So, my university has a mandatory community service program where basically students are sent to help developing infrastructure and society in undeveloped parts of the country. I and my team are going to depart in the end of this month.

We're going to help raising IT-literacy level by teaching high school students basic programming with Scratch or Python. Is that too much? Should we just start with teaching Ms. Office instead? Or do you guys have any opinion?

Start with the benefits of each tech/program and what it can do.

Give them lists with free resources for every tech.

Teach them a little bit of everything so people can "get hooked" on what they like.

Teach them the basics of Windows, office, internet (focus on security), how to search for answers, how to find educational material, how to find a job, how to save money buying online, how to avoid scammers, etc.

DO NOT waste your and their time teaching them a programming language, literally (almost) no one cares. If by chance some of them like coding have a separate class just for them.

Your goal should to create netizens, not programmers.

As for programming languages, I would go with basic JavaScript or Python and then send them over to edx, freecodecamp, etc.

Nice initiative ;)

I agree with others start with "why programming" and high level programming language.

@theKarlisK Leave Linux for last. Once you have teached them the basics and they know a few things point them to Ubuntu or some other distro meant for stupid people and let them decide if they like it.

By the way, I can advise you to read something useful. A few days ago I found this https://gradesfixer.com/free-essay-... here you can find ideas or at least inspiration) In those essay examples is told about a personal experience of doing community service, there are the stories of students from different programs. Once I also read this in order to come up with my own interesting program for the group.