukae see opportunities through the challenges and decided to
> move on realising the potential ICT can bring to its populace. In that view
> point I would call on for more support towards ICT expansion in Schools.
>
> Let us not criticise the technology, nor those that are trying to help. But
> rather ask the question, what can I do to add value to this initiative. At
> Patukae we take the view that we need to empower our teachers so that they
> in turn can empower our students. There is no point always looking at the
> empty portion of the ‘half-filled bucket of water’; rather we should be
> asking the question, how can I fill the rest of this bucket of water so that
> can achieve its full potential?
>
> I support the OLPC programme and what it sets out to do. I have seen the
> benefits it has provided to those that have received it. It is my hope
> countries can put in place mechanisms that will empower teachers to empower
> children but also processes that will objectively evaluate the impact of
> this technology in the education of our children into the future because the
> outcome of such evaluations will add more weight to the effectiveness of
> OLPCs as an effective learning and communication tool...’
>
>
>
> Brian Bird
>
> Ian Thomson
>
> ICT Outreach Section
>
> Economic Development Division
>
> Secretariat of the Pacific Community
>
> B.P. D5 - Noumea Cedex - 98848
>
> New Caledonia
>
> Phone +687-265419
>
> Fax +687 26 38 18
>
> http://www.spc.int
>
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