On Feb 19, 2008 5:29 PM, Thomas Wanhoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Dear Edward, I got your address through the Cambodian Blogger Summit > Group. You were asking for help regarding the One Laptop per Child for > Cambodia.
Thank you. > I am just a foreigner in this country, working as an employee for a > Cambodian company (I am the manager of Monument Toys). But I have some > experience in human ressources now. The main problem in this country > is that the most Cambodians do not have a wide knowledge. We have a > lot of primary schools here, and its always nice to see children > smiling, but when they grown up, there is nothing left. > > Yes, of course they need to learn writing and reading in Khmer, but > English too, and this means on a higher level then before. And they > need something like Wikipedia on DVD, because they do not learn in > school the basics about the world (not only the western, the whole > world I mean.) These are issues that One Laptop Per Child has thought about seriously, and addressed. OLPC XO laptops for Cambodia will include both Khmer and English. School servers in areas without Internet will have a large part of Wikipedia on their hard drives, in both Khmer and English. > It would be fine if the laptops do not only offer the basics. Check > out KhmerOS, they translated even Open Office. See http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Activities for a list of XO software, current and in development. OpenOffice would not fit on the XO, but it includes a version of AbiWord. We intend to mine KhmerOS for translations and computer vocabulary that we can use in XO software. Any bilingual Cambodians who would like to help can join our localization list at http://lists.laptop.org. We are setting up a Khmer language project at http://dev.laptop.org/translate. We also need Khmer and Pali literature and textbooks (public domain or under Free license), and assistance setting up text-to-speech conversion in Khmer. > But keep in mind, that the total level of education is very low, > although we have so many NGOs here. But nobody takes really care about > the knowledge level of the young people from 20 up. But thats the next > generation in charge. The plan is to support not just the traditional curriculum, but teaching children how to learn new subjects on their own, using collaborative discovery. The first experiments that led to the One Laptop Per Child program were done in Cambodia. http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Constructionism Then Earth Treasury intends to teach students with computer skills, learning skills, and other skills and knowledge how to go into sustainable international business together. > Just my 20 cents > > Greetings from Phnom Penh > Thomas > -- > mobil: +855 12598370 > skype: thomaswanhoff > Blog: http://wanhoffs-cambodia.blogspot.com (english) > Blog: http://weblog.wanhoff.de (german) > > Podcast: Wanhoffs Wunderbare Welt der Wissenschaft > (http://wissenschaft.wanhoff.de) May we package your science podcasts for the XO, and translate them into other languages? -- Edward Cherlin End Poverty at a Profit by teaching children business http://www.EarthTreasury.org/ "The best way to predict the future is to invent it."--Alan Kay _______________________________________________ Library mailing list [email protected] http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/library
