Learning4Content/Workshops/Face-to-Face schedule/L4C6/Report

Face to Face Workshop Report L4C6 Nauru

Facilitator:

David Leeming

Leeming Consulting,

Honiara,

Solomon Islands

tel: +677 76396

email: leeming AT pipolfastaem.gov.sb

See also the WikiEducator L4C6 home page

Acknowledgements

The facilitator wishes to thank the following:

• The Director Michael Longhurst and Education Secretary for giving their strong support to the workshop, and releasing the participants from teaching duties for the workshop
• Xavier Barker, Director (acting) of the University of the South Pacific Centre, Nauru, for making their computer room and facilities available
• The participants who where an outstanding group and who made the utmost of the opportunity
• COL for their prompt and reliable support, in responding to questions and requests.

Background

The workshop was organised by the COL Focal Point for Nauru, Director of Education Michael Longhurst. The workshop was held between 1^st and 4^th August, 2008.

Venue

USP Centre, Aiwo, Nauru

Participants

15 participants attended the workshop, all being primamry, secondary or college school teachers. All the particpants are women – teaching being traditionally a woman's role.

The participants' list is given on the L4C6 page.

Preparations

The following pre-workshop organising was carried out by the COL focal point.

• Finalising participants list
• Finalising venue
• Printing handouts, photocopying
• Organising lunch and refreshments
• Pick up and drop off of the facilitator

Handouts included:

• The agenda
• Cape Town Declaration
• The 11 workshop lesson notes (about 70 pages)
• The electronic copies of the lesson notes, lesson slideshows and other useful items such as Open Office 2.3 was made available for participants to copy

Workshop

The workshop went ahead according to the schedule (given on the L4C6 page) and all items on the schedule were completed.

Each participant created a user page and was able to use the info they had previously completed on their registration page. The results were very good – most of the participants obviously enhjoyed writing their own profiles, and some even added their own photos.

Most participants did very well with their example learning materials, which are linked on the L4C6 page. They were encouraged to complete these and develop them further.

All participants were joined to the Wiki-Alumni google email list, which is a community of L4C workshop participants from around the region.

The L4C workshop was linked to a parallel activity to launch a trial for the One Laptop Per Child Oceania programme, at Yaren Primary School. Some of the teachers attending the workshop are also teaching at that school and have received OLPC training. The activities were linked as follows:

• In one session at the L4C workshop, it was demonstrated how wikieducator content can be exported as IMS packages and installed on the OLPC school server. Participants viewed their own wikieducator content (their user pages and example content pages) on the OLPX “XO” laptops, after it was installed on a demonstration OLPC “XS” school server
• The school server set up for Yaren school's OLPC project was loaded with a set of demonstration content. This included about 40 of the “Biology for Elementary Schools” lesson plans exported as an IMS package from the Wikieducator content section, installed with a simple index page on the school server. (note: not all the 57 lesson plans were available as they created errors when using the IMS export facility). Some of the teachers in the OLPC training had attended the Wikieducator course and were thus able to appreciate how to add new content to the school server, including their own materials.
• OLPC teacher training guides developed on the wikieducator (wikieducator.org/OLPC_Oceania) were downloaded as PDFs and printed, to be used in the OLPC teacher training

For more info on the OLPC Nauru project, see the OLPC wiki page for Nauru.

Participants completed Learning Contracts before the workshop, which are to be sent to COL directly by Michael Longhurst.

Training certificates will be prepared by COL and sent to Nauru, for each attendee.

Please view the L4C6 page on the wikieducator at the address given above, to view outputs from the workshop.

Issues for Nauru Ministry of Education

Internet Access

Participants have nowhere to go for Internet access after the workshop. In order to consolidate on their new skills. Internet access is needed either at their own schools, or at the college where a computer lab is provided for that purpose; however , currently it has no Internet access. This was pointed out to the ISP, RONTEL.

Consider developing new curriculum materials and porting existing materials to the Wikieducator

The teachers in Nauru are actively involved in curriculum development. This gives the wiki a lot of relevance. Nauru might wish to consider developing policies regarding open curriculum content, and consider how to link the teacher's new skills to official policies.

For instance, the Ministry might conisder making curriculum materials available as open content on the wikieducator, and then porting them to the XS school server. This will contribute to the development of a free curriculum for the Pacific, and encourage other countries to follow the example, thus helping in the scaling up of the cointent development for the OLPC. Teachers could be tasked with this activity – transferring curriculum materials to the wiki.

A section could be created for Nauru on the Wikieducator. Please contact David Leeming for further advice should this be taken up by the Ministry.

Encourage the linkage to OLPC to provide content for the school servers

The linkage to OLPC is to be encouraged. Teachers can create worksheets and activities for their lessons. In the OLPC training, one teacher created some CLOZE activities which were put on the school server, so that the teachers could access them on the XO laptops and relate that to a lesson activity.

Lessons learned for facilitators

In this particular workshop, the following lessons were learned for future reference:

• Creating accounts takes time and care. It is essential to make sure that each participant chooses a unique Username, and understands that it becomes the URL of their wiki user page.
• Before they create accounts, give them a convension to follow. For instance, I suggested they choose a username consisting of a single word starting with a single capital letter, and they could either write their full name with no spaces (I.e. Davidleeming) or choose a nickname or unique local language name. Avoid dots, underscores and spaces in usernames, as they cause ambiguity.
• It might be easiest if they write the username on paper first, and the facilitator checks and helps them get it correct.
• Explain carefully that it is case sensitive

• If you don't take care with this, it can waste a lot of time
• It is useful to encourage them to develop their user page first. They can use the material they should have written from the registration sheets.
• From previous experience it is necessary to insist that participants choose the name of their Learning Contract contribution wiki page, and create a link at the top of their user pages early on. They need help with choosing names for the page. It needs to be done after the lesson on navigation, and emphasise that if they put their page in the general “flat” structure of the wikieducator, they must select a unique name. I encouraged them to use the word “Nauru” in their page names, to make it specific and unique.
• The COL lessons are very good, but the associated slideshows are rather too lengthy and it is best to trim them down and customise them for your own purposes. What you do will depend on progress, and for that reason I recommend that each evening prepare some slideshows for the next day's workshop
• Using Open Office Writer as a “whiteboard” was useful to set quick activities and give examples.