[Edu-sig] RE: [Tutor] a couple of ideas I've been bouncing around

[Rob Andrews]

#
# Hi Patrick and Rob,
#
# I also like both of your ideas! (BTW, thanks Patrick for sharing this with
# the edu-sig list! I had not realized there was also a Tutor list!)
#

The Tutor list is great! I can't easily think of a more helpful, decent
group of people. And some of the answers to newbie coding questions could
easily be quoted verbatim in documentation.

# Building on the ideas you presented, what about an software tool (possibly
# an "enhanced" version of IDLE?) that gives learners a set of successively
# harder programming tasks? At any point, the learner can jump to a virtual
# "help center" and view tutorials, the Python references, FAQs/trivia, or
# even be given a way to ask a question on the lists. As the learner
# successfully complete the tasks given to them, the software will keep a
# record and let them know how far they are towards "mastery." (Of course,
# true mastery comes only with experience, but it's a start!) I think it has
# elements of everything discussed thus far, trivia, tutor, and
# testing. While
# I'm not sure how we could "officially" certify people who complete the
# training, we can at least give them a list of all the skills they've
# gathered over the course of the training, along with when they were last
# assessed.
#
# I think making "real-world tasks" would help increase motivation and give
# them examples of what Python is typically used for. The more real
# it seems,
# the more it will be part-game and part-edusoft I think. If we did it well
# enough, it could even lead to a finished software product, which
# is at least
# as good as a certificate IMHO!
#
# What do you all think?
#
# Kevin Ollivier
#

Sounds quite interesting, although quite far beyond my skill level. There
are probably lots of odd games we could develop using curses, pygame, etc.
to reinforce learning. If we came up with enough components, I could even
see a Python Learning Lab on sourceforge or similar (or on Useless Python
heehee).

Rob

"Perl is worse than Python because people wanted it worse." Larry Wall
(Creator of Perl), 14 Oct 1998
Useless Python: http://www.lowerstandard.com/python/