Mailman 3 April 2000 - Edu-sig

Re: [Edu-sig] Articles of possible interest
by Dorothea Salo May 3, 2000

May 3, 2000

Hi, Guido (and edu-sig), Thanks for being such a good sport! >I had wanted the examples to be more realistic, but I don't really >know any girls (or boys!) in the ages described in the article, and I >still don't have the faintest idea what kind of games or other >activities *would* appeal to them so I could make the examples. >(Surely not Pokemon!) You'd be surprised. My coworker's daughter -- 9 or 10, I think -- got her picture in the newspaper last Halloween in some sort of Pokemon getup. I myself am rather an anime fan (although Pokemon makes me gag). I remember what I liked myself around that age, >but I was probably several standard deviations away from the norm, and >too socially inept to know what the girls were interested in. Well, I don't deny that the Barbie girls exist (I started to include a paragraph to that effect, but it got whiny, so I deleted it). I'm just not sure they're CP4E's first target, and they're certainly not its only target! >I did realize before it went to press that girls of that age no longer >play with Barbies, but I didn't know what to substitute, and neither >did my fiancee. I figured that 95% of the audience would be men like >me who wouldn't notice the cultural discontinuity, so I decided to >leave it in... Part of the problem. But I said that. :) You have more women in your audience than you probably realize, and you'll have more (and more vocal) women if you make them feel welcome. >Coming around to your plea for more text processing: good point. I >still believe that many kids would find text processing boring (you >must have a more than average interest in it given your interest in >linguistics), Well, yes, I certainly do, in the same way that computer programmers tend to have a more than average interest in mathematics. (I do confess that I haven't darkened the door of a math classroom since the calculus class I mentioned.) My point is more that kids might find text processing *immediately useful* in a way that robots aren't. Moreover, text processing is probably already a part of their lives in a way that robots aren't -- I think I typed up my first paper at age 13, and I expect kids these days are doing it younger. It seems a shame not to leverage some of that familiarity. They've seen and used spellcheckers, why not have them program one? There is also the fascinating interaction between computer language and natural language to explore. What are the "parts of speech" of Python? "for" isn't really a preposition, is it? Then what is it? I think verbally-oriented kids could really get into discussions like that -- and learn about *both* computer language *and* natural language in the process. and to really show off the power of today's computers, >graphics are in order. Searching a million words in under a second >isn't quite as impressive as displaying realistic full-screen 3-D >animation at 30 frames per second, I think, and the latter appeals >more to people who can't program at all, Internet search engines not >withstanding. No argument. But again, there *really are* people who yawn at pretty pictures who can be grabbed by an instant translator (especially if it's any good, which most of them aren't). Playing with strings can actually be a lot of fun. The "aha moment" that brought me to Python was learning about regular expressions. Most programmers, I think, find regexes as boring and difficult as I find computational math games. Me, I *love* constructing regexes, do it all the time and have done really pretty amazing things with them -- and I think there are LOTS of people who would catch onto them quickly and find them as fascinating as I do. >I also believe strongly that graphical user interfaces (if done well!) >are better than text interfaces for most things, including debugging. Oh, I tend to believe that also (she said, typing busily on a Macintosh). It's not like most people use emacs instead of Microsoft Word (*spit*). >Interestingly enough, I believe that programming itself, >i.e. expressing the intended operation of a computer program, is best >done through text. Well, because I'm so painfully verbal rather than visual, I sort of like the draw-the-GUI-widget development aids. But in the main I agree, insofar as I'm qualified to. >I hope that you could see through my biased examples and found some >information on where I think IDLE should go. I'd love to discuss that >here or in the idle-dev list. Yes, indeed I did. I shall have to start lurking on idle-dev. Thanks again for keeping your temper. I did try to stay out of flame-mode, but I'm never quite sure I've managed it. Dorothea ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dorothea Salo <*> |"He querido mas vivir en mi peque~a casa, dorothea(a)terracom.net |exenta, y se~ora, que no en sus ricos http://www.terracom.net/~dorothea |palacios, sojuzgada y cativa."_Celestina_

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RE: articles of possible interest
by John Maxwell May 2, 2000

May 2, 2000

David Scherer wrote: > > what I think we maybe need is Python-MOO integration... maybe a MOO-Zope > > integration. THAT would be truly cool. > > I hope you will elaborate on the latter, but I still believe that an > *entirely* Python MOO would be an extremely useful tool for teaching > programming, precisely because Python is not "limited in domain." > > Beginning programmers struggle with language syntax and semantics - it is > only later, after one or more languages have been mastered, that people > begin to abstract away the differences. Hmmm. I think we're diverging on the issue of the end goal. You seem to be assuming we're aiming to teach people to be programmers. I'm not sure that's the goal in and of itself... my personal take is programming as a means to greater control and understanding in an IT-dominant world -- 'literacy', if I can use that word. And if that's the goal, then a language that is very wide in domain scope may not be ideal... one with a certain degree of domain-specificity may be preferable. I think we've seen on this list many arguments for why Python is a better choice than C++ on those very grounds. The nice thing about Python is that it is very well suited to the kinds of Internet-y things that are hot these days -- parsers and GUIs and CGIs and stuff like that. The very things that we wouldn't use C++ for because it's too darned general. MOO is a further narrowing of domain, and I'm going to invoke Bruckman's work again to point out the efficacy of a very tightly-coupled language/application pair. She's got 9-year-olds programming not because you can create this or that data structure in MOOcode, but because you can do something that's immediately meaningful within that *cultural* context -- a pet dog 'bot or whatever -- in not too many lines of abstraction. Somebody the other day wrote here very eloquently about the line between interface and implementation. We're always walking one or the other with that line. Python is great because it allows us to draw it in different places. We might call it "scaffolding". Zope is a great example -- the line between interface and implementation is so blurry! And I'll agree -- if we had an entirely Python-based MOO, that would be wonderful, but I'm not sure it's the most important thing on the agenda. But Pavel Curtis' MOO succeeds by keeping the implementation layer very thin, and letting most of it happen up above, in MOO code, so the line between implementation and interface remains, in practice, fairly fuzzy there too. > Learning a MOO language would teach someone the fundamentals of programming, > but it would leave them powerless to apply them in the REAL world. I would invite you to take a critical look at what this "real world" is you're appealing to... I'm not at all convinced that it's so real out there these days :-) Seriously, though, I think it comes down to the difference between aiming to teach people "Programming", and aiming to teach them to make technology work for their own ends, whatever that might look like. - John Maxwell jmax(a)portal.ca ------------------------------------------------ Multimedia Ethnographic Research Lab (MERLin) University of British Columbia, Canada

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Articles of possible interest
by Dorothea Salo May 2, 2000

May 2, 2000

As most of you probably already know, _Linux Journal_ just put out a Python supplement that includes an article on CP4E by Guido van Rossum. I have been lurking for a while on edu-sig, and have read its archive, so of course I was pleased to see the article. I found myself reacting rather strongly to it, and have written up my observations and placed them on the Web. I decided not to bring them forward here because a) I am a total edu-sig newbie, b) some of my observations are tangential to CP4E, and c) most, if not all, of my observations are rather polemical. The essay I have written can be found at http://www.terracom.net/~dorothea/femhack.html. I will be around edu-sig if anything I have written deserves comment here. Dorothea ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dorothea Salo <*> |"He querido mas vivir en mi peque~a casa, dorothea(a)terracom.net |exenta, y se~ora, que no en sus ricos http://www.terracom.net/~dorothea |palacios, sojuzgada y cativa."_Celestina_

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Re: [Edu-sig] RE: articles of possible interest
by Jtsswim＠aol.com April 30, 2000

April 30, 2000

In a message dated 4/30/2000 2:41:04 PM Eastern Daylight Time, dscherer(a)cmu.edu writes: > Even at sites that provide forums, the vast majority of visitors lurk. For > example, there are 164 people subscribed to edu-sig right now, and others > reading the archives. Since 2/1, there have been roughly 420 posts by 63 > people. (Hi, lurkers! :) Now that's a thought...some of us, like my self wait for a time then talk, or they don't need questions answered on that list they just need a place to read about what is going on. |----------------------------------------------| |Yorktown Webmaster Jason Straw| |jstraw(a)yhspatriot.yorktown.arlington.k12.va.us| |Please quote me in your reply | |#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-|

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RE: Articles of possible interest
by John Maxwell April 30, 2000

April 30, 2000

David Scherer wrote: Stephen R. Figgins wrote: > Has anyone metioned POO yet? Maybe I missed it. > Ah, and one more, MOOP, this one found lurking in the vaults. Haha. Same project! Good decision to change the acronym, methinks! > That said, I find news forums a more interesting place to meet others > and learn about programming, and it has the added benefit of being > archived. In a chat or moo, the conversation is often lost, and > because of when you logged on, or what room you are in at the moment, > your questions might not reach the right eyes. Precisely the reason for my earlier plea for a Zope-MOO integration (or a Zope-Poo integration, I guess). We used to have a MOO project for teachers where they could build website objects (essentially just URLs) that could be used to show webpages to groups of people in real time (like a synchronized slide show) or like books in a library that you could look at on your own. The idea was to try to leverage the MOO for both synchronous (chat-like) and asynchronous (mail- or list-like) purposes. Now, MOO does an unparalled job (IMHO) of the synchronous stuff, but something like Zope has it hands down for asynchronous groupwork. To be able to merge the functionality would be fabulous. > And if I am to take the time building interactive objects in Python, I > think I would like them to be more visible to the world. What if we > thought of the web itself as a giant moo? With each site as its own > sort of room? Or, perhaps think of the web as a medium for delivering > a moo? The moo could be built in a distributed environment, all that > would be needed is some sort of moo servlet that can pass on state to > other moo servlets running on the web... OK, right, exactly, and -- to actually bring it back to relevance for CP4E -- the big picture is an object-based distributed environment for our programming tasks. Both your synchronous and asynchronous interactions (and the objects that make them go) are *situated* -- you're not working on your hard drive or your desktop, you're working in a virtual environment. I think this is the feature that makes Amy Bruckman's adolescent programmers tick... that they're not coding scripts to do things on a desktop or a disk, but rather within a shared virtual space. The Web is such a space (though rather flat). MOOs and MUDs are much richer environments. I'm loving working with Zope right now, because it starts to look like these two things are getting closer together... it's not just pages and files, it's objects and behaviours. If it actually can be distributed across servers -- Python being the glue -- then we'd really have something. My standard_html_header object should be able to refer to my player object, right? And vice-versa? - John Maxwell jmax(a)portal.ca ------------------------------------------------ Multimedia Ethnographic Research Lab (MERLin) University of British Columbia, Canada

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Re: [Edu-sig] RE: articles of possible interest
by Jtsswim＠aol.com April 30, 2000

April 30, 2000

In a message dated 4/30/2000 2:59:45 AM Eastern Daylight Time, dscherer(a)cmu.edu writes: > > Hmmm. I think we're diverging on the issue of the end goal. You seem to be > > assuming we're aiming to teach people to be programmers. I'm not sure > > that's the goal in and of itself... my personal take is programming as a > > means to greater control and understanding in an IT-dominant world -- > > 'literacy', if I can use that word. > > I think the goal is to put tools in people's hands. Not to make them > professional programmers or expert software engineers. Just to give them > skills that they can use and build on. Someone who has only programmed in a > MOO just isn't going to apply the skills they've learned to a problem that > pops up in their life. Someone who takes a course that does (for example) > some Python MOO programming, some Python graphics programming, and some > Python Internet programming can! > > It's an incredibly ambitious goal to try to get "Everybody" to learn a > programming language. Getting everyone to learn two is probably just > impossible - so I'd like to push the Right Thing. Everything related to > CP4E has to be looked at in that light: choose your battles. > > > And if that's the goal, then a language that is very wide in domain scope > > may not be ideal... one with a certain degree of domain-specificity may > > be preferable. I think we've seen on this list many arguments for why > > Python is a better choice than C++ on those very grounds. The nice thing > > about Python is that it is very well suited to the kinds of Internet-y > > things that are hot these days -- parsers and GUIs and CGIs and stuff like > > that. The very things that we wouldn't use C++ for because it's too darned > > general. > > Python is a better choice than C++ because it is easy to learn, and because > it is a more useful tool for casual programmers. There is nothing > "domain-specific" about Python. Anything a nonexpert can do in any > programming language, they can probably do with Python given some > appropriate modules. > > C++ may be at the opposite end of the "power" spectrum from MOO, but someone > with a year of C++ instruction is probably in the same position as someone > who has played LambdaMOO for a year. They've learned a lot - but until they > learn more, they can't *do* anything. In practice, C++ is useless in the > hands of anyone but an expert. > > > MOO is a further narrowing of domain, and I'm going to invoke > > Bruckman's work again to point out the efficacy of a very tightly-coupled > > language/application pair. She's got 9-year-olds programming not because > > you can create this or that data structure in MOOcode, but because you can > > do something that's immediately meaningful within that *cultural* context > > -- a pet dog 'bot or whatever -- in not too many lines of abstraction. > > Bruckman's work is an incredible step. My hope is that, since Python is so > remarkably easy for a general-purpose language, her basic approach could be > used to teach Python, which is a much more directly useful skill. > > > Somebody the other day wrote here very eloquently about the line between > > interface and implementation. > > Thank you; that was me :) > > > And I'll agree -- if we had an entirely Python-based MOO, that would be > > wonderful, but I'm not sure it's the most important thing on the agenda. > > But Pavel Curtis' MOO succeeds by keeping the implementation layer very > > thin, and letting most of it happen up above, in MOO code, so the line > > between implementation and interface remains, in practice, fairly fuzzy > > there too. > > MOO code is still only good for making more MOO. Having invested expensive > time learning that language, you can't use it to script a graphics engine, > because there isn't one in MOO. There are several for Python. You can't > script a web page, you can't draw a graph, you can't control your mail > client. Theoretically all of these things could be integrated with the MOO > language, and perhaps a few of them have, but Python is a far better tool > for that sort of thing. You wouldn't choose MOO to write a symbolic > differentiator in calculus class or an orbit simulator in physics, but both > of those would be accessible projects for Python-literate students. > > Of course, there's a great danger that even people who learn Python won't go > on to do these things. One of the big goals of CP4E needs to be connecting > its "graduates" to the resources and community they will need when they ask > "can I use Python to do *this*?" That's another place where I think a > "Python MOO" could serve - if there were a centralized server like Moose > Crossing for Python, Python experts would surely gather there. I think that > a world implemented and immediately extensible in Python would be a great > place to learn, teach, and talk about Python. I agree, but why use some integration of Python with something else when Python itself is easy enough to learn without dumbing it down. The idea of CP4E is to allow someone after a class or two to be able to write a program which solves a problem such as a mathematical expression or a game which will allow his/her friends to play and maybe even wow at his/her ability. The game would not even need to be graphical. I know of dozens of Computer Science I and II students at Yorktown who use a non-graphical Linux prompt (vim) for programming python over something like GNOME's gedit, or windows notepad. When they need to see if something will work they test in the interactive interpreter and then see their mistake. They then easily fix it because they saw an error, or if they don't understand they check their book online (Downey, Elkner and Zadka; How To Think Like a Computer Scientist -- Python Edition available at http://yhslug.tux.org/obp/thinkCS/thinkCSpy/index.htm). This book is a translation from a C++ version for the US Advanced Placement class. First, it is very easy to understand because the writer is a teacher NOT a programmer. It also allows an easy transition to the higher class because the styles are similar. In addition there are students who just sit down and learn Python on their own because they had taken Computer Science I and II when the Language in use was C++. I actually happen to be one of those. Right now I am learning, Python, Zope/DTML, and Networking all in 1 class at Yorktown. This a choice a finished "CP4E" Student could go to, but this class is flexible because the student creates their curriculum by keeping a webpage such as http://yhslug.tux.org/bus_cs/csc/home/jason_straw which gives a set of goals and a set of accomplishments. For More Information on any Computer Science Classes at Yorktown see: http://yhslug.tux.org/bus_cs/csc/ For More Information on Yorktown High School's Open Book Project; Including: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist. HTML Programming and Python Resources see: http://yhslig.tux.org/obp To Learn about Yorktown High School's Linux User Group see: http://yhslug.tux.org To contact the Computer Sciences Department at Yorktown send mail to: jelkner(a)yorktown.arlington.k12.va.us or jstraw(a)yorktown.arlington.k12.va.us |----------------------------------------------| |Yorktown Webmaster Jason Straw| |jstraw(a)yhspatriot.yorktown.arlington.k12.va.us| |Please quote me in your reply | |#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-#-|

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More on RPN example
by Gordon Worley April 30, 2000

April 30, 2000

With the major focus on math that we have on this list, I think I should mention about by RPN (Reverse Polish Notation) project again. While as a whole the project is a bit large for students to take part in, they could focus on learning how stacks work and how RPN expressions are different from algebraic ones. Because few students have used RPN, they see it as a different system for algorithems than the algebraic stuff their used to, so, in a way, it is like a proto programming language to them. I realize that many teachers may not be aware of how RPN works, but a quick search on Google <http://www.google.com/> turns up some good tutorials within the first five links that can help get one started. At the moment there is not documentation, which will hopefully be forthcomming, but the text-based python program (thus cross platform) does have some online help will get one started. Also, more advanced students in need of a simple project may wish to contribute (dispite my earlier note) by helping me expand the range of supported operations (I have the five basic functions and exponents, plus stack operators). Anyway, this may be something a little bit more down to Earth for those of you weary (or not, if you prefere) of using 3D to teach programming. All this can be found at <http://www.rbisland.cx/brew.html#scripts>. I hope that this project is of interest to some of you and can aide you in teaching students (and maybe yourselves) to program better. -- - Gordon Worley http://www.rbisland.cx/ mailto:redbird@rbisland.cx

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Re: [Edu-sig] RE: articles of possible interest
by Stephen R. Figgins April 30, 2000

April 30, 2000

In yet another followup to my own post! >Digressing further, I have always thought that the web itself is an >excellent eduactional medium. ^^^^^^^^^^^ I like this typo. Wish I could say it was intentional. Programming the web is definitely eduactional! Stephen Figgins fig(a)oreilly.com

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RE: [Edu-sig] Articles of possible interest
by John Maxwell April 29, 2000

April 29, 2000

David Scherer wrote: > Let me make a specific, if rough around the edges, suggestion: a > Python-based MUD/MOO. Yow! Ther's an interesting idea. But you know, I want to argue against it -- LambdaMOO is such a nice system already, and has a very, very nice language (though, appropriately, much more limited in domain than Python), what I think we maybe need is Python-MOO integration... maybe a MOO-Zope integration. THAT would be truly cool. > I don't have a lot of experience with MUDs, and I don't feel like I can make > the case for this as well as it should be made. However, I don't think this > would require boys and girls to go off in separate corners. Absolutely! As Amy Bruckman's copious writings (not to mention a goodly amount of the rest of the MOO/MUD literature) point out, there is relatively little gender barrier in MOO. If anyone is interested in this, Bruckman's dissertation (http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~asb/thesis) has some amazing material covering adolescent girls programming interactive agents. The CP4E community really needs to be aware of this work. - John Maxwell jmax(a)portal.ca ------------------------------------------------ Multimedia Ethnographic Research Lab (MERLin) University of British Columbia, Canada

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Women and Computing
by Stephen R. Figgins April 28, 2000

April 28, 2000

Speaking of stories about women and computing.... Those wishing to have some stories to tell to girls in their classes should check out the PBS Special Minerva's Machine, or the ACM's online complimentary website at: http://www.acm.org/minerva Or the University of Alberta's overview at: http://www.ualberta.ca/~nfriesen/582/into.htm Or, moving beyond the computer, here is information on 4000 years of Women in Science: http://crux.astr.ua.edu/4000WS/ And then there is the Ada Project: http://www.cs.yale.edu/~tap/tap.html And of course, the ever popular girlgeeks.com http://www.girlkeeks.com Well, just so you know that there are stories to be found, stories to be told. There are famous women mathemeticians, scientists, programmers, engineers. Well, they would be famous, if we told their stories more. Stephen

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