3:16 p.m.
Forgive the cross posting as this is sort of crossing over between an
Ambassador Event and an OLPC SIG item.
I just got off the phone with EdTech Day[1] organizers at Ithaca College
and they will be giving me a speakers slot in their program to talk
about the XO - after all you can't get much more edtech than that.
I want the focus to be on what I know about - obviously - Fedora/OLPC
together in harmony and changing the world one line of code at a time -
specifically what's going on today at Fedora to propel the OLPC
Mission. So most likely 4th grade math curriculum and the massive
amount of work being done regarding packages.
More importantly, this is your opportunity to fill me full of talking
points. Of course I'm happy to wing it, but I'd really love it if you
could tell me more about what's important to you. If you were giving
the talk, what should be said?
~Karlie
[1] http://www.ithaca.edu/edtechday/
3:29 p.m.
On Tue, 24 Feb 2009, Karlie Robinson wrote:
Forgive the cross posting as this is sort of crossing over between an
Ambassador Event and an OLPC SIG item.
I just got off the phone with EdTech Day[1] organizers at Ithaca College and
they will be giving me a speakers slot in their program to talk about the XO
- after all you can't get much more edtech than that.
I want the focus to be on what I know about - obviously - Fedora/OLPC
together in harmony and changing the world one line of code at a time -
specifically what's going on today at Fedora to propel the OLPC Mission. So
most likely 4th grade math curriculum and the massive amount of work being
done regarding packages.
More importantly, this is your opportunity to fill me full of talking points.
Of course I'm happy to wing it, but I'd really love it if you could tell me
more about what's important to you. If you were giving the talk, what should
be said?
~Karlie
[1] http://www.ithaca.edu/edtechday/
Make sure that you have read "Disrupting Class", and then encourage
attendees to think about how the principles therein -- disruptive
technology, serving underserved markets like poor rural school districts,
etc. -- dovetail with the unique value-adds provided by a Free Culture
approach.
Get people to think about the following problem: what if, instead of
Addison-Wesley producing dozens of 4th grade math textbooks, a community
of educators could get together to produce one single electronic 4th grade
textbook? Solving this problem unlocks a whole world. Encourage people
to think *deeply* about the ramifications of this.
Man, I need to videotape the talk I gave at FOSDEM.
--g
--
Got an XO that you're not using? Loan it to a needy developer!
[[ http://wiki.laptop.org/go/XO_Exchange_Registry ]]
3:59 a.m.
On Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 4:29 PM, Greg Dekoenigsberg <gdk(a)redhat.com> wrote:
On Tue, 24 Feb 2009, Karlie Robinson wrote:
> Forgive the cross posting as this is sort of crossing over between an
> Ambassador Event and an OLPC SIG item. I just got off the phone with EdTech
> Day[1] organizers at Ithaca College and they will be giving me a speakers
> slot in their program to talk about the XO - after all you can't get much
> more edtech than that. I want the focus to be on what I know about -
> obviously - Fedora/OLPC together in harmony and changing the world one line
> of code at a time - specifically what's going on today at Fedora to propel
> the OLPC Mission. So most likely 4th grade math curriculum and the massive
> amount of work being done regarding packages. More importantly, this is your
> opportunity to fill me full of talking points. Of course I'm happy to wing
> it, but I'd really love it if you could tell me more about what's important
> to you. If you were giving the talk, what should be said? ~Karlie
>
> [1] http://www.ithaca.edu/edtechday/
Make sure that you have read "Disrupting Class", and then encourage
attendees to think about how the principles therein -- disruptive
technology, serving underserved markets like poor rural school districts,
etc. -- dovetail with the unique value-adds provided by a Free Culture
approach.
Get people to think about the following problem: what if, instead of
Addison-Wesley producing dozens of 4th grade math textbooks, a community of
educators could get together to produce one single electronic 4th grade
textbook? Solving this problem unlocks a whole world. Encourage people to
think *deeply* about the ramifications of this.
Man, I need to videotape the talk I gave at FOSDEM.
without seeing it, I'll second that.
SJ
10:13 a.m.
Samuel Klein wrote:
On Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 4:29 PM, Greg Dekoenigsberg
<gdk(a)redhat.com> wrote:
> Get people to think about the following problem: what if, instead of
> Addison-Wesley producing dozens of 4th grade math textbooks, a community of
> educators could get together to produce one single electronic 4th grade
> textbook? Solving this problem unlocks a whole world. Encourage people to
> think *deeply* about the ramifications of this.
>
without seeing it, I'll second that.
SJ
Ok, so if you don't mind me borrowing this what about the presentation
being titled - One Laptop Per Child - What if...?
Synopsis - What if a community of educators could get together to
produce one single electronic 4th grade textbook?
Of course I'll cover history and mission of OLPC, but I'd like the talk
to focus on the NA Ambassadors work on the 4th grade math curriculum.
By then I also hope to have RIT on board and helping so I can show that
it's not just a hypothetical.
10:58 a.m.
Synopsis - What if a community of educators could get together to
produce one single electronic 4th grade textbook?
Of course I'll cover history and mission of OLPC, but I'd like the talk
to focus on the NA Ambassadors work on the 4th grade math curriculum.
By then I also hope to have RIT on board and helping so I can show that
it's not just a hypothetical.
That what-if sounds awesome. If there's time, perhaps get folks to talk
about why that what-if is hard/impossible - what are the blockers? (Why
/haven't/ communities of educators gotten together to produce a single
electronic 4th grade textbook yet?)
That gives us a pedagogically-focused bug list of problems to solve. ;)
(Some of the solutions might be technical, some might be marketing, some
might be funding, policy, etc - we need the problems list first to find
out.)
If that bug list exists already, that would be awesome. Then get folks
to talk about how to attack them. ;)
Some common blockers that aren't:
* No funding. (Not true: open-licensed stuff can be profitable, as
everyone on this list already knows. Also, writing sprints can be held
on ridiculously small budgets to bootstrap - the Sugar and XO
FLOSSmanuals(.net) got started that way.)
* Impossible to make a single 4th grade electronic textbook that serves
all use cases. (Sure, that's true - but by that logic, it's impossible
to make a 4th grade non-electronic textbook that serves all use cases
therefore nobody should ever write 4th grade textbooks. You start with
one to prove it's possible, not to solve everything for all time.)
* I'm sure people here can think of more and better ones.
10:35 a.m.
Hi all,
* Impossible to make a single 4th grade electronic textbook that
serves all use cases. (Sure, that's true - but by that logic, it's
impossible to make a 4th grade non-electronic textbook that serves
all use cases therefore nobody should ever write 4th grade
textbooks. You start with one to prove it's possible, not to solve
everything for all time.)
Doing something is clearly better than doing nothing here, yeah. As
far as OLPC goes, though, my impression is that it's not true that most
of the kids with XOs in the world have the prerequisites for a US
curriculum fourth grade math course -- maybe we should chat with some
of the learning folks and find out if we'd be reaching many more kids
(and not holding too many others to a lower level) if we started out
with something easier?
(I imagine it takes more effort to produce a textbook as the material
gets harder, too, so I think there might be something to be said for
starting out simple and getting the hang of the mechanics of making a
textbook before attacking the harder stuff.)
I don't mean to bikeshed, though; it's all your call. ;-)
- Chris.
--
Chris Ball <cjb(a)laptop.org>
12:34 p.m.
Chris Ball wrote:
my impression is that it's not true that most
of the kids with XOs in the world have the prerequisites for a US
curriculum fourth grade math course --
If this comes up, my response would be...
While we are using American educational benchmarking as a guideline, the
fact is that these skills will only be used when the children are ready
for it. As individual children and classes vary, so will the course work.
Simply because Americans measure understanding with grade levels, it
does not mean that all 9 year olds must comprehend the course work.
The goal is education, the means is the XO, but that does not mean we
decide what is learned and when.
3:02 p.m.
far as OLPC goes, though, my impression is that it's not true
that most
of the kids with XOs in the world have the prerequisites for a US
curriculum fourth grade math course -- maybe we should chat with some
Exactly! And I think that's why Massachusetts 4th grade math standards
are a good arbitrary first target:
1. we know/have easy access to people - teachers in MA - who will
probably (we should turn that into a "will") immediately use the stuff
we make for 4th grade math. (Though "Peruvian students" are a larger
audience, I only have a dim and uncertain idea of how we'd get our stuff
to them / get them to use it - though I would *love* for that not to be
the case.)
2. it puts more pressure on the "lots of kids with XOs don't know enough
math to use the stuff we just made" bug - now there's a concrete,
nice-sized, ambitious but achievable, next step to shoot for that's
pretty easy for most people to conceive and run towards, which is "(make
something to) get these kids ready to use the 4th grade math material we
now have."
(As opposed to "make something that prepares these kids for this lovely
calculus textbook we just made, or "make something that teaches these
kids 'more math.'" - too large a scope, and too vague, respectively.)
3. it's going to happen already. ;)
--Mel
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7 comments
5 participants
participants (5)
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Chris Ball -
Greg DeKoenigsberg -
Karlie Robinson -
Mel Chua -
Samuel Klein