HI all,
I volunteered for the ICT@KaranatakaSchools program's high school teachers training program for two days that is 23rd , 24th and 25th of July 2009. It was a very different experience for me to help the teachers to get used to GNU/Linux and do the hand holding job
There were around 21 participants from different schools in and around Bangalore
The following people volunteered for the training program on day 1 as facilitators / trainers / volunteers
Oam Shiv Prakash ( sampada ), Harish Singh ( fsug-bangalore ) , Renuka Prasad ( fsug-bangalore ) , Anivar ( moving republic ) Ravi Jaya ( ilug, chennai) ,
Around 8.30 am Anivar, Renuka Prasad and Ravi Jaya had come to the venue and started to install customized edition of debian edu on the existing systems , I helped a bit in installing.
Around 9.45 there was a small meeting for the volunteers /trainers /facilitators , Mr Vinay from itfc gave an introduction about the program and following were present at that time including those mentioned above
Anupama (itfc), Shantharam Nayak , Raghavan, Sreenivas, Sharath, Dharani - lecturers from different engineering colleges ) and Arjuna , Sudhanva, Harshith, Indumathi, were also present
By 11 the session started with Oam Shiv Prakash giving an introduction to fundamentals of computers and a glimpse into the free software philosophy . Then there was a tea break , soon after which the more practical utility of free software Philosophy was introduced to the participants with the help of Stephen Fry's video which had kannada done by Oam Shiv Prakash.
Meanwhile few more people joined the training team and i am unable to recall those names. Soon after that there was an introduction to the mouse and keyboard events , we used GCompris Educational suite to make the participants comfortable with mouse and keyboard and enjoy as well , then there was an introduction to TuxPaint
A post lunch session on file management which included creating document using gedit followed, after which there was a tea break.
At the end of the day 1, participants were given exercises on Tux Paint and gedit
Day 2 started at around 10.50 am with an introduction to open office by Sudha. Today, there were new volunteers/trainers -- Sharvani, Sudha, Raghavendra Prasad, Sharath Shashidhar, Adithya ( all from R.V. College of engineering)
Sudha and Renuka Prasad gave an introduction to open office , the the session went on till the lunch
Then Harish Singh gave a small introduction to the Openoffice Impress followed by a tea break. Then there was an introduction to Openoffice Calc by Anupama ( itfc ) and the hands-on training sessions were closed.
Next, Renuka Prasad played the "big buck bunny" animated video ( created free softwares ... blender,gimp,python and others ) and another video about trusted computing , participants enjoyed the movie and at the same time they were told about the importance of using free softwares in schools
Finally Renuka Prasad gave a small introduction to Inkscape, Gimp and Scribus ( just a demonstration to make the participants aware of Free Softwares that are available for DTP ) for about 10 -15 mins after which everyone dispersed.
It has been an interesting expericene for me so far.
As it is a weekend tomorow I request the list members to join for the final day session when an introduction to the internet will be given followed by creation of email id's and making then comfortable with communicating using email's . We plan to enlist them in various mailing lists ( karnatakaschools at osscomm). There is also a plan to introduce some of the advanced topics on openoffice writer, impress, followed finally by a session on wikipedia
I hope more will join us on the last day of training program.