Abstract
Aim
To create awareness about emerging technologies, renewable energy and spark curiosity in children through DIY (Do It Yourself) workshops.
About Workshop
Fellow organized workshop in Sharda Mandir Vidyalay on 10 February 2017 in which 110 students from 9th, 10th to 11th standard participated. This workshop was all about creating hands on experience through do it yourself activities on designing electronic models and digital demos.
The workshop provided a platform for children to learn and experiment. It let the children ask three major questions such as why, what and how. Why a phenomenon occurs, what constitutes it, and how experiments used to demonstrate? Phenomenon based learning is an innovative approach that has been practiced in West such as Finland and UK.
Why the Workshop
Currently Education system in India focused on rote learning to mark high marks in exams. Rote learning do not help children to learn deeply and think out of the box. As per Annual Status Education Report-2014, over 50% class V students in India are unable to read, write and comprehend books of their level.
E- Learning skewed into a level where teachers are using it to skip classes or download power point presentations from internet and read it out in the class. The author concludes that current system has a huge scope to rethink and redesign but refrain from blindly copying from West practices.
I visited multiple Government schools and have observed some issues.
High dropout rate and illiteracy
As per the need assessment study 2008-09 conducted by Tata Motors Ltd in Sanand, 65% women & 45% men illiterate and 90% girls and 70% boys drop out after primary schooling. The situation has not improved much even till now. Most of girls gets married off after they attend eighth standard. Boys drop out in 9th or 10th standard to do daily job, start a small business or become agriculture laborers.
Lack of exposure to outer world
Children are not aware of current technological advancements and scientific innovations. They are confined to a limited source of learning materials mainly textbooks. Some schools do not have proper libraries, which is resulting in lack of information dissemination and poor reading.
Practice of Conventional pedagogical methods / Rote Learning in Schools
The current education system focus on rote learning thereby encourage to students to score higher marks in the exams. Such teaching practices discourage students to come to school or to continue further studies.
Lack of adequate materials in Science Labs
Most of the Government schools did not have necessary materials in science labs due to lack of funding. Some schools did not allow children to use existing materials in the fear that these will be damaged hence kept in glass boxes to avoid children to use them. Some schools did not even have science labs. These labs are just a storage space to dump old chairs and tables.
Goals and objectives
• To create awareness about renewable and non-renewables energy.
• Spark curiosity in children and encourage them to experiment and learn
• Encouraging deep learning process in an inter disciplinary modern framework
• Builds sensitization toward the energy crisis and climate change issues
• Acquaint students on emerging technologies and new digital innovations in the world
• To ignite interest in studies and think out of the box
• Provides a platform for students to study fundamentals scientific laws, electric circuits and components, specifications and uses.
DIY Kit Components
Breadboard, Hookup wire, Wire Stripper, Resistor, Ceramic Capacitor, Electrolytic Capacitor, Assorted Transistors, LEDs, Logic Gates, Misc ICS, Voltage Regulator, DC motor, Speaker, Buzzer and Misc ICs and Components, General Purpose Printed Circuit Board-5 Pc + Female Berg strip-5Pc+ Male Berg strip-5Pc, 9v batteries and connector clips.
- Robo India Pizo Buzzer (Set of 5)
- Gadget Deals 6 in 1 Soldering Iron Kit
- Component 7 General Purpose Printed Circuit Board-5 Pc + Female Berg strip-5Pc+ Male Berg strip-5Pc
- Component 7 Toy Motor (Set of 4)
- COMPONENT7 B00C743288 LED Pack-Basic-Ultimatum, 200 Pieces, 5 Colors
- Banggood 50797 Snap 9V Battery Clip Connector I Type with Cable, 10 Pieces, Black
- LDR – Light Dependent Register- Photo resistor (10 Pcs)
- Hi-Watt 9v BATTERY (Set of 10)
- ATRIM Ultimate Electronics Kit DIY Components Resistors, Breadboard, Wires, Capacitors, Transistors
- Kejia Transparent Glue Stick (20 Sticks)
- Stanley 69GR20B Gluepro Trigger Feed Hot Melt Glue Gun
Raspberry Pi Components
Raspberry Pi computer with digital programing – The Raspberry Pi is a low cost, credit card sized computer that plugs into a computer monitor or TV, and uses a standard keyboard and mouse.
Raspberry Pi 3 Computer
- SanDisk Ultra MicroSDHC 16GB UHS-I Class 10 Memory Card (SDSQUNB-016G-GN3MN) Rts™ High Quality Hdmi To Vga Converter Adapter Cable – The Simplest Converter (White)
- Official Raspberry Pi Case (for Raspberry Pi 3 Model B only) with free Heat sink
- Enter Multi Card Reader
- Cables Kart RJ45 CAT6 CAT5E Ethernet LAN Network Cable – 9.84 feet (3 Meter)
- PNY BE-740 BE-740 10400 mAh Power Bank
- Sony CP-AD2 USB 2.1A Fast Charging Adapter (Black)
- Logitech MK215 Wireless Keyboard and Mouse Combo
- Dupont DPNT Jumper Wires Male to Male, male to female, female to female, 120 Pieces
How it Went?
110 students participated in the program, with a duration of 2 hours on the following topics. A team consisted of 5 children and leader selected per team. I am not a raspberry pi certified educator nad vane not attended raspberry pi online course but I think it is a platform to explore and we have done it. I started talking about what is raspberry pi used for, what can you do with a raspberry pi 3, how it work, raspberry pi 3 famous projects for beginners, creative Raspberry Pi Projects etc.
I am planning to conduct more raspberry pi training workshops in Gujarat in Government schools.
DIY Topics
1. Sustainability & Energy introduction
2. Basic of electronics and solar concepts 3. Understanding of functioning of electronic components 4. Experimentation and creating electronic models
Digital Technology
• Introduction to Raspberry Pi 3 and parts
• Connection and working
• Demo on Programing
Outcomes
• Increased curiosity of children to explore more on science and related subjects
• Increased confidence of children to explore more on science related subjects
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| Raspberry Pi Training Workshop To Students in Gujarat |
Reference
1. About. (2017). Phenomenal Education. Retrieved 9 January 2017, from http://www.phenomenaleducation.info/about.html
2. Phenomenal education. (2017). Phenomenal Education. Retrieved 9 January 2017, from http://www.phenomenaleducation.info/
3. Beas Dev Ralhan. (2016). India can learn from Finland’s phenomenon-based learning system. http://www.hindustantimes.com/. Retrieved 9 January 2017, from http://www.hindustantimes.com/education/india-can-learn-from-finland-s-phenomenon-based-learning-system/story-PMu4sT7KrUyYE6c7yI3RZO.html
4. Raspberry Pi. (2017). En.wikipedia.org. Retrieved 9 January 2017, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi
5. Pratham. (2017). Img.asercentre.org. Retrieved 9 January 2017, from http://img.asercentre.org/docs/Publications/ASER%20Reports/ASER%202014/National%20PPTs/aser2014indiaenglish.pdf
