KOCHI: Braving the impact of Covid-19 pandemic, 7,753 students in Ernakulam district have registered for the Little KITEs (LK) programme, a unique initiative in schools envisaged by the Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education (KITE). Currently, there are 177 LK units in the Ernakulam district with almost 5,200 students.
This year too the routine and expert classes are being telecast via the VICTERS channel and the follow-ups are carried out by the KITE masters. No activity of LK has been stopped on account of the Covid-19 crisis. More than 60,000 students from almost 1,900 schools in the state are now part of LK.
New-age training for students
Little KITEs gives intense training in various disciplines like animation, cyber safety, Malayalam computing, electronics and hardware, etc. The Hi-School Kuttikootam programme, which was part of the Public Education Rejuvenation Mission of the state government, was later remoulded and upgraded to Little KITEs’ IT Clubs and has now emerged as the largest student IT network in the country, said KITE CEO Anwar Sadath K.
“The concept and modus operandi of the initiative were widely accepted among the parents, teachers and students that the KITE has now added more core areas like mobile app development, programming, robotics and IoT, video documentation, etc. in the module,” he added.The members of LK units are selected from the students of class eight, after conducting an aptitude test. The number of members in each unit is limited to a maximum of 40. Training starts while they are in class nine.
Activities
LK offers many activities to empower members on many aspects of technology. They include maintenance of ICT equipments in schools, computer literacy for parents, single-window help desk, special ICT training for the differently-abled, free installation of FOSS-based operating system and applications for public, updations in school Wiki, assistance for the conduct of fairs, news-making for VICTERS channel, etc.
In each LK units, two teachers are officiated as KITE masters/mistresses of club activities. They will be given intensive training and hands-on experience in the aforesaid disciplines through workshops. The classes and other activities are monitored sub-district wise by the KITE master trainers. In addition to these, advanced classes on programming, robotics etc. are also given by subject experts.
School-level programmes
The programme will organise yearly school-level LK camps. Selected members from each unit can also participate at sub-district and district levels. The first state-level camp was conducted in August 2019 at Startup Mission, Kalamassery.
Kite facts
Revamped from Hi-School Kuttikootam programme
Monetary expenses of LK units met by KITE
More than 60,000 students
8,000 new applications from Ernakulam
Training in 5 key areas Animation, Cyber Safety, Malayalam Computing, Hardware, Electronics