BingBee @ RaglanRoad - A field trial with unattended educational kiosks

A pod of ten unattended “behind-the-glass” computer kiosks has been running at the Raglan Road Multipurpose Centre in Grahamstown for more than three years. The goal is to enhance computational thinking skills, and to provide logic, mathematical, reading and computer literacy skills via edutainment and fun. The technology is explicitly engineered so that usage is not dependent on having willing teachers as supervisors. Initially targeted at 7-13 year old children, we´ve had to make adaptations for younger children from the on-site pre-primary school. We describe the innovative mechanism that allows unattended access while securing and protecting our systems. We give a brief overview of the technology and content on the kiosks, the implementation, and some observations about usage. Unusually, the project was conceived and initiated from a technical perspective, and we discuss some issues that have arisen around maintenance and division of responsibilities between the parties involved.