Securing of technology

The School Manager, School Network assistants, Staff

Securing your technology during the vacation period

Khanya trusts that the technology has been most beneficial in its application for curriculum
purposes at your school. This communication serves to act in the interest in the continued use of
the technology at your school by securing it during the school vacation period.

The holiday periods have gained some notoriety for being the season when schools are hardest hit by either burglary or downright vandalism. With this in mind Khanya advises schools to pay
particular attention to having the equipment sufficiently insured and attending to security.

Please allow me to list but a few precautionary measures:Before going on vacation:

· Ensure that the school’s insurance has not lapsed and that it offers sufficient cover as the
one safety net that the school could count as a sustainability measure.

· Make sure that you make a backup of your system by following the proper backup
procedures outlined in the attached document. The backup should be done just before the
system is shut down for the vacation period and the backup drive should be stored safely in
the school’s strong room for the duration of the vacation.

· Servers should be shut down and disconnected completely.

· The UPS should be completely powered down according to the attached procedure.
Wes-Kaap Onderwysdepartement, Western Cape Education Department
ISebe leMfundo leNtshona Koloni

· All workstations should be properly shut down as per the attached procedure.

· Switch off all other peripherals including the Switches, Printers and Modems.

· After all equipment is switched off, all electrical plugs are to be removed from the wall
socket to avert electricity spikes and/or lightning damaging equipment.

· Draw up an infantry of all software. Software should be stored in the strong room with the
relevant licensing information and manuals.

· Dust covers (or even black bags) would protect the equipment from direct sunlight and
dust.
· Draw blinds/curtains to protect PCs from direct and harsh sunlight.

· Ensure that the windows seal to prevent sand and dust from entering.

· It might be prudent to box and store easily removed items such as mice, earphones,
disks, speakers and keyboards.

· If safety locks are attached to the workstations, ensure that the keys are securely locked
elsewhere.

· In high risk areas the feasibility of storing all equipment in the school safe could be
explored.

· Please ensure that the alarm system is switched on before leaving the school.

· Surely it could never be considered negligence on the school’s part should the unfortunate
happen amidst all reasonable precautionary measures taken to secure the technology.

After the vacation period:

· All electrical plugs should be placed back in the wall sockets.

· Switch on the UPS by following the attached procedure.

· Switch on the equipment in the following order: After switching on the UPS, switch on the
server and wait till the Windows logon screen is displayed. Switch on the switches followed
by the presentation workstation, the learner workstations and all other peripherals

· Make sure that the network is in full operation. If not, report the problems at the CeI
helpdesk on 021- 900 7123

Thank you for your tireless endeavours and indelible contribution to the growth of our learners.

It was NOT EASY, but it was WORTH IT !!

2009 @ Khanya was not easy, but it was WORTH IT !!

I, as a Khanya Facilitator, just want to say @ the end of 2009, that visiting schools with so many "obstacles" and many other social, emotional, physical, finacial and a host of other issues @ the schools, the learners ALWAYS surprised me with their absolute down-to-earth-up-to-heaven, human and spiritual believes. What a lesson for so many of us with so many .....

The highlight was on Friday 4/12/09 @ Bottelary PS...... watch and listen to the video clip.

Albie

CAMI 2010 @ Petunia PS

EMDC East and South met @ Petunia PS with Ricus Groenewald of CAMI re the 2010 version. Ricus took us through the latest updated CAMI.

Amoy assisted those who needed help, while Sylvain worked very hard towards his certificate award. Ricus was sometimes on his KNEES to explain the various feature within CAMI.

All in All it was a very rewarding workshop.

Albie

Kuyasa is IT!

The excitement on learners faces when David and Mark switched on the internet . The educator had already attached the laptop to the Interactive Whiteboard. They were eager to try the new device in their classroom despite the fact that others may laugh at the mistakes they make. Yet they seem to take this in their stride.

We went to the Takalani Sesame website and allowed learners to explore the pictures they could colour in. They may not know what the internet is, but they know what excites them. It is hoped that through the interaction with the interactive whiteboard and the internet learners will have greater exposure to a world far bigger than Khayelitsha.
The learner on the left was the first person to make shapes on the board using smiley faces. Other learners were disappointed that they did not get a chance to try their hand using the board.

It was good to see that learners and educators did not wait for their facilitator (Nontobeko) to instruct them. They took the bull by the horns.

Nontobeko has indicated that she is just as excited as the learners!

Technology Enabled

Amoy Appollis was in action today as the teacher in him reached out to the learners at Injongo Primary. After checking the interactive whiteboard he encouraged grade two learners to count in English and Afrikaans. Then it was to the board. There was no shortage of learners who would try out the board. This young lady did not need an invitation to do maths on the board. Her striking pose shows how confident she is in trying something new.

Sylvain assisted Amoy checking the interactive whiteboards at Yomelela The passion to engage with techology is evident as the facilitators go about their job explaining as much as they can in the short time they have with the school. This was done to ensure that educators understand how to use the board effectively.

From the learners' reactions it seems evident that they are excited to use techology. I hope they encourage the teachers too!

Umnqophiso Ps @ IAWB mania

Educators are excited in using the InterActive Whiteboard. Mr Thembile Galada explained the finer details of using the laptop together with the InterActive Whiteboard.

Halelua!!!! to the Khanya LTSM material

The educators @ Irista Prim are grateful to the Khanya LTSM team that developed such a wonderful material for learners. One educator confessed that if was for her learners, they would have liked to spend almost every minute of the day in the lab.

Sosebenza Primary in action

Sosebenza Primary has been part of the Khanya project as from 2008 June. The school grabbed the bull by its horns from the start until now. They have'nt gone weary of making use of this wonderful resource availed to them by the Khanya project.

The SNA (Mr Xolani Ndamane) going through the process of installing Khanya LTSM on the server.


Mrs Kamana explaining to the learners what they should do during her maths lesson with grade 6s.

Mr Futho with his grade 7 class in the lab. He is so cool and confident because technology is there for him as a resource to enhance his teaching methods.


Miss Sono is happy to have the software programs like CAMI reader that assist her in building & developing the learners’s vocabulary.

Wat is die slaap?

Wat is die slaap? ' n Wonder soete ding......as the poem goes.

Khanya work proves too much for this one or is he bored?

We'll let sleeping dogs lie or this one may bite your head off if your not careful.

Lol Sylvain!

Meeting at Intlanganiso

On friday a meeting was held at Intlanganiso to initiate the use of the Interactive Whiteboards at the school. Ms Dlova was the first to scribble some science stuff on the board while the other educators looked on. Three educators, Ms Dlova (Science), Mr Yali (maths) and Mr Ndoyantya (Geography) have attended training at Zola Secondary School. They are ready to assist other educators who are not so sure about using the board.


At our meeting we discussed :

• what the expectations and fears are when using the board,
• the usage of the boards,
  
• the time-tabling of the rooms,
• the management of people where the laptops were concerned, and
  
• the safety and security of the laptops. This included the updating of insurance.

Just before we used the board Allan Naidoo visited the school to check whether the quality of work was acceptable. Then it was time to play. For a short while we oriented the board again, wrote on it and played with the science flash animations.

Shortly, the interactive whiteboards will be in full use.

EMDC EAST KHANYA Team visits Schools

EMDC East Team under the leadership of Bonny Hendricks (Coordinator) decided to pay a courtesy visit to 9x schools to assess the usage of the LAB @ the schools during the fourth term. Schools were identified during a short meeting the previous day. Schools identified were those as indicated on the Term Planner of the Facilitators, also without being informed about the team visit.

Meeting @ Faure Youth Centre, the 10x EMDC East Team members (Bonny, Mark, Faeesa, Sylvain, Amoy, Siki, Sipho, Nontobeko, Steward and Albie) travel together in ONE vehicle. The route was preplanned to save travelling time and cost.The schools were in close proximity to one another. We left @ 8:09 am sharp to the first school and returned to FYC @ 13:15pm. The total distance travelled between the 9x schools were 82km from Macassar to Khayelitsha on average 9km apart between 2x schools.

The usage of the LABs @ schools varied from being fully utilized with an effective timetable, Khanya File in place, neatness inside the LAB noteworthy, learners @ the ws doing effective curriculum activities, to educators doing their digital data, to LABs "closed" for the day due to the exams @ schools. During the visit @ the various schools, brief meetings were held with the principals and SNAs, negotiations took place, advice were given, ideas were shared, general inspection was done re hardware and software, facilitators had the opportunity to gather some valuable insight into the LABs of one another and the LAB in general was evaluated re effectiveness.

During the morning travelling form one school to another, the facilitators had time to think about what was experienced at each school. Nevertheless all the formal and official duties, we also had a lot to laugh about inside the "taxi / VW Kombi" with Steward as the driver. The ride was sometimes slippery and bumpy due to the condition of the roads. The rainy weather also contibuted to a wet look appearance. Fitting into the Kombi was a tight business !! Sylvain even had time to ride on a black zebra with white stripes or is it a white zebra with black stripes ? @ one of the schools. Albie was later sentenced and put in the dogbox due to unrule behaviour. All in all - a fruitful exercise !!

Albie

GAMES ? Educational Games in the LAB ?

After CAMI perceptual activities, two educational games were allowed as a reward for being able to complete the LAB activity as on the OFFICIAL timetable. The time left towards the end of the period was being assigned for GAMES ! To reinforce the perceptual, literacy and numeracy skills and a host of other skills, learners engaged in a game. Is the LAB not suppose to be a LITNUM LAB ?

No, many other skills building activities can be implemented and after I scrutinized the game activities, it can be summarized as follows: reading the instructions of the game (LITERACY), then finding a clue to proceed (COMPREHENSION), using problem-solving skills to do an investigation (PLANNING), from the different learning areas included e.g. Social Science (mapwork) and Natural Science, then the learners had to decipher the task ahead by some word activities (SPELLING), that was followed by some word challenges (DECISION-MAKING), then an area was to be searched (MAPWORK SKILLS), eventually putting together a puzzle (PERCEPTUAL), doing some calculations that included Roman numerals (MATHEMATICAL skills / NUMERACY), also doing some mind mapping activites (HIERARCHICAL ORDER), then they had to focus on an specific area (ATTENTION SPAN), giving some serious concentration, expanding their wordbank (VOCABULARY), and eventually exploring the natural environment (LOR). Further, finding an object must be done by looking at colour, shape, size, spatial orientation, sequences, retention and background.

WOW what an LITNUM Educational GAME !!!

Albie