These pages aim to help those planning informal, fun learning activities for their community technology centres, and particularly UK online centres. We bring together two sets of tools which we hope are useful to centres - workshop materials, and online resources:

Workshop materials

These materials including a card 'game' which helps groups discuss and plan what sort of online activities they might be interested in - before they even lay hands on a keyboard.

• General introduction to our planning games (you may have come from this page) here >
• The cards for fun centre activities (pdf download 820 K). Right click and download the link (Windows) or option/alt click (Mac) otherwise Acrobat may load as a plug in and show the file on screen instead of downloading. Here >
• Review general instructions for using the cards, plus other materials here >
• Download a Word document with specific instructions for this game here>
• Dowload a planning sheet (you will need to redraw to larger size) here >

Online resources: ideas for 'fun' online activities

The cards relate, in part, to some 'real' ideas for centre activities created for the CuriousIT programme being developed by the Direct Support consortium. This is funded by the UK Government's Department for Education and Skills. The idea is that after playing the 'game' and choosing a package of activities, participants and tutors can then follow through online .

• Link to CuriousIT i deas for 'fun' centre activities , with downloadable worksheets. The activities are designed to engage people who may not immediately see the usefulness of computers and the Net, and provide ways for people to learn through personal exploration and group activities.
• More about DirectSupport.
• Resources about centres on this site
• The Help is at Hand resource for UK online centre managers, also funded by DfES.
• The official DfES UK online centres site

We would really welcome feedback and ideas on developing the games further.
Please mail David Wilcox david@makingthenetwork.org