ELDER Project

The Story

ELDER in Poplar Hill

On December the 6^th, I had the opportunity to visit Poplar Hill First Nation, one of the KO communities. These communities recently received a generous donation from the Lieutenant Governor’s Office and Hewlett Packard of laptops for their school, and so I made the trip to install ELDER and take the opportunity to learn more about the community.

When I arrived, Howard (the principal) drove me around to see where the different buildings were located and brought me to the school. There I began my work, with the help of a grade 3 teacher named Melissa who was such a great individual to work with. She tells me that when the laptops arrived, the teachers were ecstatic that they would have another valuable resource for the children to use and learn from. However, simply turning them on led to the realization that there were very few student-oriented software that bolsters learning and engagement. This is a great case that states where having computers are only half of the solution – the software is the other essential component for maximizing the potential of a laptop as an effective learning tool.

Together, Melissa and I spent over 7 hours trying to install Edubuntu and QIMO on a variety of different laptops. We chose QIMO for the 10 netbooks for the younger grades, where the kids would probably have an easier time navigating programs with the toolbar at the bottom of the screen, as well as the attractive character on the background. These netbooks came with a dual boot feature, where users can choose from boot whether to run QIMO or Windows. On the Windows side, we installed some of the programs from open-education disc that would appeal to kids more, such as Tuxpaint and Tuxmath.

For the larger notebooks and tablet PCs we did things a little differently. We installed Edubuntu with some must-have games, such as Supertux (linux version of Super Mario) and other essential educational software. Like the netbooks, we installed it as a dual boot with Windows 7. On the Windows side, we installed almost all the software on the open education disc including GIMP (an open source photoshop) and BYOB (a programming tutorial). One of the tablet PCs didn’t respond properly, so I will need to bring it back to K-NET to have windows reinstalled. Many of the teachers responded very positively to the software, one saying that “it was just what they needed to engage their students with a computer”. Tux Paint and GIMP work very well with the tablet, allowing users to freely and accurately draw or design from their imaginations.

The next day, we had the chance to continue our work on the laptops, as well as let the kids enjoy the netbooks fitted with QIMO. They had a great time with Tuxmath and Tuxpaint, as well as GCompris. I am always surprised to see how quickly kids can learn to navigate around a desktop and learn with very little guidance to use programs and play games. Melissa will be finishing the rest of the laptops with the USB sticks I left behind.

Some of the Highlights of the implementation:

· Installed QIMO on 10 netbooks, dual boot Windows 7 with open source educational software

· Installed Edubuntu with OFRIS on 8 laptops, dual boot Windows 7 with open source educational software

· Open Education Disc was distributed amongst the teachers for use as well as installation on other machines.

· One Elitebook didn’t have the Windows installed properly and needed to be brought back to be reinstalled.

Some plans for the future:

· Bring manuals – some of the files are too big and can’t be downloaded from the website.

· BIOS or Wubi? Some of the advantages and disadvantages need to be weighed on the installation method. Wubi is undoubtedly faster but it does not partition the hard-disk.

· Have workshops – engage the teachers into learning more and experimenting with the laptops.

Overall, it was a very enjoyable and successful implementation – I hope to hear more from the school on how they’ve been using QIMO, Edubuntu and the Open Education USB!