Sri Lanka/L3 Farmers/Content Development Workshop Colombo-2008



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Introduction
Commonwealth of Learning (COL), in association with Sri Lanka Association of Distance Educators has conducted a workshop on collaborative development of OAER Content on WikiEducator from 31/03/2008 to 03/04/2008 at Staff Development Centre, Open University of Sri Lanka, for select representatives from the five Universities in Sri Lanka who are partnering with COL in L3 Farmers Project

Outputs of the Workshop

 * 1) An Introductory Reference Material for the participants
 * 2) Participants became familiar with Wiki Educator
 * 3) Participants acquired basic skills in using, creating and editing Wiki Educator Pages.
 * 4) Participants acquired basic skills in using/editing media along with content on Wiki Educator.
 * 5) Participants got introduction and opportunity for group discussion on utilizing M&E tools and QA concepts in collaborative content development for L3 Farmers Project in Sri Lanka.
 * 6) Participants acquired basic experience in collaborative development of online eLearning material on a web platform viz Wiki Educator.
 * 7) Five draft interactive lessons on Wiki Educator by the five University teams.
 * 8) A Node for Sri Lanka on WikiEducator with the URL http://www.wikieducator.org/Sri_Lanka and a Node for L3 Farmers project, Sri Lanka with the URL http://www.wikieducator.org/Sri_Lanka/L3_Farmers
 * 9) A consensus and draft plan for post-workshop stakeholder consultations and activities for further improving the draft content.

Content Developed during the Workshop

 * 1) Chilli Leaf Curl complex and its Management
 * 2) Banana Cultivation
 * 3) Chilli Diseases
 * 4) Cost of Production in Rice Cultivation
 * 5) Housing and Feeding of Poultry

Post-Workshop follow up & Support

 * 1) Community Consultation: Prof. Uma Coomaraswamy has explained a tentative plan for post-workshop follow up. According to the plan, the participants will discuss the draft content they developed on WikiEducator with the farmers of their locality to collect their feedback in April/2008 itself and discuss it among the group. Thereafter the IT personnel in each Group will be called to the Open University of Sri Lanka again to rework the content based on post-workshop feedback/ discussions.
 * 2) The participants were provided with the email IDs of the facilitator and the Resource person so that they can contact at any time when they require support.

General Suggestions/Recommendations

 * 1) The participants’ demand for a moderated discussion form for L3 Farmers Project was very strong during the open forum as well as informal discussions. The participants are of the view that since the content on wiki is subject to changes at any time, there is an authenticity-crisis of the content, especially when farmers or other non-technical users use the content on the online wiki to find remedy for their immediate problems in the field. To overcome this authenticity-crisis, the participants of the workshop has suggested implementing a moderated discussion forum on Wiki Educator for the L3 Farmers project so that farmers and extension workers can raise queries on problems that require immediate remedy. These queries required to be answered by an empanelled voluntary expert group and moderated by responsible persons from the implementers of L3 Farmers Project, Sri Lanka.
 * 2) Necessary arrangements are required to be made to ensure easily accessible web connected computers in the areas were L3 Farmers project is being implemented. Setting up of Web Access Centers with connected audio/visual equipment will be a viable solution.
 * 3) In areas where web access is very difficult, alternate solutions like community radio may me explored to.
 * 4) Participants may be encouraged to conduct pre-workshop stakeholder consultations on the interactive content that they are planning to develop during the workshop.