The Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education (KITE) has rolled out– KOOL, Online Open Learning training platform to train teachers, students, and general public. Registrations for training have started and the first batch comprising of 2500 teachers with one mentor for every 20 teachers is scheduled for next month. The six-week course includes creation of word documents, spreadsheet, presentation, image editing, video-audio editing, development of digital resources, Malayalam typing, internet, educational applications.
KOOL has been designed in a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) model, which is becoming popular worldwide. “KOOL is a major step by the State of Kerala to become Indias first complete digital state in Education”, said Prof C Raveendranath, state Education minister. Learning Management Systems were a part of the approach paper on ‘Samagra’ resource portal and KOOL has been developed as an expansion of ‘Samagra’, the resource portal of the education department. KOOL has an array of features for learners in the form of animated learning assistants, video tutorials and checklists for practicing the activities,a press release said.
Over 5,000 teachers have approached KITE so far seeking such courses and the initial training in KOOL has been incorporated with relevant modules. Teachers who successfully complete the course would be awarded certificates.
KITE has already submitted a proposal to the state government, seeking approval to declare the KOOL Certificate acceptable for declaring the probation of teachers.