Finals month already?

Hard to believe, but true! My last update was in February, when we were midway through the second trimester. We had a week and a half of spring break at the end of March, and have just finished the second week of the final one, which finishes in mid-May.

Burkina trimesters, however, aren't created equal as they are in the States. The fall trimester is usually pretty laid back, with very few papers and tests, and some tolerance for interruption. The second semester is when everyone attempts to catch up. And the final trimester seems to be chock full of evaluation. The students in Terminale (12th grade) and 3eme (9th grade, last year of middle school here) just had their practice exams last week for the BAC and BEPC, tests that they must pass to advance to university/high school. There is high demand for computers during off hours-- students come and do research for their assigned papers. Everyone is much busier than they were back in October.

Our "finals month" started off with finishing up some business from last semester. Earlier in March, I had everyone choose a topic related to IT to research-- from the Apple II to Google Glass. After their research, they prepared a Power Point presentation, and I graded them on the quality of their research, their written presentation, their oral presentations, thoughtful questions they asked of other presenters, and how well they responded to questions that they recieved. It was a lot of fun-- the idea of points for asking good questions really got everyone involved (and embarrassed the ones who didn't do their research). I could turn this into something like a game show next year.

Correct! One point.

The students now have the rest of the month to do a final project of their choosing (based on a list of suggestions that I provided). Some examples:

Write a children's book using MS word!

Pictured: Bernard Bacye, working on his story Le dernier gardien de l'arbre. (The last guardian of the tree) The paper at the bottom right: an illustration he drew. We took a picture of it today, in the absence of a working scanner, and it's now on his cover page.

Interview family elders and write down some of their stories.

Pictured: Rania Koala, writing an account about her family titled L'origine des Koalas. If you look carefully enough, you might notice a picture of a koala on her screen.

Imagine that you had 70,000 FCFA ($140) to start a business. Come up with a list of expenses and revenues, and estimate your monthly profits over the course of a year using MS Excel.

Pictured: Véronique Sondo imagines how she might start up a restaurant. After coming up with a complete list of startup expenses, she is thinking about how much she might get away with selling a plate of riz sauce for.

Improve the speed and accuracy of your typing. Try not to look at the keyboard.

Pictured: Alassane Diabaté is hoping to find temporary work this summer as a secretary, and is shooting for 30-40 wpm (a little harder on French keyboards).

Come up with an art project using GIMP.

Pictured: Wilson Traore uses an improvised light table to trace some pencil-sketched comics with a dark pen. We used the photo below to transfer his drawing to the computer.

And so the fun continues. It's really a pleasure to have a group that now knows the basics of how to use a computer-- that was something that I struggled with at first, coming from a place where that sort of knowledge is assumed. There are a lot of ways I could improve the class next year, and I'm looking forward to having June off to reflect on the curriculum. But I'm excited to see what comes out of these projects! Really proud of this group after a long, full week of work.






And lest I forget...

Some students (not pictured) have started a blog as their project and are putting up local news stories. If you're versed in French, or care to take a chance with Google translate, here is the link:

Burkina News Network