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• Publié par: Chiod
• Nombre de lectures: 15
• Langue: English

Extrait

OFFICE OF ADULT EDUCATION

COMPUTER LITERACY INITIATIVE

2009-2010

PROGRAM NAME Darlington County School District

DIRECTOR: Portia McJunkin

Please write a brief narrative that describes what your program did in each of the

following instances.

1.

Please describe your computer literacy class and the curriculum used to

teach the class.

We developed our own curriculum. Many of the activities are available on our

web site, located at www.darlington.k12.sc.us.

“Brain Train” was designed to exercise the body’s most important muscle – the

brain -- through an engaging, interactive computer-based curriculum modeled, in

part, upon the Nintendo hand-held game, Brain Age. For those familiar with the

Nintendo game, each session begam with participants racing against the clock –

without the aid of a calculator -- to record their responses to multiplication,

division, addition, and subtraction problems. (This sounds a great deal like our

TABE Math Computation Subtest, doesn’t it?)

To keep their brains in top form, during the 72-hour class, participants learned to:

play Sudoku, Solitaire, and Scrabble on the computer; examine visual images that

can be interpreted in more than one manner; play “reflex” games to reinforce

hand-eye-coordination; “draw” on the computer using the mouse as an extension

of their hands; decipher logic puzzles and riddles that challenge their normal train

of thought; and participate in timed games and activities to push their reasoning

skills to the limit. Teacher-directed math instruction, designed both to stimulate

the brain and to aid students in achieving EFL gains in post-testing, constituted a

segment of every instructional session.

For additional math practice, students

utilized available software programs (WIN and Pre-GED), as well as math

websites such as www.math.com. Although individuals of any age were

encouraged to participate, the class was designed with the 40+ population -- those

who are all too quickly losing their precious brain cells -- in mind.

2.

Please explain how your class was designed by describing the number of

hours per day or per week students trained on the computer, and the number

of hours they received academic training.

We ran three classes, which met 9-12 hours per week. Classes were held in the

computer lab, and academic skills were incorporated into each class session.

Participants received 30 hours in computer training and 30 hours in academic

skills.

3.

How was your computer literacy class marketed?

Direct mailings to former

Computing for Seniors Participants and distribution of flyers.

4.

Who was your target audience?

If applicable, please include any

partnerships that were used to gather students for the class.

Individuals age 40+ who wanted to improve computer literacy skills and keep

their brains sharp and active.

5.

If you had an opportunity to re-write your proposal, what would you do

differently?

We received much positive oral feedback from the participants, but 60 hours of

instruction was LONG, and they struggled a bit with the daily emphasis upon

TABE math skills. Math computation instruction was a component of every single

class period, which was a struggle for our oldest participants (four of whom were

OVER age 80!) Overall, 42% completed their EFL. 2 of the 19 who completed

the class came in at ASE High, which negatively impacted the overall EFL

performance level.

When offering this grant-funded opportunity, we also offered, in-house, another

shorter class,

Preserving the Past

, to a different group of individuals age 50+; that

class provided the opportunity for participants to write short memoirs that they

could pass on to children/grand-children and also included several instructional

opportunities in our computer lab, where they scanned in original photographs

designed to “illustrate” their writing.

Each participant left us with a “thumb

drive” to which they had saved their work.

In the future, I would suggest offering a two-part class, consisting of at least 30

hours of

Preserving the Past

and another 30 hours of

Brain Train

. Combined,

every individual would have at least 60 contact hours of instruction; use of

computers would play an important academic role in both sessions.

Participants

could be pre- and post-tested in either TABE Reading or Language Skills. Such a

two-part class, aimed at our older residents, would elicit a great deal of

participation from our community.