Kids’ computer training on the go

BILL SPARKES/Acorn Newspapers MOBILE TECHNOLOGY—Though it may look like a typical vehicle for transportation, this van is actually a mobile computer lab that travels to local preschools and kindergartens to teach young students basic computer skills. Four excited preschoolers marched anxiously in a singlefile line, fighting the urge to run to the parking lot in front of Born Learners, their small school in Agoura Hills.

Their weekly computer class isn’t held in a lab or typical portable classroom. Computer teacher Cindy Lazenby was leading the children to a parked bus.

Lazenby drives her renovated bus, filled with laptops and a television, all over the Conejo Valley, teaching young children how to navigate the technological world. The software she uses, aimed at kids ages 2 to 7, tutors children in typing, computer networking, e-mail and Internet navigation.

“The software actually adjusts to the child’s level,” Lazenby said. “If a child is more advanced with their ABCs, it can adjust to that. . . . It’s great to see them jumping to the next (level). It’s really rewarding.”

Lazenby found Imagine Tomorrow, the company that puts out the software, while looking for computer classes for her two children, ages 1 and 9. The Lazenbys were so taken with the program that within two weeks they were off to teach their kids and others. It didn’t hurt that the two have a related background— they own a computer consulting firm.

“We went to Colorado for the training and learned how to teach the classes and bring them back to the community,” Lazenby said. “We think it’s important because technology is our way of communicating. It’s so big in every child’s life. It’s not just your CD player—8-year-olds have their own laptops. It’s important for them to understand what a computer is and how it works before they are just handed one.”

When they returned, Lazenby began preparing to bring the classes to local recreation centers and school computer labs, but her husband had a better plan. “He came up with the idea to do the classes in the bus,” Lazenby said. “We spent six weeks fixing it up.”

It was a hit. “The kids love it,” Lazenby said. “We don’t drive with them in it, but every class time they ask, ‘Are you gonna take us for a ride somewhere?’ They love getting on the bus; it’s so much fun. The minute they see the bus, they are running toward it.”

The bus is decorated with “computer bugs” from top to bottom, including a giant rug where the children gather for circle time.

After doing some fingertip push-ups and sit-ups to prepare for mouse clicking, the kids shouted the mantra: “I can do anything if I put my mind to it!”

Then they were off to Webwood Forest to learn about the Internet, and Network Neighborhood to practice linking computers.

Preschooler Max Wolff announced he had conquered the backspace button during his mission at Keyboard Castle.

“It makes all the letters go back” Max shouted. “It erases them. Sometimes I erase all of them in a row.”

Lazenby started with Born Learners in August. Now she’s spanning out to other preschools and recreation centers in Thousand Oaks and Newbury Park, and would like to teach 6- and 7-year-olds at elementary schools, too.

“We’ve actually been really happy with the response we are getting from parents and teachers,” Lazenby said. “The parents really like the classes and the bus idea—they say it brings back memories for them with the bookmobile bus.”