Educators using Intelligent Practice the classroom
Intelligent Practice is Siyavula’s premium homework practice service. It was implemented in 2012 and is now been used by over 60 South African schools. Community involvement is one of the three pillars on which Siyavula stands, and so we welcome educators to be apart of the development process for Intelligent Practice. Siyavula has begun hosting termly Intelligent Practice community events in Cape Town, Johannesburg and the Eastern Cape (we’ll be heading to Durban soon). At these events, we ask educators using the service in their classrooms to help us improve and contextualise...
Read MoreCape Town mini-expo for young scientists
On Saturday the 12th of May, Mark Horner and I assisted in judging the Cape Town mini-expo for young scientists (http://www.expo.wcape.school.za/). This event serves as a prelude to the regional expo (Cape Town expo for young scientists) that will be held in August. This event gives learners who have never taken part in an expo the opportunity to see what it is all about and to receive feedback on how their projects are progressing. For many learners participating, the expo is their first chance to do real science that fascinates them and often goes outside the borders of the school...
Read MoreThe life sciences textbook weekend
This past weekend was incredibly exciting for Siyavula and South African education! With a group of 23 volunteer educators and post-grad students, we produced the first draft of a free and open Grade 10 life sciences textbook, aligned to CAPS for 2012! This first draft is a 300+ page document, which although will need revision before it can be made public, is an amazing achievement overall. Preparation In the lead up to the life sciences weekend, much planning and preparation was undertaken by the Siyavula team, namely Mark Horner, Neels van der Westhuizen, Carine Grobbelaar, Bridget...
Read MoreSecond translation Hackathon at Stellenbosch University
Saturday 30 July was our second Afrikaans translation Hackathon at Stellenbosch University. We had 19 Afrikaans volunteers arrive for the day, and they translated a huge amount of content and did a brilliant job (plus 2 English volunteers who did other work for us on Connexions)! Once again a large amount of preparation was done to ensure the day ran smoothly, including brainstorming any potential issues that may arise, and having solutions at the ready! Heather spent days splitting each chapter of Grade 11 Maths and Physical Science on Connexions into smaller modules, which meant that every...
Read MoreConnexions uploading sprint at St John’s College, Johannesburg
After our previous visit to Johannesburg in May, St John’s College expressed interest in joining the open education movement, and making their science content available online under an open licence. Following this, the Siyavula technical team arrived at St John’s on Monday morning 18 July, ready to help the science department upload their content to Connexions. On our arrival, the IT team at the school was just finishing off installing all the software that we recommend using, such as Google Chrome and LibreOffice. Mark started off with a short presentation on the process...
Read MoreAfrikaans translation day of FHSST at Stellenbosch University
Two months ago we held our first ever Hackathon at Stellenbosch University where, with the help of first language Afrikaans volunteers we started the process of translating FHSST into Afrikaans. We made excellent progress on our Grade 10 maths textbook, which we have since submitted for review for the government approved textbook list! Our video from the day is almost ready for airing, and we will post it as soon as it is available. The day started at 09h00, with all the volunteers arriving promptly to begin translating. A large amount of preparation had been done beforehand, including...
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