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Erwin in South Korea

Interacting with the Korean students.

ERWIN O. MOGUSU

At Chuncheon National University of Education in South Korea.

Elementally school pupils

Kenyan teachers pose for a photo with the Korean school children.

Travelling to Korea

At Dubai International Airport.

Sunday 29 April 2018

Sir Isaac Newton


English physicist and mathematician Sir Isaac Newton, most famous for his law of gravitation, was instrumental in the scientific revolution of the 17th century.
Isaac Newton was a physicist and mathematician who developed the principles of modern physics, including the laws of motion, and is credited as one of the great minds of the 17th century. In 1687, he published his most acclaimed work, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), which has been called the single most influential book on physics. In 1705, he was knighted by Queen Anne of England, making him Sir Isaac Newton. 

Portrait of man in black with shoulder-length, wavy brown hair, a large sharp nose, and a distracted gaze 
Portrait of Newton
He was born on January 4, 1643, in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England. Using the "old" Julien calendar, Newton's birth date is sometimes displayed as December 25, 1642.
Isaac Newton was the only son of a prosperous local farmer, also named Isaac Newton, who died three months before he was born. Born premature, tiny and weak, Newton was not expected to survive. When he was 3 years old, his mother, Hannah Ayscough Newton, remarried a well-to-do minister, Barnabas Smith, and went to live with him, leaving young Newton with his maternal grandmother. The experience left an indelible imprint on Newton, later manifesting itself as an acute sense of insecurity. He anxiously obsessed over his published work, defending its merits with irrational behavior.
At age 12, Newton was reunited with his mother after her second husband died. She brought along her three small children from her second marriage. Until he was seventeen, Newton schooled at The King’s School, Grantham, which taught Latin and Greek and probably imparted a significant foundation of mathematics.
Newton’s uncle, a graduate of the University of Cambridge's Trinity College, persuaded Newton's mother to have him enter the university. Newton enrolled in a program similar to a work-study in 1661, and subsequently waited on tables and took care of wealthier students' rooms.
When Newton arrived at Cambridge, the Scientific Revolution of the 17th century was already in full force. The heliocentric view of the universe—theorized by astronomers Nicolaus Copernicus and Johannes Kepler, and later refined by Galileo Galilei—was well known in most European academic circles. Cambridge, like most universities in Europe, was steeped in Aristotelian philosophy and a view of nature resting on a geocentric view of the universe, dealing with nature in qualitative rather than quantitative terms.
During his first three years at Cambridge, Newton was taught the standard curriculum but was fascinated with the more advanced science. All his spare time was spent reading from the modern philosophers. The result was a less-than-stellar performance, but one that is understandable, given his dual course of study. It was during this time that Newton kept a second set of notes, entitled "Quaestiones Quaedam Philosophicae" ("Certain Philosophical Questions"). The "Quaestiones" reveal that Newton had discovered the new concept of nature that provided the framework for the Scientific Revolution. Though Newton graduated without honors or distinctions, his efforts won him the title of scholar and four years of financial support for future education. 
In 1665, the Great Plague that was ravaging Europe had come to Cambridge, forcing the university to close. After a two-year hiatus, Newton returned to Cambridge in 1667 and was elected a minor fellow at Trinity College, as he was still not considered a standout scholar. In the ensuing years, his fortune improved. Newton received his Master of Arts degree in 1669, before he was 27. During this time, he came across Nicholas Mercator's published book on methods for dealing with infinite series. Newton quickly wrote a treatise, De Analysi, expounding his own wider-ranging results. He shared this with friend and mentor Isaac Barrow, but didn't include his name as author.
In June 1669, Barrow shared the unaccredited manuscript with British mathematician John Collins. In August 1669, Barrow identified its author to Collins as "Mr. Newton ... very young ... but of an extraordinary genius and proficiency in these things." Newton's work was brought to the attention of the mathematics community for the first time. Shortly afterward, Barrow resigned his Lucasian professorship at Cambridge, and Newton assumed the chair.

Toward the end of this life, Newton lived at Cranbury Park, near Winchester, England, with his niece, Catherine (Barton) Conduitt, and her husband, John Conduitt. By this time, Newton had become one of the most famous men in Europe. His scientific discoveries were unchallenged. He also had become wealthy, investing his sizable income wisely and bestowing sizable gifts to charity. 
Despite his fame, Newton's life was far from perfect: He never married or made many friends, and in his later years, a combination of pride, insecurity and side trips on peculiar scientific inquiries led even some of his few friends to worry about his mental stability.
By the time he reached 80 years of age, Newton was experiencing digestion problems and had to drastically change his diet and mobility. In March 1727, Newton experienced severe pain in his abdomen and blacked out, never to regain consciousness. He died the next day, on March 31, 1727, at the age of 84.
 

By Erwin Mogusu
A STEM teacher and blogger from Nyamira County - Kenya

Monday 16 April 2018

Factors affecting the use of ICT in the classrooms

Despite the immense benefits of using ICT in the teaching and learning, its penetration in the classrooms especially in the developing countries is still wanting. Many teachers are still using the traditional methods of using a chalk and a black wall to deliver a lesson in a presentation form to their 21st century learners.
The challengers facing the use of ICT in the classroom can be categorized into three levels; teacher-level, school-level and system-level.
A teacher without the necessary ICT skills will shy from embracing it so as to avoid the perceived embarrassment in front of the leaners. For this reason, GESCI that is working to transform the ADSI schools in Kenya among other African nations is constantly training the STEM teachers in the selected schools. The training is geared towards, among other goals, equipping the teachers with the technological skills to embrace ICT in the classrooms.
Another factor is the lack of suitable educational software. There are the financial implications in the acquisition of software and even some teachers or school administrators may not be knowing where to access the required software. Teaching using certain approaches will require specific software. For instance, teaching with a concept map requires a software like Visual Understanding Environment (VUE).
Limited access to ICT tools has equally contributed to the low penetration.
Also there exists a rigid structure to traditional educational systems. For example, classes are built without having electric sockets or even projector screen among other requirements that enable easy integration of ICT in the classroom.
Restricted curriculum like the teacher not allowed to interact with the learners during school holidays may also contribute to the teachers’ reluctance in reaching to their learners remotely.
By; Erwin Mogusu (omogusu@gmail.com)
A STEM teacher and blogger from Nyamira county – Kenya.

Saturday 14 April 2018

Difference between a website and a blog

The African Digital schools initiative (ADSI) is encouraging the secondary schools here in Africa to have an online presence. A school can have an online presence by having a social media account such as facebook, tweeter among others. A school can also start and run a website or run a blog.
What is the difference between a website and a blog?
I have gone through many articles and journals to try and answer this question. I have decided to summarize the information and present it here so that you can cannot equally go through the same jargon that I have gone through.
Basically the difference is how data is presented to the reader. A blog is a short form of web-log while a website is a short form of the phrase, “a site on the web”. A web is the interconnection of computers around the world (world wide web i.e www).
According to Wikipedia, a blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time, while a website is a collection of related web pages, typically identified with a common domain name and published on at least one web server.
In Nyamira we say, “all bananas are fruits but not all fruits are bananas”. Likewise, all blogs are websites but not all websites are blogs.  A website can have a blog as part of the website but not as the only thing. A website will also have a homepage that displays a menu that is hyperlinked to several of the internal web pages like contacts, about us, donate, apply online among others.
A blog provides commenting system and therefore it is considered to be more interactive between the author and the readers. A blog will also offer a subscription system to send free emails to the readers and the articles inside a blog are organized in a reverse- chronological order. That means the latest post on the blog appears at the top of the page. Therefore, you can have a blog as a standalone website or you can have a website whereby a blog is part of it.
Although blogs are becoming a popular way of presenting ideas online, websites have also started to incorporate the advantages of blogs. For instance, some websites now days allow their visitors to give comments and even conduct opinion polls.
As the online platform is changing very fast, the African schools are not going to be left behind, thanks to GESCI that is holding our hand.
By Erwin Mogusu (omogusu@gmail.com)
A STEM teacher and blogger from Nyamira county – Kenya.

Wednesday 11 April 2018

ADSI teachers start blogging

The concept of blogging is becoming popular in educational institutions worldwide. In Kenya, this concept is being introduced by the African Digital Schools Initiative (ADSI). While facilitating the School Based Coordinators (SBC) seminar at Nyamira, Mr. George Waithaka who is the gesci project coordinator in Nyamira county, emphasized the benefits of blogging.

First, it enables collaboration among teachers. A teacher’s idea in a blog can spark discussions and contributions of ideas from other teachers worldwide to solve a problem or meet the diverse needs of all learners in a classroom.

Teachers can also use blogs of other teachers as part of the online resources which can aid in a preparation of a lesson.

As more Kenyans are getting access to computers and smart phones, blogging will be an efficient way of communicating between the parents, teachers and learners on issues like homework, missed classes, learners discipline among others with minimal travel involved.

Students can also form discussion groups that that go way beyond the walls of their classrooms to promote creativity and collaboration among the learners. As the learners write the blogs they will also perfect their communication skills. The questions posed on the blogs will provoke the learners to stimulate their critical thinking and problem solving skills.

Whoever, researchers are afraid of some of the negative effects that may be brought about by the idea of blogging in the educational sector. The effects include, publishing of erroneous and uncorrected work by learners and the possibility of learners being exposed to cybercrimes like cyber bulling as they access and respond to blogs.

By Erwin Mogusu, (omogusu@gmail.com)

A STEM teacher and blogger from Nyamira County - Kenya

African Digital Schools Initiative (ADSI) - Kenya


The African Digital Schools Initiative (ADSI) is one of the best programs that aims to transform secondary schools in Kenya into digital schools of distinction. The program is designed specifically to build secondary-level student 21st century skills and teachers’ innovative practice in a way that is responsive to the needs of the market place and to the emerging knowledge economies and societies. The 21st century skills emphasized the program include: communication skills, collaboration, critical thinking and creativity. Since the inception of the program there has been a noticeable improvement in the Science, Technology, English and Mathematics (STEM) subjects. There has also been an increase in the sourcing and regular usage of open education resources (OER) in the classroom.
In helping to define an effective, sustainable and replicable model to transform secondary education, the ADSI will improve the quality of teaching through ICT – based teacher professional development it will also support integration of ICT in secondary level to improve learning across the curriculum. Moreover, it will improve teaching and learning in STEM subjects to correct the low student take-up and mediocre     
The program is supported and funded by The MasterCard Foundation.
The ADSI program consolidates and develops a holistic expansion of a successful previous project in relation to its innovation practice, whole school approach, horizontal (geographic) and vertical (institutional) outreach and impact, and shared ownership. The ADSI model presents a portfolio of system-wide ICT innovation elements that can address policy coherence needs for ICT integration in teaching and learning. This includes a blended learning teacher development approach, whole school involvement, school leadership capacity building, converging technologies of e-and m-learning, use and development of open education resources and an online repository of materials. A digital school award and recognition structure for schools will be accompanied by an accreditation and certification framework for teachers to incentivize ICT integration and progression. To raise awareness and to influence new policy formulation, structured policy dialogues will take place.