Labs on tabs for science buffs in govt schools

A few government schools in the State will be provided with tablets loaded with interactive content on various science subjects to help them understand these subjects better.

 
The ‘Lab-on-a-Tab’ project, as it is called, is being implemented by Agasthya International Foundation, an NGO and Lenovo, the computer technology company. The project was officially inaugurated here on Wednesday.  

It will be initially implemented on a pilot basis in five government schools within the City, involving 150 students and four other schools around Kuppam, involving 108 students studying in classes four to nine. As many as 160 tablets will be provided in the nine schools.

“The project has been implemented in a few schools in Pondicherry on a pilot basis as well. The pilot phase in Karnataka will be for a period of three months, after which a decision will be taken whether or not to scale it up. For now, it will focus on various key areas,” Bhaskar, Choudhuri, Director, Marketing, Lenovo India, said.

The tablets will have a number of interactive experiments on physics, chemistry and biology. It includes six modules on topics such as plants, food, matter, water, air, volume along with various videos and e-books. Learning will also be complemented by hands on science toolkits provided by the organisations involved. The entire content is in Kannada as the tablets are specifically designed for government schoolchildren who are more fluent in the language.

“This self-learning platform will also have a means of assessment to gauge the levels of learning from the exercises given. A number of institutions, such as NIT Warangal and National University of Singapore, have helped in the making of the interactive tool,” K

Thyagrajan, Chief operating officer, Agasthya International Foundation, said.
In addition to this, the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) and Samhita Social Ventures, a social sector venture firm, are also a part of the project.  

Tablets were handed over to some government schoolchildren who were present in the inaugural programme. “We do not have any labs to learn any science experiments. So, these tablets will be helpful. However, I think I can learn everything in the tab within a day itself,” Pawan, who is studying in class eight in a government school, said.