<br><div><span class="gmail_quote">On 14/07/06, <b class="gmail_sendername">kirby urner</b> <<a href="mailto:kirby.urner@gmail.com">kirby.urner@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
I have no idea what a C16 is and don't care to ever know. </blockquote><div><br>Andreas is talking about the early 80's 'personal computers' before the computer industry somewhat "changed".<br><br>At this time the computers were:
<br><br>1) Affordable. <br><br>Actual my first computer was a 100$ laptop in front of a TV (a Sinclair ZX81 I had the chance to have at 11 when I was in a state of scholar failure... now my mum says it's the best thing she ever bought....)
<br><br>2) Designed to learn some 'programming' if you wanted to have some fun.<br><br>The first thing you had when you boot was a programming language.<br>The machines came with the hardware schematics (even without understanding it, it really stimulated my curiosity).
<br>Magazines were all about Open Source code and "usual" hardware hacking to expand your computer (and again even without understanding much, it really stimulated my curiosity).<br>Even if they were so imperfect there were already to me "tools to think with" as describes Papert.
<br><br>Nowadays computers don't come with schematics, don't come with a programming manual and you're mainly suppose to be just a "user", just a "consumer". <br><br>When I compare personal computer magazines today it doesn't surprise me that there's a lack of vocations in CS.
<br><br>I see a lot of people laugthing at the OLPC (the tiny 100$ laptop project) but if it is successful, "developing countries " could well surprise us in the future maybe because they came "back" a little (in some ways).
<br><br>"OLPC is based on <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Constructionist" title="Constructionist">constructionist</a> theories of learning pioneered by <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Seymour_Papert" title="Seymour Papert">
Seymour Papert</a> and later <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Alan_Kay" title="Alan Kay">Alan Kay</a>,
as well as the principles expressed in Nicholas Negroponte's book
'Being Digital'. Some background on our approach can be gleaned from
David Cavallo's essay, <a href="http://www.media.mit.edu/publications/bttj/Paper11Pages96-112.pdf" class="external text" title="http://www.media.mit.edu/publications/bttj/Paper11Pages96-112.pdf" rel="nofollow">"Models for growth—towards fundamental change in learning environments"
</a>"<br><br><a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/One_Laptop_per_Child">http://wiki.laptop.org/go/One_Laptop_per_Child</a><br><a href="http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/313/">http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/313/</a><br><br>I also seen again a talk Seymor Papert gave in my university in 2003. In the second part he talks about the shift in the computer industry, he also says that WWW is wonderful but that eduction by focusing too much on the information search and "Powerpoint Presentations" is missing the deepest potential of these machines for education.
<br><br>The video is here:<br><a href="http://www.canalc2.tv/video.asp?idvideo=1868">http://www.canalc2.tv/video.asp?idvideo=1868</a><br>(Papert spoke in French here but again I advise people to read his book "Mindstorms:
<font size="-1">Children, Computers and Powerful Ideas</font>" )<br><br> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> Not sure what this thread is about any more.
</blockquote><div><br>Me neither. <br><br>Anyway by reading this high egoboo-list my bet is that relevant pythonic post-squeak/Logo environments, with a critical mass, probably won't happen here (I hope I'm wrong).<br><br>
I've always found educational lists "difficult", teachers tend to think that the way they learned and succeed is the right way for *everybody* ...<br>... maybe that's why its important to also give kids "tools to think with" and rich "environments" to play with and learn for *themselves*.
<br><br>francois <br>(going back to more 'piratical' pythonic lists)<br><br><br></div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">Kirby
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