Re: [Edu-sig] Python & Smalltalk (was Re: OLPC related: pyGTK)

Have you read 'Fumbling the Future'? http://www.amazon.com/Fumbling-Future-Invented-Personal-Computer/dp/15834826... I wouldn't call the work done at PARC as 'failed research projects'. On the contrary, they were extremely successful research projects, which was a large part of the problem. A good many people at Xerox did not want to become a successful computer company, and as soon as it became clear that this was something that was not a pipe dream, but something very realisable they worked very hard at making sure that this did not happen. Laura

Laura Creighton wrote:
I wouldn't call the work done at PARC as 'failed research projects'.
My point was only that Paul is saying that Smalltalk was developed specifically for children. It is never fully clear to me in conversing with Paul whether he means for children to *write* or for children to reap the benefits of what can be accomplished by adults that can. Or what particular words we are defining (or redefining) in what way. I see so much of the story, the conflicts, the misunderstanding, the hype, the ambition, the ego in the story of how words are being used, misused and in particular the use of ambiguity in words, with intention and to ends.. And I also happen to attach the fact that I am a word guy to the fact that I am a Python guy. Art

Arthur wrote:
My point was only that Paul is saying that Smalltalk was developed specifically for children. It is never fully clear to me in conversing with Paul whether he means for children to *write* or for children to reap the benefits of what can be accomplished by adults that can.
If I have been unclear on this issue it was unintentional. Smalltalk, according to its creators, was always first about kids being able to write their own programs. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=155364&dl=ACM&coll=portal However, another issue is kids being able to understand and extend the work of others, and that brings one further into the second category you mention; they are not completely disjoint. In fact, most work done in a Smalltalk image is generally adapting other people's work to your current needs. Very rarely is stuff written completely from scratch. Libraries and classes arr reused; one often starts from working running application, say, a paint program) and makes incremental changes until it is more what you like, say, a program to design maps. Also, Kay, as in his 1972 paper of the title, seems to sometimes use phrases like: "A personal computer for children of all ages". So, you see he is playing fast and loose with what it means to be a "child", perhaps often meaning not age but a state of mind, as in "child-like" or "playful". However, you would be right to call Alan Kay on what "for children" means, as you have in the past. Even he has said in public lectures (jokingly) that the way to get money to support work on new programming systems that are easier to use is to pitch them as if they were for children (since everyone wants to make things easier or more possible for kids), whereas if you pitch work to make programming easier for adults, at least historically he says the response is something like (not his exact words), well those engineers should just suffer and use what we have right now, what do we pay them for anyway? :-) I think he did find an interesting and effective sales pitch to continue his work, which I think is broader than just for people of, say, the five to fifteen year old range. I think he genuinely does want better to use systems, if for no other reason than so he can use them himself for example. But I see nothing wrong in that -- much software gets developed because someone wants to develop it to scratch a personal itch. However, Alan Kay, having said *something* like that is still somewhat wrong about that. There are, at least now, two reasons better programming languages get built.One is that people just build them for personal or academic reasons. The other is that people make arguments based on programmer productivity (e.g. Jython developers are, say, 4X more productive than Java programmers :-). You are also right to question Constructivism as an ideology, methodology, or so forth, on the general grounds it is good to be skeptical of anything people pitch for kids for any reason; still, that is where we part ways obviously, since I do see the value in a constructivist approach towards education, meaning, present kids with tools and objects they can use to build things with and hope learning occurs for many if they are ready; present them with things they can take apart to see how they work (say, working drawing program), and let them take them apart or change them if they want. And your PyGeo http://pw1.netcom.com/~ajs/ is a great example of that kind of constructivist tool Alan Kay and Seymour Papert and so on would admire as a Geometry Microworld. [Ducks. :-)] See: "The Turtle's Long Slow Trip: Macro-educological Perspectives on Microworlds." http://www.iaete.org/soapbox/microworlds.cfm (Also note that Papert believes in both "Microworlds" (much about little) and "Hyperworlds", the World Wide Web being an example of the second -- (little about much, or in his words: "large world of.. loose connections"). http://edtechlife.com/files/Wagner_Mark_KAM_II.pdf That does not mean other forms of education are invalid. Some people learn better by other channels, some people have different interests or needs, everyone benefits from reading the appropriate books or tutorials at certain times which are essentially mini lectures, and so on. Personally, for younger kids, I am leaning more and more to "media restriction" in the early years (say, five to seven and under) as a very good thing. See for example the Waldorf policy on that: http://www.openwaldorf.com/media.html http://www.waldorfhomeschoolers.com/media.htm From the second link: "We KNOW the facts and the facts are that CHILDREN HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO BUSINESS TO SPEND TIME IN FRONT OF A TELEVISION SET OR COMPUTER SCREEN. That's it." So the Waldorfers might lump your PyGeo and Alan Kay's Squeak into the same boat, both problematical from that point of view. :-) My position is not as extreme as theirs, of course. :-) In the end, perhaps what you may smell as "silicon snake oil", I smell as "salesmanship". Although there is also this intermediate position on the larger revolution Alan Kay helped bring about, exemplified here: :-) "A Snake, Some Oil" [A review of _Silicon Snake Oil_ by Clifford Stoll] http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/sep/mcgreal.html But the truth is that all people's promotional actions, my own included no doubt thought I try not to, are in part of at least a little hype and hot air and BS. Personally, one way my opinions differer from Alan Kay's in a deep way is on his, I think mistaken, notion that an object (or a class) can have any meaning apart from the ecology of objects (or really classes) it is embedded in. I think there is a deep philosophical (and practical) point there which he is perhaps only slowly beginning to see. :-) But it is reflected in the superiority of, say, Python's modularity in practice compared to early Smalltalks, that is, if you think classes stand along, then there is no need for a higher level of "module", whereas if you think classes need to be clustered to support each other, than modules make a lot of sense. But that really is a different category of difference then the ones you outline. --Paul Fernhout

Paul writes -
And your PyGeo http://pw1.netcom.com/~ajs/ is a great example of that kind of constructivist tool Alan Kay and Seymour Papert and so on would admire as a Geometry Microworld.
But the fact remains that the only thing I have be willing to say about PyGeo with any sense of definiteness is that *building* it was an extraordinary learning experience. Though I am confident that just the right person, at just the right time, with just the right background, and just the right motivation would gain much from exploring and using it. And it is waiting for that person to find, just at that right time. Thanks to modern technology. And a supply chain concept, where I know that my learning experience was dependant on the *free* in many senses of the word availilbilty of others' contributed intellectual property, leaving me little moral choice other than to try to feed that supply. *That* did not start at Xerox, as far as I know. And goes a lot more to the essence of how we might possibly manage to get from here to there than does keyword syntax issues, for example. I think you are correct as seeing Python as both a manifestation of that energy source, and as a contributor to it, in good turn. And are right to be intrigued. It seems most probably true that my own educational philosophy, and that, say, of Guido's may have little to nothing in common. Shouldn't matter, and - as far as I am concerned - it has come to not matter. Can't believe Squeakland can ever evolve there, and so that it can never play in the same way. Too bad for Squeakland. Playing is good. For children of all ages. Art

ajsiegel@optonline.net wrote:
But the fact remains that the only thing I have be willing to say about PyGeo with any sense of definiteness is that *building* it was an extraordinary learning experience.
And I can say a similar thing about our (free, GPL) Garden Simulator. My wife and I are the people who learned the most about gardening (and software design) by spending over six person-years building it. And I think others, even Papert or Kay, would agree with that. Using a Microworld is a different (and usually lesser) experience than building one. Or, as is often said, if you really want to learn a subject, try to teach it. :-) On the other hand, you sometimes use a microworld for a different reason than you build one. If you just want a taste of a subject, or to get a hint or even a basic command of the big ideas in it, then learn using a microworld. If you want to really understand a subject in depth, or at least learn what is easily known and unknown about it, then try to build a microworld. :-)
Though I am confident that just the right person, at just the right time, with just the right background, and just the right motivation would gain much from exploring and using it.
Yes, that is the core of a movement like "Unschooling". http://www.holtgws.com/whatisunschoolin.html Or as Holt or Gatto puts it, when a kid is ready and motivated, it only takes about a hundred contact hours (perhaps much less) to teach them enough about letters and words for them to then be able to bootstrap themselves by themselves through reading to as high a level of literacy as they can or desire to achieve. So too for basic math. I would guess the same might be true for programming with, say, Python or Smalltalk. But if the kid is not interested, you can spend thousands of hours trying to teach them to read or do math or to program and they never will learn those things (which is exactly why schools graduate functional illiterates and even more innumerates, even at a huge expense in dollars and student life-hours). Ask *any* teacher what a dream their classrooms would be if only the kids who wanted to be there were the ones there. In an exchange with Kirby a long time back on this list, we agreed that the potential of computers includes having learning labs in schools where kids can approach subjects as they want to. I think where I differ from many others is saying that, unless schools change radically, that sort of learning lab is not going to happen (at least in any meaningful way using a great deal of a student's time). The only "schools" I know of now that would permit such thing are the few "free schools", like this one: http://www.albanyfreeschool.com/ General info on free schools: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_school The issue is not one of technology or tools (Kirby is right to say we have enough of them, even as I think they could be better); the issue is one of philosophy. And that is why I have greater hopes for an effort like Sugata Mitra's "hole in the wall" projects: http://www.greenstar.org/butterflies/Hole-in-the-Wall.htm over Mark Shuttleworth's initiative http://www.shuttleworthfoundation.org (as noble as his intent may be, because ultimately he is up against bureaucratic pressures which he will likely be unable to overcome with a small effort, as so many have tried and failed before, including many, like John Holt, with much more inside knowledge of how schools work now). Still, I wish all such efforts well. But feeling that current schools cannot be fixed is no longer such a radical opinion -- consider this recent mainstream report, just out: "To fix US schools, panel says, start over" http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1215/p01s01-ussc.html From there: "What if the solution to American students' stagnant performance levels and the wide achievement gap between white and minority students wasn't more money, smaller schools, or any of the reforms proposed in recent years, but rather a new education system altogether? That's the conclusion of a bipartisan group of scholars and business leaders, school chancellors and education commissioners, and former cabinet secretaries and governors. They declare that America's public education system, designed to meet the needs of 100 years ago when the workplace revolved around an assembly line, is unsuited to today's global marketplace. Already, they warn, many Americans are in danger of falling behind and seeing their standard of living plummet. " See also Time: "How to Bring Our Schools Out of the 20th Century" http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1568429,00.html The organization coordinating the report: http://www.ncee.org/ The report itself: http://skillscommission.org/executive.htm Of course, I do not think they go far enough in their proposals, from what I have read of the summary. :-) *One* answer seems simple enough to me -- just look at how the Albany Free School operates and duplicate it. :-) That's a no brainer. There may be better approaches, but that one works, and it works for some of the most disadvantaged students, including many who have been tossed out of conventional schooling as unteachable or discipline problems or requiring medication. While home-based unschooling may be better, centralized free schools which provide supervision so parents could work in conventional jobs fits easily into our current economy. And also, the new report stills look at schooling through the same telescope Gatto condemns for the design of current schools by talking about children as if they were to be robot employees, focusing on maximizing economic productivity and not individual self-actualization and fulfillment. However, to be fair, Gatto says the current structure of compulsory schooling was a bargain willfully entered into by the populace 100 years or more ago to get the supposed benefits of industrial progress (which back then required humans to become like inflexible robots in order to take part in these vast industrial enterprises). We have just forgotten the roots and rationales (even down to what Gatto claims are eugenics-theory-based "class rooms" to encourage breeding stratification of "Brave New World" style classes). Some of these roots the report mentioned above now is exploring in a mainstream way. As Gatto puts it at this link: http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/prologue8.htm "If you obsess about conspiracy, what you’ll fail to see is that we are held fast by a form of highly abstract thinking fully concretized in human institutions which has grown beyond the power of the managers of these institutions to control. If there is a way out of the trap we’re in, it won’t be by removing some bad guys and replacing them with good guys. Who are the villains, really, but ourselves? People can change, but systems cannot without losing their structural integrity." In any case, when I think about how to use a tool like Python (or anything else) in education, that is the sort of educational philosophy and objectives I have in the back of my mind. How can Python fit in to either unschooling or the latest mainstream proposal mentioned above which is dipping its toes in those same waters? To me, that need means both making something intriguing enough to try and also making it approachable by an individual (whether in class or not) with minimal adult supervision or support. (Another reason why I also need to get around to contributing to those Python advocacy homeschooling / unschooling web pages. :-)
And it is waiting for that person to find, just at that right time.
Thanks to modern technology.
Yes, quite true. Unfortunately, between compulsory schooling and addictive television, http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/healtheducation/addiction/addiction.html most children will never have enough mental space (meaning not enough free time) to find it, or our Garden Simulator, or Python, or Smalltalk. :-( As Gatto puts it: http://www.worldtrans.org/whole/schoolteacher.txt "After an adult lifetime spent teaching school I believe the method of mass-schooling is the only real content it has, don't be fooled into thinking that good curriculum or good equipment or good teachers are the critical determinants of your son and daughter's schooltime. All the pathologies we've considered come about in large measure because the lessons of school prevent children from keeping important appointments with themselves and with their families, to learn lessons in self- motivation, perseverance, self-reliance, courage, dignity and love and lessons in service to others, which are among the key lessons of home life. Thirty years ago these things could still be learned in the time left after school. But television has eaten up most of that time, and a combination of television and the stresses peculiar to two-income or single-parent families have swallowed up most of what used to be family time. Our kids have no time left to grow up fully human, and only thin- soil wastelands to do it in. A future is rushing down upon our culture which will insist that all of us learn the wisdom of non-material experience; a future which will demand as the price of survival that we follow a pace of natural life economical in material cost. These lessons cannot be learned in schools as they are. School is like starting life with a 12-year jail sentence in which bad habits are the only curriculum truly learned. I teach school and win awards doing it. I should know." Of course, how to make Python fit into lessons about "self-motivation, perseverance, self-reliance, courage, dignity and love and lessons in service to others" is a tall order. But I would think it can be done. :-) It's certainly worth thinking about IMHO.
And a supply chain concept, where I know that my learning experience was dependant on the *free* in many senses of the word availilbilty of others' contributed intellectual property, leaving me little moral choice other than to try to feed that supply.
*That* did not start at Xerox, as far as I know.
Very true. And perhaps the tipping factor in my decision to commit to Python over Smalltalk.
And goes a lot more to the essence of how we might possibly manage to get from here to there than does keyword syntax issues, for example.
I think you are correct as seeing Python as both a manifestation of that energy source, and as a contributor to it, in good turn.
And are right to be intrigued.
Well put. Ultimately, in free and open source software, community is more important than implementation (since in some ways, it is easier to fix the implementation, at least for programmers. :-). While Guido is an excellent engineer, somehow he is even better at community building.
It seems most probably true that my own educational philosophy, and that, say, of Guido's may have little to nothing in common.
Shouldn't matter, and - as far as I am concerned - it has come to not matter.
If we come back to your first point, that you learned more from writing PyGeo than anyone will learn from using it (as did I for my own projects), then we are back into asking, how can we make constructing their own educational simulations approachable for kids of any age (with Python)? What sort of development environment or libraries make sense for producing the greatest value to the learner for the least effort? What aspects of current programming systems get in the way for no good reason? Or, as Kirby might suggest, how can people most effectively use the tools they have (Python as is right now) to get the biggest educational bang for the buck? So, we now return you to your regularly scheduled edusig mailing list. :-)
Can't believe Squeakland can ever evolve there, and so that it can never play in the same way.
Too bad for Squeakland.
May well be the case.
Playing is good.
For children of all ages.
So true. :-) All the best. --Paul Fernhout

Laura Creighton wrote:
Have you read 'Fumbling the Future'? http://www.amazon.com/Fumbling-Future-Invented-Personal-Computer/dp/15834826...
Another comment, I'm afraid. No I have not read the book. But I did go so the Amazon site where, among the reviews for the book, is one by someone who was at Xerox at the time - working on the "creative" side, and who does not hide his bitterness at the fumbling and lost opportunities. It has, as a matter of fact, always seemed to me that Kay is someone fighting old battles. Probably, in some ways, this one. Very highs stakes. Higher than anything I have been involved in, and certainly not talking about financial stakes in particular .And I suspect that he was probably very much on the right side of those battles. It is also recounted that his academic career was impacted by a battle he chose to take-up regarding anti-Semitism on the campus he attended. I like a good battle myself. And my obsession with Kay is probably also some form of identification. Which doesn't change a thing about the substance of what I think the current effect of his fighting his old battle has become. The battleground itself has chnaged too drastically. Art
participants (4)
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ajsiegel@optonline.net
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Arthur
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Laura Creighton
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Paul D. Fernhout