Emily, a Peace Corps Comoros volunteer and a SolarSPELL champion, shares her experiences of using the SolarSPELL digital library. She says, “The SolarSPELL has been a great way for me to introduce lessons and then reiterate and have more practice for my students of all ages”. She shares a few of her experiences here.
So how I have used my solarSPELL is mostly in my adult clubs! We use the English worksheets as warm-ups for students to write in their notebooks or download onto their own phones or computers and do again later if they want. Many of my students have taken it upon themselves to download even more of the worksheets to do outside of class and have brought them the next day in order for me to correct what they have done. Also many of my friends have been eager to take random worksheets that aren’t even involved in my clubs. It has been cool for them to have to connect themselves and figure out how to navigate the SPELL themselves. They love to just click and adventure away. Also I have shown some of the Primary (Elementary) school teachers the different lessons in math and the French resources. We are planning a day for them to look through the resources to see if anything interests them for their kids.
The SolarSPELL in my village is also going to start being incorporated in an informatique (computer) learning course that also includes English! It is very exciting! The directors of the computer class are very excited to see the resources and videos that they will be downloading onto their computers. The plan is to use the English learning videos to listen and see the words written and then to type our own answers on the computer as we become more advanced in English.
Another great way we used the SolarSpell was that we had a group of three men who left for Dubai about two weeks ago and they downloaded all the videos about two months ago in order to increase their English learning and that they would be able to bring the videos with them when they traveled. I am eager to hear from them how it all worked out. But it is incredible how they can take the SolarSPELL resources with them wherever they go in the world. My library in my village also just recently got ten more computers and we are working on downloading some of the resources onto them.
The SolarSPELL has been a great way for me to introduce lessons and then reiterate and have more practice for my students of all ages. I love having the quick easy access to exercises and quick easy books too. We appreciate all the hard work that has been put into making the SolarSPELL student friendly and Comoros friendly as well. I enjoy seeing my students learn about an online library and to see how not every time you connect you have to connect to social media applications. Also to watch them explore different educational resources and see them look at not only Comorian resources but Rwanda and other countries in Africa. Also thank you so much for providing the tablet because that comes in handy so often due to the poverty in my village and not everyone having a way to connect to the SolarSPELL outside of the computer room and library. So thank you so so much for the tablet too! I hope to only continue the learning from the SolarSPELL throughout Mitsamiouli, Ngazidja, Comoros.
