Coordinator Workshop on Aakash for Education

Introduction

It is now well established that the quality of education can be improved considerably by proper use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), to supplement the conventional mode of education. Aakash tablets were launched by MHRD in October 2011. These are Low Cost Access cum- computing Devices. The National Mission on Education using ICT (NME-ICT) envisages that these tablets should be deployed for empowering our students and teachers. The first project under this scheme, aims at deploying 1,00,000 tablets in the engineering colleges of the country, for their effective use in higher education. Adequate number of tablets will be issued at no cost to each participating Institute. Any development of contents and applications done by the students and faculty will be released in Open Source. The documentation and testing is expected to meet global standards of quality. It is expected that participation in this project will enhance Research and Development activities in this area, in all the participating Institutes. Larger deployment is being planned in the coming years.

Under this project, IIT Bombay plans to deploy the Aakash tablets in select engineering institutions in India, with two objectives. The first is to test and enhance the effectiveness of these tablets for use in class rooms. The second is development of new educational applications and contents on Aakash, largely through final year Research and Development projects done by BE/ME students at these Institutes.

Course content

The objective of this workshop is to introduce the tablet computers in general, and Aakash tablets in particular, to the participating faculty. The emphasis will be on using applications specially developed for Aakash at IIT Bombay, for effective use of these tablets in the educational process. Following topics will be covered in the workshop

• Introduction to tablet computers and Aakash.
• Applications available on Android platform
• Special educational applications:
• Clicker software for conducting tests.
• Proximity application to develop interactive lessons
• Programming environment on Aakash(C, C++, Python)
• Engineering application - Robot Control

Teaching Faculty

Prof. Deepak B. Phatak, IIT Bombay
Department of Computer Science

Prof. Uday Gaitonde, IIT Bombay
Department of Mechanical Engineering

Prof. Kannan Moudagalya, IIT Bombay Department of Chemical Engineering

Who Should Attend

Only Faculty members of designated Aakash Project Centers are eligible. These are remote centers of our e-outreach program, which have been nominated as `Aakash Project Centers` by IIT Bombay. Please click here to see the list of Aakash Remote Centers.

Participants should be employed at these Institutes as teachers, either as permanent or temporary teaching staff. Registered participants are required to attend the workshop at their respective Institutes only

Duration and Venue

The ISTE workshop on Aakash For Education will be conducted simultaneously at multiple remote centers across the country, in the distance mode. Every remote center will have about 50-75 participants. The workshop will include the delivery of live interactive lectures from IIT Bombay, and locally organized tutorial and laboratory sessions.

Criteria for Certification

NA

Course Fee

Since the workshop is funded by the National Mission on Education through ICT (MHRD, Government of India), there is no course fee for participation.

How to Apply

Those wishing to attend this workshop should enroll on or before 26th October 2012, at:

http://www.it.iitb.ac.in/nmeict/aakash

Enrolment will be strictly online, and no other mode of applications will be entertained.

Accommodation

Since only faculty members from the Remote Centers are going to attend the workshop no accomodation will be given to any faculty members

Note

It is mandatory that participants must attend the workshop on both days

Registered participants will be required to submit a group assignment within 2 weeks of the completion of the workshop. Only such participants will be issued ISTE certificates.

Since all participating teachers will be attending the workshop at their own place of work, there is no funding support for TA/DA and accommodation.

Aakash Project Centers will be provided limited funding support for conducting the workshop.

Address For Communication

Dr. Mukta Atrey,
Project Manager,
Department of CSE,
Kanwal Rekhi Building,
Indian Institute of Technology Bombay,
Mumbai - 400 076.
Tel.: +91-22-2576 4982/ 4983

Fax: +91-22-2572 0022
Email: eoutreach@it.iitb.ac.in