The Open School Project, the 1st high school of the Blockchain!

in #dlive7 years ago (edited)

A high school built on the Steem blockchain… Yes it is possible and it is a great idea! 

So great that I am going to get off my comfortable chair and implement it!  

Let me tell you what I am talking about… 

I am a private teacher in Physics, meaning that I support students having difficulties on a 1-on-1 basis or in small groups. When the student(s) is (are) located far away, I use Skype.  

Discovering D-Live and the OBS software recently (thank you @teamhumble), I had a great idea: why not export this activity to the Steem blockchain and help as many students as I can!  


I made a test run using OBS where I present the project as if I were streaming and give a sample of what a lesson could look like (Click on picture below):

The main idea is to stream weekly lessons on D-Live (at a regular time) so to help students with their studies. The advantage of streaming is that the information can go both ways from teacher to student and from student to teacher via the chat. 

As I am a Physics teacher, I will explain the open school concept from the perspective of teaching Physics, i.e. “Open Physics”. Still, this course can be extended to any other subject, “Open Maths”, “Open History”, “Open Economics” etc…   


1/ The concept:


2/ The content of a live streaming lesson:

  • Students request a lesson on a specific topic out of a list. In my case, here is the list of the topics I offer to teach. Students can post their requests in the comment sections of the posts announcing the next stream or of previous lessons. 

  • Based on this feedback, the teacher selects the topic he will discuss during his next streaming session. 
  • The lesson contains the basics required to understand a topic, and exercises that the student can carry out during the lesson. After say 5-10 minutes, the teacher resolves the exercise and answers questions. 
  • The students can interact with the teacher via chat, therefore ask questions live. 
  • Exam training sessions can also be requested by the students, or proposed and organized by the teacher .


3/ Implementation

This idea is in its infancy, so how it is realized will probably evolve as I move forward with it. The principle though is simple: a white board and some pens, a cam, a good mike, OBS (or other) as a streaming software, and D-Live as the streaming platform. The live stream is automatically posted on Steemit so that students can refer to it and use the comment section for further questions or requests.  

Other teachers are warmly invited to join this initiative as long as the lessons they provide satisfy certain criteria: 

  • The topics MUST be part of an official high school program. When a teacher prepares a lesson, he MUST refer to which program he is using as base.  
  • Use the #openschool tag. 
  • Use a specific tag for example #biology, #economics, #englishliterature etc…  
  • Any language is OK as long as the sound and pronunciation are of good quality. If the language is not English, a specific tag should be used (for example #fr for French).  
  • An effective and interactive visualization system must be in place (white board, drawing tablet, secondary cam focused on pen and paper etc…).  
  • The teacher must be seen: No powerpoint slides with audio in the background. 
  • Streaming lessons only. 
  • The teacher must listen to the student requests and be interactive.    


4/ Financial support

The primary objective here is not to make money, but to help a student at no cost for him or her. However, teachers also have rents or mortgages to pay. The time taken by teachers for preparing the streaming lessons, carrying them out and supporting the students should be compensated. In real life, it is the student or his family that finances this.  

The Steemit community allows taking care of these costs by upvoting, and therefore, in theory, ALL STUDENTS can benefit from a high quality support in their education. Steemit makes it an amazing opportunity to level the playing field in terms of education, where teachers can be properly compensated in offering their best to all students including those that cannot afford private tuition.  

This is why I am creating this school on the Blockchain: to give an opportunity to all kids, whatever their social status to succeed in their studies. 

For the occasion I created a separate Steemit account : @openschool. Please contact me if you wish to discuss supporting this initiative with SP delegation.   


5/ Wish the project good luck!

Imagine the Steem blockchain becoming a hub where students seek and find personalized help with their studies, all for free! 

Imagine the steem blockchain becoming a hub where teachers provide their support and their knowledge to the next generation, and be compensated for it by an upvoting system. 

Wouldn’t this be amazing?  

So…send us your good vibes for the success of the Open School Project, the first High School on the blockchain.

I will try to arrange my first streaming for this week or the next, and will keep you all posted!  


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this is exactly the kind of programming i wanted to empower. thank you for jumping in and learning and doing this! amazing!

Thank you teamhumble! Let's see where it goes.
By the way, if you don't mind, could you help me from time to time when I have a tech question. There have been popping by in my head all day while I was experimenting and setting this up. For example, do I need to create a chat room in discord to go with the live, or does DLive open a room automatically?

discord and dlive are completely separate from each other. i do it in a different way, i'll do a video about it. i'm fine with receiving questions and i'll try and help where i can!

Me parece una idea genial, te animo, y te apoyo

Thank you so much!
It's a big task ahead of me to set this up, but it would be amazing if it worked. Another proof that Blockchain Tech has humanistic potential.
(btw, thank you google translate... my Spanish is not that good)

Amazing idea my friend!

Cheers mate :-)
I hope it will catch: it would be quite amazing to have a real school on Steemit with a dozen teachers helping high school students!

My 100 percent up vote for that steem reality! Good luck!

Thank you @Johano.
It's a big idea, and it will probably require a lot of work on my part, so your encouragement is warmly welcome!

students will love to learn from you and physics is a complicated subject but if once learned with interesting it is awesome :)

Totally, you got it!

Many of my (real life) students, after starting a tuition with me, while hating Physics like a plague, saw their opinion change after a few months: Physics appeared easier to them and they started enjoying it, some even ended up took Physics as their main subject at University :-)!

Everyone can understand and enjoy Physics. It is like learning how to love a new style of music.

Great idea! I look to your work and teachings to also learn from. You are doing a great job. Physics is not that abstract and you have proved that to a lot of people.

Thank you @obamike. Lessons may be a little more formal than my blog though. Hope you will still feel like sticking around when I'll pour equations on a white board ;-)

sure will...I am a Physicist too. you have made it interesting to a lot of people and that is what I also strive to do. I look forward to it.

Hi Obakhavbaye, I read your intro post. Impressive. I admire what you do.

I am still reflecting on the format of the Openschool. It is a very new idea.

I am thinking of enlarging the scope to non-streaming videos (normal recorded videos), so that the technical and time constraints of streaming does not deter the effort of talented teachers.

I read you are quite concerned in education in African countries notably Nigeria. If I can help with your initiative via the Openschool, I will, including if it is possible and useful, lessons by internet to students in Nigeria.

Oh..it is really a great privilege to have you go through my intro post. I absolutely support the idea of normal recording videos especially for us at this end. streaming can be a little difficult. Yes I am very passionate about education and I guess that is the field I am "called" to be. I want to live in a world free from educational inequity and one that provide equal opportunity for everyone.
Yes we will love to have you support us through Openschool, and reach out to students in Nigeria. I will work on the modalities for that and get back to you.
Thank you for this rare privilege.

Good morning Oba, I am glad to read your enthusiasm!

As I mentioned, the project is still in definition, and, yes, the more I think about it, the more I realise that non-live videos seem to be the way to go, for now. More I explore it, more I realise the complexity of the set up and organisation required on both the reception and emission side.

Live activities, in front of a class or group of students could be done by Skype, a system more reliable and easier to set up.

And by using OBS (a free opensource video soft), it is possible to record the video while skyping for future upload, so that others can enjoy the lesson too.

I look forwards to reading you and your proposal. Some places in the world lack of quality teachers. Internet Tech is pretty advanced now, and we can fill this gap! The openschool could become a network of teachers in all disciplines, located all around the world, helping students also all around the world.

This is huge and achievable! we actually need more tech based solutions to improve the achievement outcomes for students in Africa. I have been engaging some friends in tech industry to come in and assist. It will mean a great deal when this project kicks off...

Hey Oba, let's have a chat to discuss possibilities and objectives. Are you on Discord? If so, what's your name there. If not, it is easy to create an account and quite intuitive to use. I am @muphy on Discord too, so you can search me.

Yah that is a good work. Good work opning the blockchain school. Amazing!!

Blockchain tech can have numerous applications. Education is the core of a society. Feels like a good fit ;-)!

Yah agree with you you start a good work and sucess a many people in oir life ok

Open School Project is awesome thanks for updating us through your blog,this is very much exiting,thanks a lot for sharing with us,btw following you,have a nice day.

Cheers! It is exciting indeed, yet a lot of work to set up! Wish me luck!

your primary object and goal is great to spread the light of knowledge

More precisely to promote freedom.
Knowledge gives you choices.

this could be a new great beginning and perfect use of the blockchain great idea :D

Thank you @Blazing, let's see where it goes :-)