A Quest to Rweteera

Yesterday I taught maps to P6, particularly how to add text markers and network with each other. The mesh doesn't do what I'd expect, so I only got a few of the students networked. But those who did - they totally got it.

Today was water quality. I had the whole World Water Monitoring Day kit (pH, dissolved oxygen, turbidity), plus hundreds of litmus papers. We tested everything. All of the students had fetched water from boreholes - except maybe one or two had wells. I wrote everything down, so that I can GPS and photograph more of these sources later.

If we could measure water hardness/softness, I could have demo'd the problem that Moses clued me into, the problem with the Kigarama borehole. That thing is definitely rusting out. Fortunately, it and the Kigarama school were on my map photos. But very disappointing to see people getting water from that hole, when a shallow well a hundred feet away is pumping out clean water.

Matthew, who's been helping out me and a Harvard student filmmaker, recommended I chek out Rweteera school, which is a few miles down the road (actually a bit more than a few). Their rain barrels "don't work" and the kids wash in the river. Want more information on this. Tomorrow is a soccer game for all the schools, so I'm going to make a day trip down there.

Of RFID and Water Sensing

Monday was the last day for Primate Handshake, so they showed the vidoes they had edited together at their campsite. Super good videos with plenty of interviews. The head teacher, Lydia, talked about most of the programs. One of the videos shows off the mapping program. The kids were so funny when they watched the video - whenever they saw or heard something familiar on video (a teacher, or pouring porridge) they would burst out laughing. A few students made their own guided tours of the school programs, so these were very popular with the group.

School goes on break on August 13th, so I have 3 school weeks left, including this one. I've made it a top priority to do our water quality testing this week (more about that later). Also I'm e-mailing back and forth with Architecture for Humanity about the school roofs idea.

I went to Moses and Matthew and wrote out a schedule:

P6

• Finish mapping lessons - share activity and KML


• Lessons about sensors (smaller P6 class only tried them once)


• Making our own sensors


• RFID activity

P5

• Start mapping lessons


• Making our own sensors


• RFID activity

Water Testing (this week)

• Small group of P5, P6, or mixed students?


• Class 1: Explain water testing and reasons for testing (include Dunkard Creek example). Assign water collection


• Class 2: World Water Monitoring and pH tests - use microscopes


• Next few days: (If possible, and teaming up with Chris) visit water sources, take photos and do GPS

The RFID thing isn't going over well. It's complicated and doesn't seem as relevant. I may need to visit a cellphone repairman in Fort Portal to get it re-soldered. I think it gives the students an opportunity to connect real-world and digital things which they've made themselves, but Matthew keeps asking me how I'll explain it (how did I explain light sensors? I said that they measured solar energy, and that was that). I wish people would trust me more, since the other programs are going so well.

As soon as I got to water testing, Moses asked me if I could check out the borehole in Kigarama. "It looks like it has rust," he says. Now this project is much more serious. I wish I'd talked with Moses about this earlier. Right now I'm suspecting bacteria or actual rust. Matthew knows where this is, so I'll make sure to stop by and check things out. Hopefully I won't have to pull a John Snow and break off the pump handle.

Anyhow, we decided a small P6 class can do the water testing. I'll assign collection sites at the end of their next maps class, and get samples from a variety of water sources (rainwater, boreholes, wells, school)... I will get extra Kigarama and river samples myself.