Teachers’ First Experience of Computers
Cluster-level training was held at Karimnagar, Warangal and Ranga Reddy during 19–29 June 2017. A total of 1,552 teachers were invited to the training, 207 from Ranga Reddy, 683 from Warangal and 662 from Karimnagar. A total 1,246 teachers attended (180, 491 and 575 respectively), giving a total attendance of 80%. Initially, teachers were confused as they never got the opportunity to work on computers. They were always dependent on others to create their e-mails or to check their messages. Though many of them have smartphones, they are not well versed with all the features of a smartphone. Most of the teachers use the Internet only at home and with a WIFI connection; they don’t use digital data at all at school. Further, they don’t know many applications.
Participating teachers were happy with the training as they got to learn about computers and some applications, which enabled them to make use of computers. They expressed some apprehensions regarding their ability to continue using the computers in their schools, because those computers were outdated and frequently in need of repairs.
The teachers appreciated our efforts and were happy with the way the course was designed and delivered. Many shared with us their experiences of earlier training programmes that were not nearly as interactive. They felt that this training was conducted in a different (more realistic) environment and that, with this new experience, they would look forward to our next training.
We have registered the participants on our website (tissx.tiss.edu), explained about the course and added almost all of them on Telegram. They have learned how to create their own email ids and create and work on spreadsheets. They were particularly interested in mindmaps and very keen to learn more about them.
(Radhika Ajit, Assistant Co-ordinator, Telangana Implementation team, CLIx)
I am a computer teacher at a large private school. I teach 545 students every My first class filters in and sits in my “silent zone” at the front of the classroom. … We also set up a time for her class to use one of the computer labs