November 2007 PRESS RELEASE
Dubai, 20th November 2007
Diwan and Orange Technology have started shipping the high school curriculum on a single software CD to Yemeni schools using Diwan's Oannis Technology. This new 'e-curriculum' brings Yemeni schools into the computer age with one of the most advanced educational systems in the region.
Oannis makes it possible to put all 90 books that cover the whole high-school curriculum into a single CD that can be browsed, summarised and searched as true electronic documents yet will print with the quality of the original books.
Adil Allawi, Technical Director of Diwan, adds: “Back in 1986 Diwan revolutionised theArab publishing industry by making it possible for designers to transfer their experience of laying out newspapers and magazines to the computer. Diwan Oannis is part of the computer revolution for the world of education. It provides the essential role of evolving the wealth of knowledge and years experience embodied in the school books to the computer age.”
Basing education around the existing school books is essential. Many years of work has gone into formatting, designing and refining school books. The whole of the teacher's professional career has been based around teaching from such books. Removing books from the educational system is simply not possible. Yet the books also present significant problems for educational institutions. It is just not possible to update all the school books regularly. It is also difficult to link content of paper books directly to new educational systems. Oannis bridges that gap.
Bringing computers into education will bring innumerable benefits to both the teachers and the students. Also, the students will no longer need to search through pages of books to learn or revise for lessons. All pages are already indexed and searches can be conducted across multiple books. Teachers can easily prepare handouts and lessons directly from the content of the books and integrate his own notes to further explain the lessons to the class.
This also makes it possible to update educational materials annually as changes are distributed by replacing a single CD. New, better, teaching methods can be integrated into the curriculum as they become available.