CCing iaep. Your questions are good. As participants, we have hashed this over to death:) But, our external message is still not spread widely enough:(
I will leave the questio open so we, as a community, can both help answer your specific questions and figure out how to simplify and amplify those answers. david On Mon, Sep 21, 2009 at 10:22 AM, Marilyn Hagle <mari...@fineartsforall.org> wrote: > David, > > I have been meaning to write to you. Thank you sincerely for making this > connection. I really appreciate it. > > I am attaching at the bottom of this email the letter I sent to the grant > writing participants last week. At this point it we have not succeeded in > receiving funding from the Dept. of Ed. However the work is moving on. I am > particularly interested in testing Sugar. I have a couple of questions . . . > first . . . is Sugar a complete operating system, or is it an "addon" to an > operating system, or both? I would really like to download and installation > .iso, but have not found such a thing. Maybe I am not looking hard enough? > > I joined the IAEP list. :) > > Hope you are well. > > Marilyn > > > Quoting David Farning <dfarn...@sugarlabs.org>: > >> Marten, >> >> I would like to introduce you to Marilyn Hagle (CCed). She is active >> at the intersection of dyslexia and technology based education tools. >> >> She has recently written a grant to set up a pilot for researching and >> using sugar as a platform for helping kids overcome or adapt to their >> dyslexia. >> > > :) > > ************************************* > > Hi there everyone! Thought I ought to send you a note to let you know what is > happening. > > I know now that we did not make the first cut. I received a letter in the > mail > with the reasons and most were related to the structure of the main narrative. > One thing they mentioned was that I did not give detail about which > evidence-based technology practices we were using. Heck, I just thought that > was something that we incorporated into the process. Another issue they had > was that the resource kits would not be developed until the fourth year. My > reasoning was that I thought it prudent to be sure about our methods and > conclusions before we start sharing them with others. > > In the grant documentation it states that they reserve the right to issue a > second award if there are funds available, so there is tiny remote hope. I > have written to the competition manager for this grant, David Malouf, (who was > very helpful to answer questions earlier) and asked him about other options. > > There is another similar grant that has been posted which is due in October. > An interesting note is that they took at least three points from our narrative > and incorporated them into this new grant. It really looks like they took our > proposal and used it as a basis for the new offer. The difference is that the > new grant asks specifically for graphics and charts for disabled children, not > audiobooks or netbooks. > > I had not remembered that I had a contact person at Mozilla when I was working > on the grant in July. When I received the aforementioned letter, it jolted my > brain and I thought to go the Mozilla website. Come to find out, the Mozilla > Foundation is eager to consider educational projects offering greater > accessibility to dyslexic students. So I sent them our narrative and the > staff summary for consideration. I doubt they have vast funding like > the Dept. of Ed, but we will see what happens. > > The educators among us are back to work at our day jobs, but the work to > modify > existing technology for dyslexic children must continue anyway. This past week > my husband and I were able to find a technology solution for Hannah's book > reading situation at school. She is required to read one 200 page book per > week or she misses recess. She cannot keep up. > > Did you know that you can go to http://booksshouldbefree.com and > http://gutenberg.org and easily download the html versions and mp3 files for > many wonderful books? (I knew about them before, but did not realize they > were > so easy to access.) > > We added OMusic, an online music player, and FoxVox, a text-to-speech reader > to > Firefox. The html book files and mp3 audio book files are in a "books" > directory on the hard drive of Hannah's EeePC. We bookmarked the html book > files. When Hannah opens a book, she clicks on the music note (OMusic) at the > bottom of the Firefox window, and chooses the audio file for the chapter she > is > reading. She arrows down the text with the reader, always keeping the current > text at the top of the window so she does not get lost. > > Hannah is currently reading/listening to Alice in Wonderland. Already > resident > on her EeePc are these books: > > * Secret Garden > * Anne of Green Gables > * Heidi > * Grimms Fairy Tales > * Moby Dick > * Aesop's Fables > * Beatrix Potter Complete > * The Day Boy and The Night Girl > * The Enchanted Castle > * Dracula > * Gulliver's Travels > * Peter Pan > > Hannah has almost made it through a week listening/following along/reading her > books in Firefox and the news is all good. She is really enjoying "Alice in > Wonderland." She says she is going to read "Secret Garden" next. This is a > tremendous breakthrough for her. We are so relieved. > > Hannah's EeePC (Linux) is really perfect for her. The selection of software, > educational and otherwise is great. It is very easy to use and everything > works. Kudos to you, David Dyball. David, a member of our team, was formerly > the team leader and developer for the EeePC OS (Linux). David told me in July > that this OS was no longer under development. Sure enough, when I went to the > ASUS website the other day, they are no longer selling them. In fact > (horrors), > there is even a link to "upgrade" to XP. > > However, since the EeePC OS is not easily available we look to Walter Bender, > another team member. Mr. Bender is a senior researcher for MIT and the > executive director of Sugar Labs (http://Sugarlabs.org). I have not had the > opportunity to see it for myself yet, but one of Mr. Bender's associates, > David > Farning (who is himself dyslexic) says that Sugar is works very well for > dyslexic children. > > I have so many questions. Are the OLPC computers available for public > purchase? > Would they be durable child friendly netbooks suitable for our purpose? Or > do > we need to consider putting Sugar on Dell or Acer? > > I have attached the staff summary to this email. Hopefully, I represented > everyone correctly. In my correspondence with David Malouf of the Dept. of > Ed, > I bragged about the fine group of people involved. > > F.Y.I. = > > David Malouf, Competition Manager > Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services > Office of Special Education Programs > Telephone: 202.245.6253 > Email: david.mal...@ed.gov > > Sincere thanks to each of you for your willingness to participate. I > believe firmly in "it's not over until the fat lady sings." We'll see what > happens. > > Kind regards, > > > Marilyn Hagle > mari...@hagle.com > > _______________________________________________ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep