Thailane |
Vinicius |
Rogerio |
By Jordan Moore-Fields
In the violent and poverty-stricken
favelas of Rio de Janeiro, millions of
children lack access to technological
and other resources. The Reuters
Foundation Digital Vision Program
(RDVP) at Stanford University, along
with Projeto Uere, a non-profit organization
committed to helping the children
of Rio, seeks to redress this ill.
Through a project called Vamos Blogar,
these children gain access to technology
that can literally change their world.
Vamos Blogar improves the literacy
and communication skills of Rio's at risk
children by helping them create
Web logs that can be seen by people
all over the world. These blogs help
the children express their ideas and
share stories about where they live
while improving their computer and
literacy skills. The youngsters create
audio and visual blogs in addition to
the traditional written blogs. The
technology is available to kids ranging
from three to 16 years. Although
the age range is significant, each
child is able to participate at his or
her own literacy level with photos,
poetry, or even hand-drawn pictures.
Technology professionals are behind
this effort through collaboration with
RDVP who helped develop the blogging
technology and made it available
to Rio's underprivileged children.
Vamos Blogar is partially sponsored
by Projeto Uere, which began
in 1982 and is dedicated to helping
children overcome their destitute
surroundings. They hope to prevent
them from succumbing to life on the
streets by helping them develop educational
and social skills that they
can use in the future. It is in Projeto
Uere's houses that the kids access
the computers and scanners that
allow them to use the software created
by Vamos Blogar.
Saori Fotenos, a technologist and
Reuters Digital Vision Fellow at Stanford
and Isabel Lofgren, a Rio-based artist,
designer, and internet consultant, help
the dream of Vamos Blogar come to
life. They helped develop the technology
that allows the children from the favelas
to communicate their thoughts to
people around the world.
It is a curriculum that attracts
children who have fallen through the
cracks of the public educational system.
It allows students who are
functionally illiterate to come back to
the path to literacy by starting with
audio and video. Many of the characteristics
would apply to underprivileged
youth in the U.S. as well, says
Fotenos.
More information is available at
www.blogar.org. The online blogs created
by the children can be viewed at
www.projetouere.blogspot.com. |
