Feb 19, 2015
How does Hello-Hub look from our stand-point?
I am viewing it from a multifaceted perspective.
It is a data led project, informed by community participation.
Social impact is central to Hello-Hub.
A matter of perspective.
Physically it represents a beta version of how learning environments are making a transition away from traditional classroom paradigms. One might argue that its geographic data mapping potential, with an emphasis on enhanced child learning, positions Hello-Hub as a geo-spatial information tool.
It will probably become critical for ‘Projects For All’ to monitor and evaluate learners’ performance against multiple learning outcomes. Perhaps those outcomes could be relative to a mid to long term development plan aligned to local, state or national standards and industry relevant policy.
As a policy shaping tool, in pursuit of empathy, Hello-Hub could be used to investigate how children operate within real time assessment frame-works. It could listen to learning needs. It could be used to create a sense of agency and autonomy whilst learning. It could be used to factor in the extent to which teachers and teaching approaches are significant in improving educational outcomes. The cognitive divide that feeds into and exacerbates high levels of socio-economic inequality through existing rural education systems could be nipped in the bud.
From an ethno-social and linguistic perspective a complex but interesting line of enquiry requires deep diving with localised social structures. What might bubble to the surface when we question how skilled teachers in Suleja might frame digital technology, in order to enrich every child’s learning experience? What does a skilled teacher, who can expand a child’s world-view, look like?
In this context what we are looking at is probably the tip of the ice-berg when it comes to future trends of quality of learning at location intelligence. I don’t see why it should not be on a menu of solutions being reviewed by policy makers, particularly its social impact on Sub-Saharan Africa’s rural economy.
‘A highly educated person is more likely to engage with the child and ask thought provoking questions like, “why did you choose that colour?” or “what is going on here? What are those people saying?” These simple interactions open the door for an exchange of ideas and an expansion of intellectuality. This idea of interaction is further supported in “Effects of Reading Storybooks Aloud to Children” in which the authors cite their findings, “the amount of analytical talk that took place among the teacher and the children during the book reading strongly predicted children’s later vocabulary growth”. All elements point towards a sort of positive reinforcement beneficiary as expressed through vocabulary developed’— Excerpt Sourced from — ‘The Fault In The Educational System’ by Gabrielle Capasso
In my mind i flipped Gabrielle Capasso’s reference to ‘a highly educated person’ with ‘a highly curious community’. It echoes the cliched proverb ‘it takes a village to raise a child’. Re-framing this cliche as ‘It takes a highly curious community to raise a child’ to my mind embraces a bolder vision. It is relevant in a world where the internet extends learning opportunities to communities who previously did not have it. We now live in a situation where a mix of these opportunities, a highly competitive global labour market and smart technologies “will reward curiosity and penalise incuriosity on a global scale, because curiosity is a great motivator to learn”.
A learning crisis, where do learning outcomes fit?
“There are 8.7 million children out of school in Nigeria alone, and many millions more receiving a second rate education in Nigeria. This is the main issue as i see it. We sought a solution that was cost effective enough to reach every child in need of an education.” — Katrin Macmillan
One might ask what is an acute educational challenge right now? I imagine there are many and readers are likely to have varied points of view. I would argue a critical challenge is the availability of early learning systems designed to make learning visible, exploratory and self directed by pre-empting rote learning, low-quality education delivery and a consequent flat learning curve.
It is likely that absolute poverty, mass misery, adoption of extreme religious views, unemployed and unemployable youths are socio-economic challenges that are intricately related. These seem evident in high illiteracy levels, and frustrating life-conditions, across parts of Nigeria where young kids are vulnerable to manipulation by extremist groups such as Boko Haram.
“It has never been more important to reach Nigeria with the internet, the world’s body of knowledge, because education is the most effective way to fight endemic extremism, in my view.” — Katrin MacMillan
It is argued that in India where scientists and engineers are players in global technology, there is an appreciation of the difference between enrolling in school and learning to understand.
India’s Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) is making outcomes of learning visible to parents, carers, teachers and policy-makers; “it has become a mobilizing force for better quality education”. A variation of ASER has been adapted for use in Pakistan, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Mali and Senegal. Mexico and Nigeria may be in the process of adapting it for relevance.
Built by the community, for the community by katrin macmillan
“Rather than ‘give’ the communities these systems, we partner with them, working alongside, to make an equal investment of time, skills and knowledge in order to build a community owned, managed and maintained by Hello Hub. This ensures sustainability and community empowerment.
There are up to 150 daily participants from the community during the building of each Hub alongside the Projects For All Technical staff.
We focus on practical skills transfer; with 20 participants per Hub actively learning about technical maintenance of computer & communication equipment and solar power, and over 100 participants learning basic skills for computer equipment, and networking.”
*Katrin are there plans to build in curriculum which ensures key skills for future entrepreneurs and employment are taught and caught, in ways which empower children to direct their own learning?
“Yes! It is totally child-directed now. The children learn about their interests, they research their needs etc. Additionally, coding and programming are key skills, as well as the technology skills acquired in building the hub that are clearly transferable to employment.
We are trying to raise the funds to hire an Education and Curriculum Manager. Someone who can test for baseline academic standards in each child and then tailor a digital curriculum for them and monitor and test throughout their learning.”
I do not know that a systematic approach exists for a learning technology policy, underpinned by data science in Nigeria at the moment. However there seem to be aspirational conversations and uncoordinated attempts that are far less productive than they could be.
Typically policies and strategies tend to be top-down, and in both developed and developing parts of the world they are susceptible to politics of presumptions, “ tribal knowledge”, governance and institutional leadership. For a long time a bug-bear of society, think-tank fraternity and media across many parts of Sub-Saharan Africa has been an obsession with the lack of education infrastructure rather than a future proof socio-cultural capacity to adapt public cloud and anywhere access technologies.
Participatory Framework
Projects For All’s experience and service designers are working alongside parents, teachers and children in Suleja to guide ‘community informed experience design’. This is Inspired by Sugata Mitra’s ‘Hole in the Wall project’
Katrin MacMillan, Roland Wells, Caleb Flyn and Judith Mueller, co-working alongside their colleagues in Suleja, Aliyu Zubairu, Abu Augustine and Habiba Ali, have played facilitative roles enabling Suleja’s community beliefs, socio-cultural and economic contexts, aspirations and behaviours to influence experience design parameters.
The same co-working methods are helping in the development of Hello- Hub’s ‘design play-book’ project. The remit of this play-book includes references to open-source build instructions for Hello-Hub. It will be used to map cultural and contextual behaviours required to underpin the development of joined up curricula. It is also critical to how the project specification is being developed for scale, local adaptation and maintenance.
In a world where impact tracking prototypes are becoming part of evidence based policy tools for think-tanks, corporates, enterprise and public sector with convening power this project brings more questions to mind. These questions include: what type of approaches are needed to support rural learner-centred education systems across Africa? What specific role might infrastructure and mapping technologies play in supporting these approaches?
While classrooms have changed little in the last century, new approaches to teaching and learning are emerging. They are set to evolve further with the introduction of models that are learner and community centred. Might this be an opportunity to help concentrate the minds of civic society to re-think investment in learning spaces, which support unmet needs of early learners in rural communities?
Hello-Hub at scale, particularly in a national situation where 1 in 5 children are out of school, looks to me like a practical investment in every child’s socio-economic potential and long-term economic value for rural communities. Even more so in a 21st century environment where new infrastructure technologies and high-performing networks could extend underutilised learning abilities.
‘If kids can’t read there’ll be diamonds in the dust that you never get through on to a maths and science programme because actually they haven’t got the literacy’ — UK Literacy Campaigner Julia Cleverdon
From my stand point Hello-Hub looks like the basis of an early learning system underpinned by evidence on demand. It is an approach needed at the front lines of rural development.
This could be an opportunity to use data to make clear the distinction between enrollment numbers, the psychology of curiosity and the intrinsic desire to learn within rural communities.
An early learning system needs to conform to the learner, rather than the learner to the system.
We are not looking at a requirements document, a spreadsheet or a specification here. We have a functional product strategy, formalizing an emergent idea. To feel what Suleja’s schooling community feels, we need to spend time with them, learn about their specific wants, needs, and desires, unique culture and get to experience their emotions. Alternatively we need to listen to their narrative from authoritative data sources.
Please feel free to share your perspective, by examining lessons being learnt with Projects For All. This may include discussions about what is working and what might not be working; barriers being encountered; how the project can be scaled up or replicated; and where there may be opportunities for future intervention.
‘Hello-Hub is an off-grid education and internet kiosk. It is designed by charity Projects for All and built with family, teacher and pupil communities of Aguwan Gayan Primary School, Suleja, Niger State in Nigeria. Physically it consists of benches seating for up to eight people. It has two touch-screen computers complimented with rugged keyboards. It is built with standard off-the-shelf parts, they are housed in rugged waterproof enclosures which also protect against dust.
The computers are designed for easy maintenance, they feature remote access software to allow troubleshooting via public cloud technologies. The computers run a custom version of Edubuntu , an educational-themed Linux flavour, which contains a range of educational software as standard, plus an office suite, media editing tools and a web browser’ — adapted from hellohub.org
Indiegogo campaign to bring solar powered digital education hubs to 2 million children by 2019. View details @…
*a question I put out to Katrin McMillan during our conversations.
