Kutana na Felix: Kutoka Shule ya Sekondari // Meet Felix: A Look into Our Secondary School Workshops1/6/2018 B: Epifania Wilbard (*English printed below, please click 'read more') Felix ni kijana mdogo wa miaka 15, anasoma kidato cha nne katika shule ya sekondari Njiro Mkoani Arusha. Kijana huyu ameifahamu Twende kupitia utambulisho mfupi unaofanywa na wawakilishi kutoka kwenye kituo hiki cha ubunifu ambao hutembelea shule mbalimbali kwa ajili ya kuitangaza na kuwafahamisha watu mbalimbali hasa wanafunnzi, nia na malengo ya kituo hiki ni kuwasaidia wabunifu wadogowadogo wenye mawazo ya kiubunifu na kuwawezesha kuyaweka katika uhalisia kwa lengo la kusuluhisha changamoto zinazo zisumbua jamii za kitanzania. Katika kuwezesha wenye mawazo na ambao hawana mawazo tunatoa mafunzo ya takribani siku tatu ambapo wanajifunza ujuzi wa kutengeneza vitu kama vile tochi, chaja za simu kwa kutumia sola na kisha wanapewa nafasi ya kuja na changamoto ambayo ipo kwenye jamii walikotoka na kuitafutia ufumbuzi.  Kama mnavyoona kwenye picha hapo juu ni kifaa cha kuzalisha umeme wa maji (Hydropower). Wakati anafanya ubunifu huo, hakua mchoyo wa kuelezea habari zake kama hizi:” Kabla sijapata wazo la mradi nilifikiria kuhusu maisha tunayoishi mimi na familia yangu pamoja na jamii inayotuzunguka kwa muda, ndipo nilipogundua tuna changamoto upande wa nishati kwani mpaka sasa tunatumia taa za chemli na vibatari. Pia nikafikiria njia ya kuweza kulitatua tatizo hili, ndipo nilikumbuka kuhusu umeme wa maji(hydropower) kitu ambacho nimewahi kukisoma darasani. Pia nikakumbuka karibu na nyumbani tumepakana na mto mkubwa unaotiririsha maji ya kutosha kila siku, na mara nyingi watu huutumia huu mto kwa manufaa ya umwagiliaji tuu. Sasa nikaona kwa kuwa nilikua na wataalamu kutoka Twende nikawaeleza wazo langu wakanishauri na hatimaye wakaniambia nianze kulifanyia kazi na kwa muda wa takribani siku tatu ndipo nilipoona mafanikio yanaanza kuonekana.” “Nilifurahi sana kuona wazo langu linafanya kazi na baada ya hapo nilipata ushawishi wa kuendelea kuifanyia kazi zaidi na zaidi ili nifikie malengo yangu.” “Nilipendelea sana kuendelea kuja Twende kwa ajili ya kuendeleza mradi wangu kwa sababu ya ukarimu na msaada wa kiufundi na hata ushauri pamoja na vingine vingi nilivyovipata kutoka kwa watu wa Twende, pia baada ya wataalamu kuona na kudhibitisha kuwa wazo langu linaweza kufanya kazi ndipo namimi nilipata moyo wa kuendelea kufanya kazi kwa bidii zaidi Kwa kutengeneza mashine hii” Felix alifurahi sana na kuona nae anaweza kuwa mbunifu kama wabunifu wengine na kisha kuisaidia jamii inayomzunguka na yeye mwenyewe. Mawazo ya miradi mingine iliyokuzwa kutokana na mafunzo ya awamu hii ni pamoja na roboti ya kutembea kama mnyama, feni, kifaa cha kutobolea(drili) mkokoteni wa kutumia betri, mashine ya mazoezi inayochaji betri n.k. 
1 Comment
 Bahati anakata chuma kwa ajili ya kujitengenezea opena // Bahati sawing metal for her bottle opener Kutafsiriwa na kutumwa kutoka globalgiving.org
Imeandikwa: Deborah Tien (Executive Director) Imetafsiriwa: Epifania Wilbard (Education Coordinator) na Fadhilina Mkalli (Administrator) Imerushwa moja kwa moja kupitia taarifa za miradi ya Global Giving: Originally posted as a Global Giving Project Update: Asanteni sana kwa ukarimu na uaminifu mliouonyesha kwetu na vitu tunavyovifanya, tuliweza kupata kiasi cha $5000 ndani ya wiki 6 zilizohitajika kupata sifa nzuri kwa wawezeshaji wa kimataifa. Hii itaturahisishia kwa wawezeshaji wajao kutuelewa zaidi maana bado tunaendeleza kuchangisha fedha kwa kiasi kilichobakia ambacho ni $1826 kufikia malengo yetu ya $10000 mpaka mwishoni mwa mwezi Machi 2018. Pamoja na hilo pia tumefaidika kupitia rasilimali ambazo zimetujengea uwezo mkubwa kupitia mataifa mbalimbali. Kwa mfano, Epifania, Mratibu wa mambo ya Elimu (Twende) ametumia makala kuanza majaribio ya kutengeneza video ya Twende. Ni mara yake ya kwanza kufanya uhariri. Tutatuma majibu baada ya kukamilisha. Thank you again for your generosity and belief in what we do! We managed to raised the $5,000 in 6 weeks needed to earn a permanent spot on the Global Giving platform. This will make it easier for any future donors to support us as we continue to fundraise for the remaining $1,826 of our $10,000 goal for the end of March 2018. Plus, we have already benefited from the large amount of capacity building support Global Giving provides through its resources. For instance, Epifania, our Education Coordinator, has used Global Giving articles to start experimenting with making a Twende video! It is her first time video-editing. We’ll share results once they’re ready. Kama inavyojulikana, kwa msaada wenu tunaanzisha mashindano ya ubunifu sasa. Tumelenga kutumia muda mwingi na wanafunzi waliohitimu kidato cha nne wanaotarajia kuijiunga na kidato cha tano, ikiwa wana muda wa takribani Miezi 6. Tumeanza mwezi uliopita na idadi ya wanafunzi 12 wahitimu wa kudato cha nne kutoka shule 7 waliokuja Twende kuwasilisha mawazo yao na kujiunga na mafunzo. Wakati wa CCB wanafunzi walijifunza umuhimu wa mzunguko wa ubunifu, wakafanya kwa vitendo changamoto za ubunifu,na kutengeneza kitu kidogo cha kutumia kutoka kwenye malighafi taka. Pia walipitia kwa undani mawazo waliyokuja nayo ya kiubunifu na kuweza kuchora mfano na kutengeneza mifano kwa kutumia mabox,chupa za plastiki, mbao chakavu n.k. As you know, with your support, we are piloting our first design competition right now. We wanted to be able to spend more time with Form 4 Leavers, who have a six-month holiday between Form 4 and Form 5. We began last month with 12 Form 4 Leavers From 7 schools independently coming to Twende to present their ideas to our team and participate in our flagship workshop: Creative Capacity Building (CCB). During CCB, students learned about the importance of the design process, carried out a design challenge, and made a small, useful tool. They also delved deeper into their ideas and came up with sketch models using old cardboard, plastic bottles, paper, etc. Kutafsiriwa na kutumwa kutoka IDIN.org Imeandikwa: Deborah Tien (Executive Director) Imetafsiriwa: Fadhilina Mkalli (Administrator), Epifania Wilbard (Education Coordinator), Chris Mushi (Creativity Trainer) Sisi Twende tumekua tukiendesha mafunzo ya Ubunifu na uvumbuzi wa miradi ya mikono kwa zaidi ya miaka mitano sasa kwa watu wasiopungua 1,300 na kwa msaada kutoka IDIN pamoja na mashirika mengine. Mafunzo ya ubunifu wa teknolojia (CCB) yameigwa kutoka kwenye chuo cha MIT D_Lab, na washiriki wote wameshuhudia jinsi walivyofunguka kimawazo kila baada ya kupata mafunzo haya. Tunapenda na tunaona nyuso za furaha kila baada ya mafunzo haya yanayochukua siku 5 wakiwa na mfano wa mashine/mradi mikononi mwao. Lakini nitadanganya nikisema tumetimiza lengo letu la kuwezesha watu kuvumbua na kubuni teknolojia zao wenyewe kusuluhisha matatizo ya kujamii. Baada ya mafunzo ya muda mrefu,tumekua tukiangalia na kurejea tunachokifanya na kisha kutambua changamoto kadha wa kkadha:kama vilewatu kutomalizia miradi yao kipindi cha mafunzo ya CCB mpaka pale ambapo kifaa/mashine inaweza kutumika ili kuweza kuboresha maisha yao ya kila siku. We at Twende have been running hands-on design & creativity workshops for 5+ years with 1,300+ people and the support of IDIN, amongst other amazing partners. Our flagship Creative Capacity Building (CCB) workshop was adapted from a methodology developed at MIT D-Lab, and all participants exclaim how their ‘minds are opened’ every workshop we run. We love that, and we can see faces light up when they finish the five-day workshop with a prototype in their hands. But I would be lying if I said we found the magical silver bullet to accomplish our mission: empower people to design & create their own technology solutions to community challenges. After so many workshops, we have taken a critical eye to what we do and identified a big problem: people don’t often ‘finish’ technologies during CCB to the point where they can regularly use it to actually improve their everyday lives. Never fear, though, we are a team of problem-solvers and designers, so we have used the steps of the Twende design process to come up with a solution to test and get feedback.  Mzunguko wa ubunifu tunaotumia Kufundishia hapa Twende. // The design process we teach at Twende. Australian volunteer Liz Reece is halfway through her 12-month assignment at Twende. Liz brings design and business experience to her Business Mentor role and recently had the opportunity to mentor two local women to pursue their employment goals. Liz’s assignment is part of the Australian Volunteers for International Development (AVID) program, an Australian Government initiative.  Twende intern Reda using her new laptop. Photo credit: Liz Reece After a few months working in Arusha, Tanzania, I became more aware of the impacts of gender inequality. I saw that a girl growing up in my neighbourhood has expectations put upon her; women work hard from an early age carrying water, clothing or vegetables on their heads; and young women have a strong sense of responsibility to home duties that come before their own advancement. I also found that Twende Innovation Centre struggles to get girls equally represented in their programs, despite extra effort to market our courses, provide transport and make our location a place where women feel welcome and legitimate. The young women who do participate in Twende programs are equally passionate, but accept the fact that they have to leave their work punctually to get home to do household chores.  Reda giving her first powerpoint presentation at Twende. Photo credit: Liz Reece.  Manon (author) teaching electronics to Tanzanian secondary school students  STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) in the Tanzanian education system is really poor. Most schools don’t have resources to teach science in a meaningful way: basic electrical components and tools, computer labs, and practicals are rare in schools and in the curriculum. However, there’s an immense curiosity of the students for that and here at Twende, we believe that STEAM topics without hands-on activities don’t have the impact they should have on students, leaving many students missing out on many opportunities STEAM offers.
Twende Teaching Electronics As you probably know, Twende offers Creative Capacity Building trainings. This past April, Twende delivered its first electronics CCB workshop. In early March, I joined Twende, and Chris Mushi, long-time instructor and innovator at Twende who is responsible for the electronics workshops, as an electronics fellow to work on this new programme. Last year, Twende conducted its first workshop introducing LEDs and basic circuitry to secondary school students aged 16 and 17. Twende’s electronics team goes to a school with basic components like LEDs, resistors, switches, potentiometers and 9V batteries and teaches very basic current and voltage knowledge as students make very simple electronics circuits. For most if not all schools, it is the first and only time students see components outside the books, and the way their eyes light up when they light up their first LED shows how useful these workshops are. This year, the goal was to get deeper with the same students – in both electronics capacity and insight to the design-thinking philosophy. We decided to bring the students to Twende for a three-day workshop; no (school) teacher and an entire workshop with tools to encourage learning through making something useful. During the first session, students made a flashlight, designed by Chris, with a very basic circuit of LEDs, resistors, batteries, and a home-made switch. The housing of the flashlight, made out of basic water pipes and recycled plastic bottles, was also interesting to build, and students learn how to use some tools and how to make with available resources. Students learn how to solder (usually for the first time), make their own torches, and bring them home to use. Check out this post by Imara Tech founder Elliot Avila. He reflects on how to market to rural communities in Tanzania during his time at the MIT D-Lab Scale Ups conference. Elliot has been working on his multi-crop thresher with Twende since August 2014 and was awarded an MIT D-Lab Scale Ups fellowship soon afterwards. You can see why we like to have him around!
Check out this short video featuring our founder Bernard Kiwia!
 Creative Capacity Building (CCB) is a model of teaching based on sparking innovation in participants. This approach was developed by International Development Innovation Network (IDIN) and MIT D-Lab. Twende-AISE has adopted it to help students and other community members to uncover challenges and build technologies to improve their lives as well as the lives of others.
This is a new venture for young people, especially in primary and secondary schools. The School of St. Jude is one institution where both teachers as well as students have taken strong interest in Creative Capacity Building, beginning with 6 students (3 male and 3 female) taking part in CCB training. The students were really excited and took the training very seriously with the support of their institution including their mentoring teacher: Sister Janet. In Creative Capacity Building the students go through the design cycle which help them identify their challenges, gather information, think of ideas, experiment, choose the best idea, work out the details, build it, test it, and finally, get feedback to iterate on their solutions and repeat the cycle. They also get chance to see the existing technologies that other have already developed, and before they start working on their own challenges, they get the chance to build one of the existing technologies. The most exciting part is seeing students taking every class very seriously as reflected in the above photo. And they always try to reflect the challenges that are facing them either in the school or at home. This was very visible when they made their first maize sheller prototype.  Hi! I am Marko. I just joined the very dynamic and energetic AISE team last month and hit the ground running with Creative Capacity Building trainings for both primary and sccondary Schools. Within Twende, I am the Manager of Partnerships. At the the moment I am reaching out to schools to partner with us in order to promote innovation skills to the students, and I am the one who coordinates both the schools and the Twende team to make sure everyone is ready for CCB training sessions. On the side, I am also working on the evaluations process for on-going technologies already in the implementation stage.
I look forward to seeing Twende's innovative technologies and trainings being introduced to many young people not just in Arusha, but all over the country, in order to empower everyone in Tanzania to be a creator.
Speak soon! --Marko  Building on pedal-powered prototypes designed by Global Cycle Solutions and D-Lab, Bernard is developing a motorcycle-powered multi-crop thresher. This device is designed to enable smallholder farmers to thresh their own rice, sorghum or other staple crops without having to hire extra labor. Besides increasing throughput of a basic man-powered thresher by harnessing the power of a motorcycle engine, his design adds a winnowing component that further expedites crop processing.
During field tests, GCS discovered that many smallholder farmers pay casual laborers 3,000 Tsh/bag to thresh their rice, which at 12 bags per acre, amounts to 36,000 Tsh/acre. This means that for a small 5 acre plot, farmers pay casual laborers 180,000 Tsh or 112.5 USD per harvest on average. Considering that farmers make less than $300 for a 5-acre harvest of rice, this is a rather significant expenditure (more than one-third!). Reducing this expenditure could significantly raise profits for smallholder farmers, who are among the poorest individuals in Tanzania. While large farms tend to produce crops for exporting purposes, mid to small-sized farms sell to local food markets. Mid-sized farms often sell enough crops that they are able to influence market prices and take advantage of economies of scale; mid-sized rice farmers can often afford more efficient technologies, such as an engine-powered harvester that harvests, threshes and winnows all at once. Smallholder farmers, on the other hand, are very much price-takers. With just 5 to 10 acres, small farms do not have enough market power to influence the value of their crops through price-setting. [Although cooperatives do exits, most villagers do not belong to one.] In fact, small farms may have to take very low prices due to competition with mid-sized farms whose per unit costs are lower. If small farms do not charge the market price, an interested buyer can walk down the street to another farm. |
RSS Feed
