Kerala’s IT@School Project has created and released a suite of DVD-based resources to fuel its Information and Communication Technology-driven education system. The resource DVDs being provided free to High School teachers in the State-run and state supported system, come packed with several educational contents such as IT@School Edu-Ubuntu 10.04 Operating System, Spreadsheet, Presentation and Database applications,DTP, Graphics and Imaging software, Sound recording , Video editing and Animation packages.
All based on Open Source Software, the tools would cost over Rs 30,000 if proprietary versions were used, say IT@School officials.
The DVD release includes Open Office templates, Audio-Video files of various formats, E-Textbooks, Teacher's handbook, Training modules etc.
Some 31,740 teachers from 2,670 High Schools of the State have registered online for the training programme for whichj these DVDS will form the primary takeaway. “The fact that IT@School Project is releasing these DVDs under the Free Software license enables not simply teachers and students but also the general public an opportunity to copy, distribute and share the contents in the DVD and use it as they wish”, said K.Anvar Sadath, Executive Director, IT@School Project.

Young animators!
The new ICT textbook in Standard 9 is designed to help the students learn Sound recording, Video Editing and Animation processes easily using free software based applications. ANTS-  the Animation Training for Students programme on animation movie-making training for students which was launched by IT@School Project last week is said to to have been a huge success. Through the four-day training programme, students were equipped with unique animation movie making skills using Free Software and the 560 students who were trained in the first batch have already started to contribute their contents to IT@School ViCTERS education channel.
May 12 2011