mikes web log

Because of Eid quite a few schools in Birmingham restarted on the 8th. This was therefore the first week of the New Year. Two weeks of wonderful problems now seem to have surfaced and are gasping for air. Five of these are linked to non-internet access, two are associated with moving, ten are linked to adding software to the computers (self imposed), three are parents who have decided that they don’t want to continue with the arrangement, five are families complaining that they have not been connected, four are linked to things not really working and the rest are the vast array of things that could and will go wrong in a project of this sort.

The week did however finish well as magically Giai, the wireless providers, appeared in the area and began sorting out the problems. Who would have believed that lack of Internet access could have been caused by a poor connection between the aerial and the amplifier box! At last the computer at 259 has been reimaged so I can load the school based software. Why did it need reimaging – the family member who choose to be the computer administrator had forgotten his password.

There are the positives. Training of parents begins on Monday, next week. This is at the heart of the project – it begins the process of the pupils training the adults. There was also the vison in the ‘My Documents’ files of all the dissertation references in one home I visited. Firstly, I don’t deliberately look into these files, one of the software packages has me downloading to the computer and installing from that region. In this case the 6th  former living in the house was using the computer very effectively. I also came across one our teachers introducing blogs to his year 3 pupils – wow.

I am beginning to think that the exciting times are just beginning. Roll on next week.