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Welcome to the home of E-Minima - bring the Internet to the grassroots for better learning and governance.

PLMun training
Pamantasan ng Lunsod ng Muntinlupa President
Miguel Udtohan (inset) addressed participants
in the short but productive training session.

Dr. Raffy Mananghaya and Teacher Laury Arca served as trainors/speakers during the seminar on ICT Infusion in Instruction held at Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Muntinlupa last June 7, 2005. Following are the highlights of the occasion:

Introduction

  • Dr. Mananghaya started with an analogy of teachers/participants and young pigeons. The young pigeons still struggle learning how to fly but once they fully learned the task, they reach places they never imagined they could.
  • Constructivism; Autonomous Learning; Cooperative Learning - These are the new teaching models that go with computer-aided learning. 
  • Teachers are very creative at their own personal time. Some learn fast early in the morning. Some in the afternoon. Some in the evening. Some at noontime. They must thus be given the tools which they may use in capturing their creativity immediately.
  • Creativity + access to information = production of new knowledge.
  • www (the world wide web) is assumed in the easy search for information.
  • In the new era of learning, we help the students to help themselves and learn by themselves. Example sharing of effort:

    40% of learning = teachers
    60% of learning = students

  • Trust has to be there in an open learning environment. Willingness to join is another requirement. Combined, they foster the cooperative spirit essential to learning. 

Seminar Proper

Lesson 1. Puppy

  • Assume that you are now in your creative moment and using your new, inexpensive computer. Get the CD copied from your EM partner/friend. Turn on the PC and insert the CD. After the PC boots from the CD, you will be able to compose your thoughts using Scribus and save your pages as PDF. You can also use the Puppy CD to operate the DidiWiki for collaborative writing.

  • Native means locally raised, or the traits of a local. Being a Linux variant, Puppy is native to community self-help. However, not many people know it because it has no advertising budget.

  • Software native to commercial ventures are popular because of advertising. Example of advertising: Sharon Cuneta. People get to know the product she endorsed. People even vote for a candidate because of advertising.

  • Some answers are needed during the first boot of Puppy. One is the format of the keyboard: use US format (it is easy to do computing here because we just accept the US format). Next is the mouse: accept PS mouse. Answer NO to the scroll/wheel mouse question. Then choose
    the screen resolution: 800x600 x16 is the usual, or try 1024x768x16 for new monitors.
  • Data storage - In linux, devices are mounted and placed in /mnt. The Utilities - Mount option is used for mounting or unmounting devices like /mnt/floppy (your floppy disk) or /mnt/home (your hard disk).

  • In Linux, the administrator is called root. Your desktop is therefore in the /root folder.

  • Because of its speed and small size, Puppy Linux is timesaving and therefore maximizes your productivity.

  • What if you are using other operating systems? Can you still view and print your PDF file? Yes.

  • Sharing is a native feature of Linux. The ghttpd folder in the Puppy desktop  contains the httpd server - just right-click then select Run to start it. You can view the contents of the htdocs folder when you enter localhost in the browser. To make your PC viewable by others in a network, give it an IP address by opening a terminal and typing the command

    ifconfig eth0 192.168.0.100

  • With trust and sharing comes collaboration. Puppy can host your collaboration - start the DidiWiki server under Information Management. You will see the Wiki when your enter in the browser localhost:8000. LAN users can see it at 192.168.0.100:8000.
  • Wiki comes from the Hawaiian term wikiwiki meaning quick. What are the things that we can do with a wiki? Just press Edit to edit any page! It is a never-ending open editing for everyone with access to the network.

  • That people can be trusting and reliable is assumed by the wiki. It also allows you to outline your ideas before you write them. Words that you enclose in square brackets [] become links to new pages. After saving the outline page, click on the new link to put content to the page (the page is created automatically).  Caution: avoid using spaces when creating links this way. Use CamelCase style of writing, like MyName and YourName will be how we will write those links.

    HANDS ON: The participants were quick in using the Wiki - they even used it for chatting! They enjoyed the ability to first outline their thoughts as links then do the writing of pages later.

Lesson 2. Web Publishing

Teacher Laury Arca opened the session with her story about annex.ph-islands.net. She has already written a module for values education complete with drawings, and with Eminima, she is starting to publish the module chapters together with quizzes in the website.

This summer, Laury spent around two working days (spread across different sessions) putting content to the site. Being the first Eminima partner to do so, she asked Sir Raffy for help via text or phone when needed. News, officials' messages as well as practice tests are now available in the site. This coming first semester, she will start deploying the module chapters as PDF, and accompany each chapter with pre- and post-test that can be taken online.

HANDS-ON: Web page publishing via ph-islands.net/plmun - the PLMun website, and eminima.org

  • Everyone was excited to see the school’s website. Some created tests. Some typed memos. Everybody did something. They agreed to get started with syllabus for their respective classes.
  • As there is a free site offer for those willing to help promote eminima, one participant (Ron Diaz) asked for and got his free site (ph-islands.net/rondiaz).

  • Sample pages and tests were shown by selected participants at the end of the hands-on exercise.

Other Lessons:

  • Tux Paint - downloading and trying Tux Paint for Windows. Tux Paint is also available in the Slax/EM CD - just command tuxpaint while in a terminal window. This is very useful for creative drawing for kids (as well as for teachers who want to make drawings easily). Content has to be attractive, too!

  • Cute PDF - download and install two files in Windows for enabling the conversion of any file to PDF. After restarting, you can print to the Cute PDF "printer" and the PDF page will be produced. Then upload the PDF pages in your website.

Wrap-Up by Dr. Mananghaya

  • There are two live CDs, the Slax/EM CD and the Puppy CD. Both can be copied to mini-CD.

  • Server in your pocket - Imagine the convenience to a teacher of having a server in her pocket. This is the Slax/EM CD. The website appears exactly like the ones used in the hands-on exercise.

  • Puppy is loaded to memory, so even if the Puppy CD is removed from the PC, all Puppy software run until the PC is shut off.

  • We were here to learn something that will give us freedom to create and promote learning. As you, the teacher, become the Web administrator, both the freedom and responsibility are yours.

    Remember Spiderman?