Hi all,

Quite a few of you have asked for DSH discs.  Let me apologize that we
haven't followed up on all the requests.  But there are some
reasonably good reasons for the delay :)

(1) We have been working on "improved discs."  The new discs have
simple tests and lesson plans attached to each lesson.  All these can
be played on TVs just like everything else.

(2) We have been working on improving the "phone system" that we have
talked about in previous posts to the mailing list.  I won't go into
the details of what it can do now but we hope that the new system may
allow us to better keep in contact and share experiences among all the
"DSHers."

What we have found in the past, in terms of giving out discs, is that,
very often, people just ask for discs, and then they kind of just
"disappear."  We suspect that in many cases, people probably didn't
use the materials very consistently and probably didn't get as much
out of the content as they should.

Now we are ready to give out the new discs.

However, we propose that we experiment with something new.  If you're
interested in receiving the DSH discs, we will send only a small
initial batch.  The teachers who are to use the discs will participate
in a little "remote conferencing training" about how we think they
might best use the content so that both the kids and teachers get the
most out of it.  And after that, we will ask the disc recipients to
participate on our phone system (once a week, or once every two weeks,
for only several minutes each time), during which, the recipient
teachers will be asked to share their experiences with us (and
everyone else).  In particular, we will ask you to tell us a little
about the test results from conducting the simple tests attached to
each DVD lesson.  We will discuss other issues as well.

One reason is that we believe teachers could have much to share and
learn from each other.  The other reason is to perhaps provide extra
incentive for teachers to do an even better job, knowing, that they
are not just working by themselves, but they are a part of a bigger
world who's interested in hearing their experiences, in sharing their
joys when their kids do well, and in trouble-shooting problems or
dealing with frustrations.

We would like to make participating in these activities as a
"prerequisite" for continuing to receive DSH discs: if the recipients
consistently fail to participate in these followup activities, we may
discontinue sending out more discs to that particular school after the
initial batch.

As I was saying, this is a new experiment, so if you have feedback or
suggestions, please let us know.  If you have requested DSH discs
before but haven't received any (due to our delinquency), please reply
to this mail to reaffirm your interest.  If you yourself haven't
requested DSH discs, but know of someone who might be interested,
please feel free to forward this email.

A couple logistic notes.  (1) The content we're offering is in Hindi
(UP board).  It's quite comprehensive, ranging from pre-school all the
way to class 11 (with some small holes here and there).  There are
literally thousands of lessons.  Hindi-speaking states other than UP
are most likely to find them useful as well.  Non-Hindi speaking
states, unfortunately, are out of luck at this point (unless you're
dealing with cases such as Hindi-speaking migrant worker kids or
something).  (2) We supply the DVDs.  The recipient schools need to
organize your own equipment to play the discs---a TV bigger than 19in,
a DVD player, and most likely, power backup equipment---if you want,
you can ask us about the spec and prices for the stuff so you don't
overpay---we're talking about $500-$600 per set of equipment.  (3) All
our content is downloadable from the net.  If you want to get an idea
of what it's like, go to http://dstar.cs.washington.edu and download
anything you want.  (Be warned though: downloading in India might take
a long long time.)

Cheers,
Randy

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