Education In Nepal
About OLE Nepal
Technical
Implementation
Education In Nepal
What are the main issues concerning education in Nepal?
The main problems facing the education system in Nepal can be categorized into four areas: quality, access, disparity, and rapid expansion. For a number of reasons, the dominant learning style is rote memorization. We think that the introduction of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) can help Nepali schools provide interactive, student-centered education that will result much greater student achievement, academically and in the real world.
Some 20%
of Nepal’s school-age children never attend school. Of those that
do attend school, 46% drop out before grade five. Some of these factors are due that poverty that more effective instruction and materials cannot address. That said, integrating ICT in education would provide working children and children in very remote areas with the flexibility they need to pursue their educations.
Their is a tremendous gap in educational quality between public schools and private schools in Nepal. For this reason, we believe that the "Quality Divide" in Nepali education is much more serious than any "Digital Divide."
Nepal's school-age population is expanding rapidly while school facilities are not. Nepal needs to find innovative solutions to address the issues of quality, access, and disparity while expanding to accommodate large numbers of new students.
OLE Nepal is committed to:
- Ensure
universal access to
primary and secondary education for all Nepali children
- Significantly
enhance the quality of education provided in Nepal
- Reduce the disparity between public and private schooling in Nepal
OLE
Nepal intends to accomplish these goals by 2015
How can these problems be solved?
We believe these problems require a solution that integrates
increased spending on education, extensive teacher training,
and the introduction of ICT. More specifically, we believe that
government should develop digital learning activities, high-quality
digital educational content, and use inexpensive, low-power computers
to deliver those materials.
Who's responsibility is education in Nepal?
Public education is the responsibility of Nepal's Ministry of
Education. There are several agencies under the Ministry of Education
such as the Department of Education, Curriculum Development Center,
and the National Center for Education Development.
How can ICT help solve these problems?
ICT cannot cure all the problems that beset Nepal's education system. Giving one laptop to every child will not make them smart nor lift them out of poverty. That said, ICT can be an extremely cost-effective method to provide high-quality, interactive learning materials that would be financially impossible in another form.
Computers are only as good as the applications they provide. For example, telephones are only useful insofar that we use them to communicate with other human beings. We recognize in ICT some cost-effective strategies to address the issues of quality, access, disparity, and rapid expansion.
What is OLE Nepal doing about these problems?
We are working with Nepal's Ministry of Education to implement the One Laptop Per Child pilot in 2008. We are developing the digital educational materials for the pilot, advising the government on implementation and teacher training.
While we are working on the One Laptop Per Child project, we see OLE Nepal as a larger movement to develop and implement high-quality, open-source, digital learning materials for schools.
Is it proven that ICT can help children learn better?
ICT in itself is not a cure all for Nepal's education system. We believe that better teachers and better learning environments help children learn better. We believe that ICT can facilitate this process.
What is "Open Source?" Why is Open-Source important to ICT in education?
By “free” we mean that
any person or group of persons may use the curricula and related
materials on OLE libraries without paying a fee. Normally the creators
of such materials have licensed them under a Creative Commons license
making such use free of any charges. There may be occasions where a
world-wide license fee, without limit of time, is paid to the creator
of a given set of materials in order for it to be used in that way.
By “open source” we
mean that the portions of the content can be extracted from the
materials and mixed with other materials to create “new” content. In
most such cases, the origin of the source materials must be closely
identified with those materials. The license terms may, or may not,
include a prohibition for “commercial use” by which is meant that the
original material cannot be sold as a part of a new package, for
commercial purposes.
Open-source licensing allows educators to rapidly improve materials based on feedback from teachers and students. With copyrighted materials, changes can only be made by the copyright holder.
Educational materials are a common good. The largest purchaser of educational textbooks and related materials is the government. Each new textbook must be written from scratch due to copyright constraints. This prevents textbooks writers from building on the work others and optimizing them.
About OLE Nepal
Is OLE Nepal a non-profit organization?
OLE Nepal is a Nepali-led, non-governmental organization registered in Nepal. We do not earn profits but we are happy to work with private companies to develop open-source learning materials.
How and when did OLE Nepal get started?
The founders of OLE Nepal, Rabi Karmacharya, Saurav Dev Bhatta, Mahabir
Pun, and Bryan Berry, have been collectively working on the OLPC
project in Nepal since Summer 2006. After the Nepal's Minister of
Education approved a pilot of OLPC in May of 2007, the group decided to
create a formal NGO to help the government of Nepal implement the OLPC
project.
Are your materials Open-Source?
All the materials we develop will be released under an open-source license. At this time we are planning on using the MIT license or a BSD-style license for our learning activities. For non-interactive content, such as images and text documents we will most likely use the Creative Commons-Attribution-Share-Alike license.
How are you developing learning activities?
We have development team that includes two part-time educators, a full-time graphic designer, and three full-time programmers. We are in the process of hiring a two full-time educators, an additional graphic designer, and two more programmers.
The workflow is like this:
- The educators determine the learning outcomes for new activities based on the Nepali curriculum
- Educator and graphic designer outline and layout the learning activity
- Educator and graphic designer use Squeak's scripting interface to build the learning activity
- Programmers write any code modules not already available within the Squeak tool.
- Test with kids, teachers
Are teachers involved?
Teachers are very much involved. At the moment, one of the most respected educators in Nepal is working with us closely to develop learning activities. Read more about Christine Stone.
What ages and subjects are you targeting?
For fall 2007 thru 2008 we are creating learning activities for Math, Science, and English for Grades 2 and 6
Do you have an implementation plan for Nepal?
We do. Please see our Concept Note for details.
Who are your partners? Who are you working with?
Our primary partner is Open Learning Exchange, Inc. a non-governmental organization based in Cambridge, USA. OLE provides us with organizational and some financial support.
The Danish IT Society has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with OLE, Inc. to raise funds for laptops for Nepal and other developing nations.
How would a teacher use ICT in the classroom in Nepal?
In the typical Nepali classroom, the teacher speaks and students listen. There is minimal classroom interaction. Class sizes ranging from 50-100 students make western-style teaching nearly impossible. We intend for the teacher to read a text from her computer and then have her students work on digital learning activity in class. While the students are working on the activity, the teacher can answer questions and otherwise assist students encountering problems.
Nepali teachers are focused on getting their students to pass grade level exams. For this reason we develop all of our learning materials in line with Nepal's national curriculum. Teachers will not use fantastic learning materials if those materials will not help their students pass grade level exams. They most likely would use digital learning materials if they believe they will help their students pass their exams.
Additionally, the teacher could use ICT for her own professional development. Currently, teachers must travel to distant sites for authorized teacher training. A large portion of teachers never receive any kind of training due to funding problems.
What types of educational materials are you developing?
We are developing interactive materials and reference materials. Our development team is using Squeak to develop the interactive materials and we are working with Nepali academics to develop reference material.
There are so many educational materials on the Internet, why are you building educational materials from scratch?
There is actually very little Nepali language material for the primary and secondary levels. While there are English language materials for primary and secondary, the vast majority of them are copyrighted against free distribution and translation.
Nepali teachers are focused on getting their students to pass grade
level exams. For this reason we develop all of our learning materials
in line with Nepal's national curriculum. Teachers will not use
fantastic learning materials if those materials will not help their
students pass grade level exams. They most likely would use digital
learning materials if they believe they will help their students pass
their exams.
Are you developing Nepali-language materials?
Over the next five years we will work together with the Nepali government to develop a fully digital, open-source learning materials for grades 1 - 12, all subjects. These materials will primarily be in Nepali.
How is OLE Nepal connected to the One Laptop Per Child project?
We support the aims of the One Laptop Per Child project but we are not officially associated with them. We believe that integrating ICT into education is a long term project over which time the various hardware options will change rapidly. We will work with any ICT hardware that best fits the educational needs of children.
How is OLE Nepal related to OLE, Inc.?
OLE Nepal is the first member of what will be a global network of OLE Centers. As an OLE Center, OLE Nepal is affiliated with OLE, Inc. but not a subsidiary. We are an independent Nepali non-governmental organization.
OLE assists its centers in organizing curricula, outreach, and
financing, as well as connecting independent educational communities
within their country and with international communities.
Implementation
What is interactive-content?
Interactive-content refers to educational activities that require a response from the user. Our learning activities require the child to input answers to questions posed and provide the child with feedback on the appropriateness of the answer, e.g. correct, incorrect.
What is reference-focused content?
Reference-focused content does not require a response from the user. We consider dictionaries, encyclopedias, and textbooks to be reference content. Some textbooks do have activities that require children to answer questions and then verify them with an answer guide.
What are the key pedagogical principles in developing interactive content?
Why do poor children need computers?
Does OLE Nepal expect the Nepali government to buy a computer for every school-age child in Nepal?
We believe that this is a matter for the Nepali government and Nepali public to decide. We are focused on creating high-quality materials and training teachers how to use them. The government should purchase the supporting technology when and if OLE Nepal can show that the educational benefit merits the costs.
What is ICT in education?
What is Educator-Driven Development?
What is OLE Nepal's relationship with Nepal's Ministry of Education?
OLE Nepal signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Nepal's Department of Education on November 18th, 2007. This memorandum confirmed an agreement between the Government of Nepal and OLE Nepal to collaborate on content development, wireless networking, and implementing Nepal's pilot of One Laptop Per Child.
Does OLE Nepal use constructionist theory for its learning activities?
When does the Nepali government plan to pilot OLPC?
The Nepali government plans to pilot the OLPC laptops at a Nepali school in Spring of 2008. The particular school has yet to be determined.
What is the relationship between education and poverty?
How can investment in education reduce poverty?
Why should Nepal invest in education rather than infrastructure?
Is it worth spending scarce resources on ICT in education?
Why do we need to urgently move ahead?
Are you partnering with schools outside of Nepal?
We have not yet formed partnerships with schools outside of Nepal. We welcome any opportunity to link Nepali public schools with schools abroad.
Are you working with private schools?
We are happy to work with educators and children of any school, public or private. That said, we are focusing on improving the quality of public schools. We will pilot this project in government schools for the foreseeable future.
Do you have a plan for a pilot project?
We have drafted an implementation plan for the pilot project and shared it with the Department of Education. We hope that the government finalizes the plan for the pilot project soon.
What are your goals for the next few years?
Please see the About page for an overview of our mission.
What is the scale and scope of the pilot?
The government of Nepal has yet to determine the scale and scope of the pilot.
Do you have demo activities?
We do. Please download them and give us feedback.
Can this approach help promote inclusive education? [disability, regional, disadvantaged groups]
What are the challenges of implementing ICT in education?
Technical
What license are you using for your activities?
We intend to use the MIT license or another BSD-style license for our Squeak-based learning activities. We will use the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution-ShareAlike license for images and other types of static content.
How can I get involved in activity development?
Check out our "Get Involved" page for details.
Are you only using Squeak for activity development?
For the time being our development team is focusing on developing learning activities using Squeak because it allows us rapidly develop interactive, media-rich activities. Further, teachers can use Squeak's drag-and-drop interface to modify learning activities developed by others.
We are open to using tools such as pygame, GCompris, or Flash in the future.
Will you connect the pilot schools to the Internet?
We do intend to connect the pilot schools to the Internet using WiFi Line-of-Sight (LOS) radios and off-the-shelf omnidirectional wireless routers at the school.
We hope to avoid using VSAT or satellite for Internet access. The bandwidth charges are simply too high. WiFi Line-of-Sight networks are a viable option for most parts of Nepal.
How will you protect children from objectionable material on the Internet?
We will use a content filter and firewall to block access to objectionable materials. If we cannot consistently stop access to illicit materials, we will use whitelist to limit Internet traffic to approved sites and services.
What are you guys doing to connect pilot schools to the Internet? To power the laptops?
We are working with Nepal Wireless to to connect remote schools to the Internet and establishing local power schemes for the laptops. Nepal Wireless is a Nepali NGO with an amazing track record of connecting remote Nepali villages to the Internet with inexpensive WiFi systems. The founder of Nepal Wireless, Mahabir Pun, is a member of the OLE Nepal management team.
Who will maintain the computers at the local level?
Locals will have to be responsible for maintaining the individual machines. We believe that villagers can be trained to fix basic hardware problems and reload corrupted hard/flash drives w/ USB sticks. However, we don't think it is realistic to train locals how to administer a linux server. For that reason we intend to locate the school servers in central or regional locations. |
