<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 2/12/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Rob Malouf</b> <<a href="mailto:rmalouf@mail.sdsu.edu">rmalouf@mail.sdsu.edu</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">To turn things in a more constructive direction, let me start what I<br>hope will be a new discussion...</blockquote>
<div><br> </div>
<div>If I might be permitted to riff off your queries re our snake and </div>
<div>computational linguistics, I want to mention that Jason Cunliffe</div>
<div>and I, both contributors to this list, plus we met in New York </div>
<div>that time, were (still are?) enamoured of 'Who Is Fourier?' by the </div>
<div>LEX Institute, a language teaching academy, with an interesting</div>
<div>philosophy we needn't go into too much in this post.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Flash forward: have you seen O'Reilly's 'Head First' series and </div>
<div>its use of icons, sidebars, jokes, diagrams, different type faces, </div>
<div>more icons? Way more "right brained" than traditional CS books, </div>
<div>by a long shot, but just as technical and deep (into Java mostly).</div>
<div>We've asked Tim about a "Head First" about Python, but the </div>
<div>word back, at least then, was we had too small a footprint as </div>
<div>a nation (he has these publisher maps he projects at OSCON) </div>
<div>to merit such a sophisticated and expensive undertaking. We </div>
<div>all still dream of it though.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>LEX Institute treats mathematics *as a language* and the </div>
<div>"story" of this book is language students wanting to analyze </div>
<div>the relative frequencies of certain vowel sounds in spoken </div>
<div>Japanese, and needing to gather this information directly </div>
<div>from sound waves if possible. That led them to Fourier Analysis </div>
<div>and a need to teach themselves about it, using human language </div>
<div>learning principles, applied to learning maths.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>In my view, using visuals, including screencasts (OK, so we're </div>
<div>getting beyond print media here), we should be able to communicate</div>
<div>the gist of Python's *grammar* in mere minutes, with no threat of </div>
<div>a follow-up test if such content is non-germane to the course. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Maybe a future Ubuntu distro will simply include some of these </div>
<div>Python teaching clips on the DVD? Makes sense to me.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>*We* will make the OO paradigm seem easy, using trivial-to-get </div>
<div>cartoons. To me, that's a kind of a minimalist way of explaining</div>
<div>the "everything is an object" slogan, a way to get a sense of </div>
<div>Python's "algebra" (its design).</div>
<div> </div>
<div>I have no problem with students not "majoring" in Python, or</div>
<div>any computer language. But skating through these grammar </div>
<div>sections could be fun, engaging, non-threatening, and take</div>
<div>only minutes. For example, my 'classes and subclasses' </div>
<div>clip, only 6 minutes 41 seconds, in my Python for Math </div>
<div>Teachers series (a collection of roughly 10 clips so far).</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Such clips by others could be projected to a computational </div>
<div>linguistics class for like a total of 20 minutes one random day, </div>
<div>as a token nod, if nothing else, to one of many languages </div>
<div>you're looking at and computing with (Python).</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Show 'Warriors of the Net' as well while you're at it (??) to </div>
<div>make sure your students know the basics of TCP/IP?</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Even those who live and breath it, probably won't mind an </div>
<div>8 minute cartoon on TCP/IP (OK, maybe it's 15, I forget). </div>
<div>It's a language that computes too, no? Not properly a </div>
<div>topic?</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Kirby</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Book highlighted:</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Who Is Fourier?:</div>
<div><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Who-Fourier-Transnational-College-Tokyo/dp/0964350408">http://www.amazon.com/Who-Fourier-Transnational-College-Tokyo/dp/0964350408</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>Jason waxing eloquent thereon:</div>
<div><a href="http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/2001-October/001788.html">http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/2001-October/001788.html</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>LEX Institute:</div>
<div><a href="http://www.lexhippo.gr.jp/english/organization/index.html">http://www.lexhippo.gr.jp/english/organization/index.html</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>References in my Blogs:</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Python for Math Teachers:</div>
<div><a href="http://controlroom.blogspot.com/2007/01/python-for-math-teachers.html">http://controlroom.blogspot.com/2007/01/python-for-math-teachers.html</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>Brainstorming about Pedagogy: </div>
<div><a href="http://worldgame.blogspot.com/2005/01/brainstorming-about-pedagogy.html">http://worldgame.blogspot.com/2005/01/brainstorming-about-pedagogy.html</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>TCP/IP:</div>
<div><a href="http://controlroom.blogspot.com/2006/06/tcpip-for-gnubees.html">http://controlroom.blogspot.com/2006/06/tcpip-for-gnubees.html</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div>Background Reading:</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Computational Linguistics:</div>
<div><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_linguistics">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computational_linguistics</a></div>
<div> </div>
<div> </div></div>