African Virtual School Update

It has been a long time since our last post and I thought that I will update you on what has been going on:

• African Virtual School :  We moved the focus from passing Waec, Neco and Jamb to a dedicated site and positioned the African Virtual School as a provider of skills and training for individuals and businesses in West Africa.   All our courses are created from scratch with this audience in mind.
• Pass.com.ng is our new dedicated site for Waec, Neco and Jamb Maths and English revision for Nigeria as the vast majority of our learners are from Nigeria.  Pass.com.ng should be seen as a specialist division of the African Virtual School.

The African Virtual School will  provide courses in Literacy, Numeracy, ICT and Employability for individuals and for businesses,  courses in Customer Service, Microsoft Excel, Communications, Cash Accounting, Effective Writing, Managing Your Work Workload.

600,000 Waec Students Failed English

out of a total of around 1.5 million students who wrote the English Language paper in July 2011.  This gives an English failure rate of 40%.

The results for Maths were even more depressing, with 900,000 or 60% failing.

Do not join the failures!  Sign up for a Waec Maths and English Revision course at the African Virtual School.

The African Virtual School Magazine

The African Virtual School has launced a magazine aptly named "The African Virtual School Magazine" .  This magazine features amongst other things articles written by African students both in Africa and in the diaspora on any topic of interest to them.  The aim is to use the magazine as a place to practise their writing.

Solving the book distribution problem in Africa

Printing and distributing books in Africa is hard.  Poor roads, expensive storage all add to the cost of owning a book.  Add to the fact that some textbooks need constant updating has meant that most school students in Africa have to make do with old or badly copied workbooks. 

Our workbook, Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division Worksheets for African Primary Schools was up to today only available  on Amazon or through us via bulk purchase.   Today, we have added another option, digital worksheets; available anytime or anywhere through our partner site Primemaths.  School teachers in African primary schools can now generate as many worksheets as possible for their students.  These sheets are created on demand and changed all the time, freeing the teachers to focus on teaching.


These sheets are free for a limited time.  Please feel free to use and if you find any errors or bugs, please email us at support @ africanvirtualschool dot com.

African Teachers Forums

Free interactive forums for African Teachers are now available on the African Virtual School.   Sign-up for a free account here.   You will be able to join after confirmation.

African Virtual School goes Splash in Sierra Leone!

We are pleased to announce that learners in Sierra Leone can now subscribe to the African Virtual School (www.africanvirtulschool.com) using Splash Mobile Money (www.splash-cash.com), Sierra Leone's first mobile payment system, allowing you to send money to other mobile users using just your phone.

To subscribe to the African Virtual School with Splash, follow these steps:

SMS to 700:   Buy Your_Pin 078552777 40000

(A user name and password will be sent to you by SMS within 24-48 hours after purchase.  Check out www.splash-cash.com to find your nearest Splash Agent)

Revising in Low-Bandwidth Environments

We have been testing www.africanvirtualschool.com from the beautiful city of Freetown (ok, I'm biased :) ).  One key lesson learned is that video does not work in low-bandwidth environments so streaming lessons are out for the time being.   Simple html pages with as few graphics as possible is a must.  The good news is that the browsing speeds were sufficient to allow for a decent revision experience.  Two new developments in the works are:

1. We are working with a local payments provider to enable subscriptions using a mobile phone.   This opens up enormous prospects for e-commerce in Sierra Leone.
2. A local training company will soon start offering our ICT courses as instructor-led backed by distance learning through the African Virtual School.  In this way, learners will get the best of both worlds.

Stay tuned for for more...

Online Customised Maths Worksheets for African Schools

As part of our school support program, the African Virtual School now offers customised, printable maths worksheets for schools.  African teachers can use our worksheets to create customised questions covering addition, subtraction, multiplication, percentages, rounding and more for their students.  These customised worksheets are available online, saving schools money compared to workbooks.  Of course, schools can still order printed workbooks from us.

How to send money to Africa using Internet Banking

http://www.africandatabase.com/wiki/How_to_send_money_to_Africa_using_Internet_Banking

Senior Secondary Maths and English Revision

The African Virtual School now offers exam revision in Maths and English for senior secondary school students preparing for exams such as WAEC, NECO and Jamb.

How to pass time at an African airport

http://www.africandatabase.com/wiki/How_to_pass_time_at_an_African_airport

How to get screened for sickle cell disease

http://www.africandatabase.com/wiki/How_to_get_yourself_screened_for_sickle_cell_disease

African Virtual School 2010 Catalogue is ready

Download our latest catalogue here.

Introduction to the African Virtual School

African Virtual School Subscriptions

African Virtual School subscriptions are now just $4 per month or the equivalent in your local currency.  Access all the courses, cancel any time.    Subscribe through your school and save.

African Teachers Forum

A forum for African Teachers.

African Virtual School - Digital Workbooks

We are working on our first digital workbook - The African Virtual School Maths Workbook 1, which will cover worksheets in Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division for African Primary Schools.  The book will be available in pdf  and each will be branded with details of the primary school and will involve the following:

• a one-off purchase
• rights for the school to print and make as many copies of the worksheet as they wish.

The African Virtual School Maths Book

This book covers Maths that will help both junior secondary school students (12 - 14) and adults pursuing a Maths course. The topics cover areas such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, decimals, fractions, probability , knowledge of which is essential to survive in the 21st century. A word about currencies. We have used where possible the US Dollar, the Leone (Le) and occasionally the British Pound [ £] to illustrate problems where money is involved.

Available from Amazon.

www.africandatabase.com

Africandatabase.com offers africa-focused databases on jobs, cvs and more.

Four Days to Launch !

On Monday, the African Virtual School will launch with the course "Essential Maths for the Workplace".  This course will cover key Maths skills like Multiplication, Fractions, Decimals, Percentages, Area, Volume, Pie Charts and more.