XO laptop
This is one of the products by children on the talent XO camp in gitega primary school
The XO talent camp took place in Gitega Primary school combining two schools(Gitega and Kimisagara Primary schools) in April, 2012. In this four day camp, children expressed their talents through the use of XO. The talents were grouped in three major areas: The Paintings, The Songs and the Poems. However others proved talent in Journalism and dancing. Children learnt how technology can help to express and explore their talents(Use of XO). Not only they expressed their talents, they also achieved 21st century skills(collaboration, expression,…). Children helped each other to achieve their goals, those who knew more helped those who knew less with the same objective, to achieve a way to express their talents. The children in these two schools proved that they have a big potential for the country. On the last day(fifth day), they presented to others about what they achieved, how they organized themselves to achieve a group work.
Outstanding moments:
The most outstanding moments are, when children helped their collegues who were stuck and showed them the way out, also the child who was shy and never wanted to collaborate finally became the team leader of the group and the group presented a good team work. The whole team was astonished to see the group which was disorganized and un-collaborative come to good results. This was set as an example to all the team to know how to solve a problem and come out with tangible results.
Assessments:
Beside the short period of the camp, changes were observed in groups and individuals. There was a big difference of understanding for all the team. They achieved skills that will help them express their talents through the use of technology, they also achieved skills of expressing themselves in front of a big number which was a problem at the beginning. They enjoyed the camp and had fun throughout the whole camp. The assessment strategy was to allow children to assess by themselves providing feedback, comments and suggestions on the camp and projects of their fellow colleagues. This was effective since all the feedback, assessment and ideas came from them creating a feel of responsibility in them.
Personal view:
Personally, children are more intelligent than we think and it is us that do not open the doors for them to achieve what they are capable of. Offering them a chance to express what they are capable of and guiding them through the way they may do it can be a key to a whole new generation of thinkers, painters, decision makers and problem solving community.
An education is a process of providing information to a generation and help them transform the information into usable daily habits (meaning knowledge). Most of the educational purpose takes effect in the future, for example a child provided with a good education will prove himself successful in the near future, that’s the outcome of a good education. All the information he was provided with, were turned into tangible things, the different ways of achieving education are:
-School Education: this is when the one achieving the education has to go in a school and follow the instruction and structure of education they offer to him in increasing your knowledge; this kind of education is common and has recently taken over other kinds of education worldwide.
-Home Education: this is when the knowledge is achieved at home through different ways, it may be through parents teaching their children, through tutors coming to teach children at home or through self guided education where the environment provided serves as self educational material for the child.
-Self Education: this kind of education is mainly done by elder people, where they search and learn by themselves, the knowledge they acquire through self education depends on how motivated they are and what kind of information they are exposed to.
When we see and analyze deeply, all these kinds of education listed above, have a similarity “knowledge”, which is the basic and target outcome of education but they differ from the ways of achieving that knowledge and on the kind of knowledge needed to achieve.
In Rwanda, the common method of education used is school education. In this kind of education other types of education can arise as additional. The outcome of the school education basically comes from the quality of the teachers and the methods used (Curriculum).
Rwanda is a country that cares much about the development of its citizens and the nation focuses on improving the level of education in the country. The goal of the country is to change the economy of the country from depending on agriculture to a knowledge based economy. The use of modern technology (internet, mobile phones, computers) has increased considerably compared to the past years. The use of new modern ICT has been strengthened in all government institutions and businesses.
The Country of Rwanda plans education for the next years basing on the 21st century skills. Motivating creativity and research to learners, building capacity for teachers and developing the learning with technology. The country has the vision of following international goals such as MDG’s and EDPRS, with its own vision 2020.
This camp was based on making children use their Xo laptops to create a short documentary on a day in their life that was special to them. At first it was to use the video (record activity) on the XO’s but surprisingly some of the kids wanted to do animated documentary in scratch and a picture documentary in e-toys which is so amazing. Normally scratch and e-toys are more complicated to use than using record but children choosing to use them in their documentary shows how creative they are. I feel like our children have a lot of potential and they only need an opportunity to show it, this camp and other that we did proves it.
The best moment is when kids are busy working on their documentaries, no time to loose and you really see in their faces that time is not on their side and their ability to adapt to all situations is very interesting. On my side I think the camp went on well, the only challenge is the timeline (one week seemed too short for the kids)
I can recommend that these kinds of trainings can be happening often to make our children express their creativity.
To conclude, the camp was a success because all the children who attended proved to work hard and provided all they can for the documentary.
This week we didn’t have activities in Nonko because their was the district exam taking place,so we had to do something else. What i found out is that our children are getting more and more new technologies which is very good. As we were in Kagugu Making a skype conference with the children from Brasil(Porto Alegre) i found out that this is very important for the children to communicate with other children from far away while they are seeing them face to face,i mean through skype of course. This brings into a deeper thinking of the children wondering how this can happen,asking their collegues about the cultural issues from another country. They also learnt some portugues such as (TUDO BON: how are you,OI: HI,Ciao: good bye); this is very intresting and good for the kids at the same time,exchanging ideas and talking through technology builds our yourth,do you think it is better to reveal all the technolgy at a such young age?Is their any other approach that we can do to develop our young ones?
On monday,june,14,2010;the Journalism club published its first newspaper.Congulaturations to all the members and team who helped out in this action.This was so exciting to see that children search for themselves the information to include in their newspaper,this proves that the laptops are of big importance to our young brothers and sisters,to help them to start taking charge in different activities and make research using the modern technology!However,we still have much to do concerning the participation because some of the kids start making their news when they arrive for the clubs,this is not good for the kids and teachers at the same time,because the kid doesn’t put much effort on whatn she or he is writting and the teacher waits for the kid to finish his work.But this also is not bad because as everybody makes mistakes the way you deal with those mistakes is what counts.
As i told you some of the kids start doing their work when the arrive in clubs,it was after we game them tem minutes for personal group discussions which we always give them that i found out how this project is so important.In their meeting,each groupe made serious decisions by themselves on how they should be working and become responsible in what they do!you may take it as a simple thing but it is not,a group of children sitting together and deciding on what they must do without participation of their teachers.As i told you everybody commits mistakes but the way you handle the mistake is what counts,these kids proved to be responsible.
Do you think giving the kid the right to make his decisions is the best thing to do?
We started by introducing ourselves and introducing the general idea of the Music club. We had the children sing and dance at first and they split in groups to go practice what to show to the rest of the classmates. They expressed their talents and this was a good thing to find out some hidden talents. They recorded their songs and sung the songs.
The most interesting moment on this day is that kids recorded in less than ten minutes music and danced it; They were free to finally show their talents to their classmates by the use of the laptop.
Music staff:
Jimmy
Avram
Tiffany
J.Claude
Pie
During these coming weeks, children in Nonko primary school are going to fulfill their curiosities and talents through two clubs which are to be started this Wednesday. The clubs will be Music club and programming club. We hope to achieve a lot from these kids and hope they will find a way to express their talents through the use of XO’S.
Nonko survey is nearly ending, by the end of this week Nonko survey will be finished and we will be able know the accurate and updated information about the laptops in Nonko school. This is the most tiresome work in most of the cases, but still re-flashing is next. We met difficulties and challenges during this survey because of power cuts and availability of the headmistress was a problem.
Thanks to all who helped in this process and to the staff of Nonko.
Escaf children are doing well mostly concerning journalism club,we have got good ideas that are going to be printed out for their newspaper.
The children proved to be hardworking and full of good ideas.tha science group was the best among the orther two but also the escaf news group showed group work and collaboration in making their story.
this shows how good the laptops are to our young kids,working together and making research on a particular issue.
