Mobile Learning Proposal Digital Skills for Women and Youth in Africa

Intro. A professor in my country said this about 20 years ago at an event looking at the changing climes in our national landscape: “Our educational system needs a system” Those words struck a chord. They encapsulated the dearth of progress and development and the loss of a precious vital central piece of our society that would take a long time to be regained. Education is one of the key areas of a national whole that would bring about sustainable growth. Quality Education is, indeed one of the seventeen United Nations Sustainable Development Goals This project was to look critically at the delicate relationship between digital technologies and sustainable economic growth, the backdrop being the foundational courses each participant had to go through to develop skills in this area. Emerging technologies are those frontier edge, budding areas of development on the technology scene that are literally taking the world by storm. They include such recent terms as Internet of Things, and the phrases that have been around quite a bit like Artificial Intelligence; broad aspects like Block chain. They are popular, they are growing, they are changing the way we live, think, relate, do business, and establish how we gather, store and analyze information. They include digital devices, and the interconnectivity that allows the sharing of information.

The skills covered in this foundational learning pathway are broad and diverse. There is so much we cn do with these tools to promote sustainable development. A device to revolutionize tomorrow, • Something simple • Something inexpensive • Something young children can use…

One way to harness digital technology to promote sustainable growth and development is in producing or accessing devices children can use to learn at different stages of early education. This would include software that is tailored to specific age groups, and devices that are easily available and affordable. The growth of mobile technology in developing countries is quite remarkable. In my own country mobile lines have increased in quantum leaps since they first were introduced in 2001, nearly 23 years ago. The advent of smart phones has drastically altered the social space of young children even in cases where they do not own a mobile device. Being able to seize this opportunity and use similar devices strictly for learning could further enhance the learning process, and the growth of users. This is one way that digital technology could expand sustainable development. For this project, a proposal is being made to encourage our sponsors to take this program a step further. We are all very grateful to the government and people of Japan for their tremendous and generous sponsorship. Not only has this program sought to build very needful skills among those whose digital connection is far behind the giant tech nations, but it has also opened a way for us to promote such learning in our own context. Therefore this proposal is to the government and people of Japan to do more, by providing digital devices for primary schools pupils starting with a very young community school in the rural part of Kuje Local Government Council of the Federal Capital Territory Kuje. Already the government and people of Japan have given considerable sums to the development of infrastructure and educational buildings in rural areas of the FCT, in Nigeria. Here is an opportunity to do more. The idea for this project has been somewhat dormant for a few years – the developing of English tutor apps. The software would be made by us in collaboration with indigenous input using Natural Language processing to develop simple English Learning Tutor. Many of these children are from a background where they speak one or two languages before they start school. In close to 90% of the cases , none of the languages are English.

References https://www.researchgate.net/publication/360810919_Understanding_the_Role_of_Digital_Technologies_in_Education_A_review?enrichId=rgreq Abid Haleem, Mohd Javaid, Mohd Asim Qadri, Rajiv Suman (2022), Understanding the role of digital technologies in education Accessed February 1, 2024