Hi to everyone! I'm "new" here... I was invited by friends who are visiting Uruguay right now!...
I introduce myself: BA in computer science with a graduate degree in virtual learning, working as a teacher and Coordinator of "the 1:1 model" in a private school in Uruguay. I am also volunteer member helping CEIBAL and one of the organizers of the tour "Conozco Uruguay Tour" I'm so glad to read you David!. Hope you have a very nice day! Leticia Romero. 2011/5/2 David Farning <dfarn...@activitycentral.com> > The afternoon and evening sessions of the tour were a great complement to > the morning session. Yes, you heard correctly, afternoon _and_ evening > sessions:) Pablo has us hopping. Tomorrow morning starts a 600am. > > The afternoon session was again at public school 286. Rather than observe > and interact with the kids in the class room, the teachers asked us to take > a step back and look at the larger picture of how the laptop project affect > the school and how the school affects the project. One interesting note was > the emphasis they had that the laptops were educational tools. They were > part of a larger tool box consisting of textbooks and other activities. > > While kids usually receive their laptop at 6, when they start school, it is > common for kids to begin using and becoming familiar with the laptop and > sugar when they are 4 years old. By the time kids enter high school they > have had several years of experience. This presents a challenge for > teachers > as they try to catch up and keep up with the kids :) > > The primary technical requests were that social-calc works and that there > is > timeline activity. > > In terms of education theory, it was interesting to listen to a discussion > the evolved from the timeline request. Several teachers commented that the > timeline was a very valuable tool because it would give the students a > place > to consolidate the information they had learned over several week. Maybe > it > was my poor Spanish. But the conversation seemed to reflect concepts very > similar to portfolios and the act of refection the journal affords. > > The evening session was with Flordeceibo. (http://www.flordeceibo.edu.uy/) > We started the evening off with a video providing an overview of project. > It > is just over 2.5G so I hope that someone with some bandwidth uploads it and > links to it in a blog post. > > Sadly, the university and Flordeceibo are not directly involved in teacher > training. Teacher education happens in a parallel system similar to normal > schools. > > The real meat of the session (for software developers) happened after the > break during a feedback session. Several of the Flordeceibo members had > lists of bugs they have encountered during the last few years. At that > point > the passion became palpable. > > Because of the sheer amount of feedback we invited everyone to share > 'headlines' of their concerns at this session. Then, follow up Sunday > morning at the first day of the hack feast. > > Over the last couple of months one on the most important lessons we have > learn while working with ParaguayEduca is the importance of one on one and > face to face sessions between developers and educators. The normal tools > that open source developers use for feedback are too 'unfamiliar' to most > teachers. > > Instead the feedback, at least initially, requires a personal relationship > which builds trust and helps the developer and educator learn how to > effectively communicate. As a result, we invited everyone to join the sugar > camp on Sunday morning. I would like to encourage all developers to spend > time talking one on one with the Flordeceibo members to turn their feedback > into a format which is can be submitted as bug reports. > > david > > _______________________________________________ > IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) > IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep >
_______________________________________________ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep