User:AducAndibah

My Contribution to L4C11 Workshop is on Information Literacy

=Myself=

My name is Nathan kwasam. I am a lecturer in Information Management with Information and Communication Science at The University of Papua New Guinea.

=My Community= I live in a community of learners and educators. On a daily basis I interact with staff and stduents. This is the University of Papua New Guinea, one of the six Universities in PNG. Afer work I interact with my immediate family and neigbours at home. This community extends to the shopping centre and the locals who come and sell their produce at the market.

What excites me about this community? Well, the excitement of teaching the future leaders of PNG that motivates my commitment to teaching and research in the area of ICT to help with teaching and research and also to bridge the digital divide that exists within the community.

The critical needs of my community is that of ICT capacity. There is lack of human resource in the area of ICT as well as limited infrastructure for members of the community. The number of computers per student is 20 to 1 while many staff do not have computers and access to the Internet.

=My work=

I teach "Information Technology" or ICT skills and knowledge to students at undergraduate. At the University of Papua New Guinea, academic disciplines are grouped into Schools and Strands/Disciplines. Information and Communication Science (ICS) is one of the ten disciplines of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. ICS is my home discipline.

The University of Papua New Guinea is embarking on Distance Education and through its Open College. It is expanding its locations and building capacity to provide quality distance education. One of the many projects that UPNG is carrying out is to externalise all courses, and disciplines are tasked to write courses for Distance Education. This basically means converting the existing course materials that one uses in internal program to distance mode. I am involved for the first time to write a course for distance education.

=Impact=

WikiEducator (I abbreviate it to WE) has the potetial to bridge the digital divide that exist in the education sector in PNG (one of the many applications). It is a collaboration tool the many educational activities that are already taking place in offline setting. One of these is the development of learning materials or curriculum. Teachers and curriculum development staff can use Wikieducator to enhance and greatly improve teaching and learning materials. Sharing of knowledge and skills by professionals in the education sector will be greatly enhanced.