2022
I have initiated this theme "Google Map towards Rural" in September 2018 to take technology-related education towards rural areas and educating school kids and youth, I have taken Google Map and other free Google tools for this mission.
Based on the need, I have selected schools and other public places where awareness on technology is lacking and I made my own map called "Google Map Towards Rural Marathon".
I'm already running my monthly accessibility meetup and on top of that, I have taken this as the second scheduled meetup from my list. Yes, the plan is to host similar meetups every month and educate people on Google Map and other free tools of Google.
This is my third meetup from the date I initiated and up to now, I have been enjoying teaching youth and kids on this theme.
In Sri Lanka, there were places with less access to technology and there is not many volunteers to educate school kids and youths on technology. I have taken this as a challenge to contribute to my community on what I have learned from Google Map and how this will be useful for our community.
During my last three visits school teachers and principals have told "mapping related education is needed for schools in order to know the basics of Maps and existing technologies" I was really happy after hearing those from these leaders.
This meetup was scheduled on Sunday 24th and a school teacher advised rescheduling this to Saturday since the kids will be busy with Sunday school (religious education) activities. So I rescheduled this to Saturday and went for this.
When I entered the school I could see many little faces and they were playing here and there and after seeing myself and @Meshanth they came as a big flock, greeted us Good Morning and went inside the hall where the session was scheduled.
When I went inside the hall I got shocked! yes, there were no tables or chairs given for kids and all were on floors. I was asking the kids are you comfortable with this seating positions and everyone was telling, normally we sit like this and listen since there are no many chairs existing in the hall.
This school actually has limited access to facilities and there is were no computer labs in this school too.
Nobody there knew much about computers and when I ask do you know Google they said yes!!!
Then I slowly jumped into the session and asked how did you know Google and what's that? they said it's a search engine (in Tamil), maps, can learn by searching a keyword and etc. but sadly they said they have heard of all these and not accessed and they didn't even know how a map looks like.
I started explaining Google maps and it's features, how to search a place you like to see, how to see places photos, 360's and how we can see a road with street view images and etc.
after teaching I was asking questions to them. and out of 100/100 they answered the question and I was really happy with this performance. Also, I asked few kids about the places they wish to locate on maps and some of them saw 360 images of their houses and were surprised. Some asked me to show the worlds best places through this Streetview. yes, I did and showed many places without getting tired.
My passion has always been, teaching technology to people talking about the environments too. yes, you got me right. It's about all my tree planting and plastic pollution activities. This time Meshanth undertook this plastic pollution topic and educated kids (@ErmesT I'm sure you will be happy with Meshanth's work)
As always, we filled our hearts with lot of satisfaction after this event and went home.
This will also be one of my monthly meetup which I have scheduled for 2019 entire year. Please check the below map and join us if you like to help on this "Google Maps towards Rural" theme. Let's hope for a better world.
Please click this link to view the meetup photo album
@DeniGu , @YasumiKikuchi @NarenChandra as promised I'm sharing my RECAP with you all 🙂
