Sunday, May 18, 2008

Teaching kids computing - Tiki Wiki on Linux part 1

I teach twice a week at my children's school. One is too stage 2 children (7-9 year olds) and this is the basics around understanding emails, internet and using tools such as PowerPoint and movie maker. I add value because I have been using these tools for decades, where for a lot of teachers it is fairly new. Although, there are exceptions teachers as a rule are behind on technology. Where I worked previously all members of staff were expected to be able to run an Excel model and put the results into word or PowerPoint for at least a decade.
For the second lesson, this is with stage 3 children who are around 9-12 years old. Last year I just gave them the same course as the stage 2 children, but these kids are moving ahead so fast I thought I would do something different. I decided to get the kids to create and manage a wiki for the school. I was going to put it on a Microsoft Server as the school could get free licenses but decided that it would be less hassle to put it on a Linux box. I chose Ubuntu 7.10 and Tiki Wiki for the wiki. Ubuntu because it was available on the Linux Mag and Tiki Wiki because it also allows forums and blogs.
this series of posts is about my adventures as a linux tyro setting up the server and installing the wiki and hopefully how the children enjoy the experience with this millenniums version of a school newspaper

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