Singapore, 21 June 1998   

Think Quest Competition 98
 

Entry: The Solar System


When Raphael asked me to write a few lines as coach I saw it as an opportunity to summarize a few highlights we came across on our way to and through The Solar System.

Im am teaching my students at the Swiss school in Singapore. Two years ago we heard first time about the Think Quest. Especially the boys were quickly attracted by the idea to contribute and to design our own web site. We submitted an entry about 'drugs' and a second one about 'the jungle' last year.

Lukas who was already contributing for 'the jungle', didn't hesitate to engage himself for our current entry 'The Solar System' again although he had moved back to Switzerland where he attends the third grade in college now.

One of the first toys Raphael, a first secondary student, wished to have, was a computer. The day he migrated from primary to secondary school he seldom was seen somewhere else than in front of the computers of the secondary classroom. His mother even had to schedule a 'computer free evening' during which Raphael was supposed to deal with no IT means only.

Jonas attends the second secondary grade in our school and was almost computer illiterate. Being a great researcher and always ready to learn new skills he desisted to enlarge his horizon and to contribute.

Lukas, Jonas and Raphael (all from different grades) and I had several on line chat sessions in order to decide about our subject, to define who is caring for what and to mail URLs and all kinds of sources for our project forth and back.

I have been very much impressed with the pace and effort the three boys started their enterprise. They were not exempted from other tasks. They arranged the web site to a very big part in their spare time. The Solar System started to get brighter on one hand and more amazing on the other. We well know that we only touched basics but we learned a lot about the Solar System as well as how to use this great tool Internet.

We definitely will not hesitate to participate at the next year's Think Quest again!
I only can recommend to participate at this contest! Great discovering, learning and contributing for everybody who can access the Internet!