Re: [IAEP] New FLOSS Manual Reading And Leading With Sugar chapters need review
Hi James, I have just skimmed so far. Looks great! One of the issues schools have is students who can not read text well, either from a vision problem or a reading problem. A great deal of what is taught is taught through text, especially science and social studies. It is important that children who cannot understand the text can still learn the content. In addition, reading books for pleasure is a vital way for children to learn about the world and expand their horizons and thinking. One of the wonderful things about technology is that students who can't read text can still listen to text and learn. Sugar is for all children, and not all children can see or decode text, so listening to text should have equal standing as a way to read. I think it would be useful in the section that goes over the different formats and programs to explicitly say which can support text to speech and which can't. It would also be great if you could write a section on how teachers can create documents that can be read to the students. I'm almost certain that for a teacher to retype or scan in a text book and then let a student read/listen to it, is fair use. Certainly that is something that the special ed teacher at the GPA was interested in doing. I'm sure other teachers with students who can't read text at grade level will also be interested in doing that. Consider adding sections about where to get free audiobooks to your wonderful coverage of where to get free books. On a separate note, would it work to put the section on book formats towards the end of the chapter. I think the sections on how you read the books on Sugar to be more interesting. I'm worried that people won't make it through the drier, more confusing, reference materials on book formats, until they are motivated and excited by seeing all the things they can do with the books. Thanks! Caroline On Thu, May 6, 2010 at 3:53 PM, James Simmons nices...@gmail.com wrote: I've started work on another FLOSS Manual, this one about how to get the most out of Sugar as an e-book platform. It will cover what Activities are used for e-books, where to get books, pros and cons of the various e-book formats, and will conclude with instructions on creating your own e-books in the supported formats and options for getting the books distributed. The last part has not been written yet, but I've got some people interested in helping me put it together. I plan to scan in some old books from my own collection and get them in shape to donate to the Internet Archive and Project Gutenberg. The book will document the whole process. In the meantime the Sugar-y chapters are pretty much complete and could use a review. Any suggestions or feedback would be welcome. The book is at: http://en.flossmanuals.net/ReadingandSugar/Introduction Thanks, James Simmons ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep -- Caroline Meeks Solution Grove carol...@solutiongrove.com 617-500-3488 - Office 505-213-3268 - Fax ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 11:46 AM, Cherry Withers cwith...@ekindling.org wrote: Excellent. Thank you for sharing this. Looking forward for more. On May 9, 2010 10:54 AM, Chris Ball c...@laptop.org wrote: http://vimeo.com/8709616 -- Chris Ball c...@laptop.org One Laptop Per Child ___ 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 A confession. I saw all this video last night, and I don't know why...maybe it was a long day...but I found tears streaming down my face when I saw the classroom scene with the kids (4:14). Very touching. Thank you for sharing. cheers, Sameer ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
This is indeed a truly amazing video, thanks for sharing! Christoph Am 09.05.2010 19:51, schrieb Chris Ball: http://vimeo.com/8709616 -- Christoph Derndorfer co-editor, www.olpcnews.com e-mail: christ...@olpcnews.com ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] New FLOSS Manual Reading And Leading With Sugar chapters need review
On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 10:46 AM, James Simmons nices...@gmail.com wrote: Caroline, Thanks for your feedback. Only one Activity supports Text To Speech at the moment: my own Read Etexts. You need a Plain Text file to use that, and I will have a chapter on creating those. In fact, I will have chapters on creating books in every format we support, plus I will have a detailed chapter on how to scan books and how to make your own home book scanner from common household items. I don't have any text in the scanning chapter yet but I do have a couple of illustrations (with many more to come): http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/ReadingandSugar/ScanningBookPages I agree with everything you've said, mostly. As far as the presentation of contents goes, I'd like to get all the content I have to present in the book in a sequence that seems logical to me, then get feedback on the ordering of topics. It may be that I move the chapter on book formats after the one on e-book Activities. It may also be that I remove references to Sugar from many chapters so those chapters can be shared with another book just about e-books (proposed title Everything You Always Wanted To Know About E-Books But Were Afraid To Ask). Audiobooks *might* be in scope. Project Gutenberg has them, but most are just read by a text to speech program, so the student would be better off downloading the e-text and using Read Etexts to get speech and highlighting. I think they have some read by humans too, but there's no way short of downloading them and listening to know which ones they are. I worked on scanning a whole book this weekend, plus I wrote most of a chapter on how you can easily make PDF's: http://en.flossmanuals.net/bin/view/ReadingandSugar/MakingPDFs In the end, I think everything you want will be in the book, plus some stuff on copyrights and Creative Commons licensing, plus some other stuff I haven't thought of yet. Thanks again, Thank you for this important work! James Simmons On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 9:12 AM, Caroline Meeks carol...@meekshome.com wrote: Hi James, I have just skimmed so far. Looks great! One of the issues schools have is students who can not read text well, either from a vision problem or a reading problem. A great deal of what is taught is taught through text, especially science and social studies. It is important that children who cannot understand the text can still learn the content. In addition, reading books for pleasure is a vital way for children to learn about the world and expand their horizons and thinking. One of the wonderful things about technology is that students who can't read text can still listen to text and learn. Sugar is for all children, and not all children can see or decode text, so listening to text should have equal standing as a way to read. I think it would be useful in the section that goes over the different formats and programs to explicitly say which can support text to speech and which can't. It would also be great if you could write a section on how teachers can create documents that can be read to the students. I'm almost certain that for a teacher to retype or scan in a text book and then let a student read/listen to it, is fair use. Certainly that is something that the special ed teacher at the GPA was interested in doing. I'm sure other teachers with students who can't read text at grade level will also be interested in doing that. Consider adding sections about where to get free audiobooks to your wonderful coverage of where to get free books. On a separate note, would it work to put the section on book formats towards the end of the chapter. I think the sections on how you read the books on Sugar to be more interesting. I'm worried that people won't make it through the drier, more confusing, reference materials on book formats, until they are motivated and excited by seeing all the things they can do with the books. Thanks! Caroline On Thu, May 6, 2010 at 3:53 PM, James Simmons nices...@gmail.com wrote: I've started work on another FLOSS Manual, this one about how to get the most out of Sugar as an e-book platform. It will cover what Activities are used for e-books, where to get books, pros and cons of the various e-book formats, and will conclude with instructions on creating your own e-books in the supported formats and options for getting the books distributed. The last part has not been written yet, but I've got some people interested in helping me put it together. I plan to scan in some old books from my own collection and get them in shape to donate to the Internet Archive and Project Gutenberg. The book will document the whole process. In the meantime the Sugar-y chapters are pretty much complete and could use a review. Any suggestions or feedback would be welcome. The book is at:
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
Hello All... I've been following your comments on this. Am I the only one who finds this charming but at the same time strangely disturbing Caryl Date: Mon, 10 May 2010 22:10:43 +0200 From: e0425...@student.tuwien.ac.at To: c...@laptop.org CC: iaep@lists.sugarlabs.org; patr...@collison.ie Subject: Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia This is indeed a truly amazing video, thanks for sharing! Christoph Am 09.05.2010 19:51, schrieb Chris Ball: http://vimeo.com/8709616 -- Christoph Derndorfer co-editor, www.olpcnews.com e-mail: christ...@olpcnews.com ___ 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
[IAEP] SoaS Deployment in Delhi, India
Hey all, Some of you might already know but for those who don't, there will be a SoaS deployment in Delhi, India. A team of 3 students from Boston University will be leaving for Delhi in June. The deployment will be about 10 weeks long from June-Aug. We will be working closely with SEETA (www.seeta.in) while we are in Delhi. Dr. Stefanakis (Boston University School of Education) will be our faculty advisor for the project. We have made great strides in preparing for our project, but like any deployment, planning is an on-going job that can always use help. We have set up a wiki page for our project. You can find it here: http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_on_a_Stick_in_Delhi_India We have raised about $4000 for our project and are continuing to fundraise more. We are targeting for $6000. We would greatly appreciate any donations, which can be made via PayPal on our wiki page. There is a lot to be gained from this deployment as we plan to write a case study this fall. As part of our research, we want to measure how Sugar impacts student learning. We will be measuring this through qualitative and quantitative data with a sample size of at least 150 students. We are planning to use SoaS Strawberry version1 in India. If USR is stable by June, we would like to use that. We ruled out SoaS Blueberry because of problems with collaboration. Anyone suggest a different strategy? Also, we need some help setting up a school server, ideally with integration with Moodle. I tried setting up an XS using the steps on the OLPC wiki but did not have much luck. Is there anyone who can point me in the right direction or is willing to help set this up? I'm not sure if anyone has successfully done this in the past. My technical skills are at par, but if there is any documentation on setting up a backup/restore server I am willing to give it a shot. If you would like us to test certain activities as part of the deployment, please let us know. Feel free to foward this email and the wiki page to anyone else. Thanks, Anurag Goel Boston University '12 College of Engineering -- Anurag Goel ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
Hi, Hello All... I've been following your comments on this. Am I the only one who finds this charming but at the same time strangely disturbing What did you find disturbing about it? - Chris. -- Chris Ball c...@laptop.org One Laptop Per Child ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
Hmmm. Would you elaborate, pleae? I might be missing something important. As to myself, I saw it as a rather well made piece of art, I felt empathy with it, maybe because once I did walk that sort of jungle and met that kind of people. Do you mean it lacked substance? On 05/10/2010 08:59 PM, Caryl Bigenho wrote: Hello All... I've been following your comments on this. Am I the only one who finds this charming but at the same time strangely disturbing Caryl Date: Mon, 10 May 2010 22:10:43 +0200 From: e0425...@student.tuwien.ac.at To: c...@laptop.org CC: iaep@lists.sugarlabs.org; patr...@collison.ie Subject: Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia This is indeed a truly amazing video, thanks for sharing! Christoph Am 09.05.2010 19:51, schrieb Chris Ball: http://vimeo.com/8709616 -- Christoph Derndorfer co-editor, www.olpcnews.com e-mail: christ...@olpcnews.com ___ 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 ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
I've been following your comments on this. Am I the only one who finds this charming but at the same time strangely disturbing If you mean the intrusion of the outside world into their idyllic lifestyle - no If you mean the interviewee talking about Darwinian social evolution - yes On the first count, I quote Noel Pearson, well known Australian indigenous activist Keep our diverse languages and cultural traditions by excelling in education and digital technologies, the only means of arresting the decline of our ancient and oral traditions Maintain our identity as a people but encourage individual excellence in education and achievement On the second count, I am perplexed as to why that material was included Tony ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
Hi All I sent the video links to a few people. They shared my concerns. Here are some of their comments: First, from a highly respected cultural anthropologist who happens to specialize in the people of the Andes: 1 Have they not heard of the problems of reading a Darwinian evolution onto society and culture? That's called social darwinism, a terribly mistaken idea about the transformation of human societies. 2 Globalization did not arrive with the web. In fact, for those pictured, you might say it started with colonialism. There is much more to say here. 3 One should not confuse poverty with cultural difference. Of course no one wants to continue living in poverty. But many societies are using global connections not to become like us ( that is the assumption in the videos, and one I don't buy), but to make global connections with others who are trying to make changes in their lives by NOT becoming like us. Curiously, indigenous politics has seen a resurgence in Latin American contexts since the 1990s. And in some cases, the web has facilitated these politics of difference. Another, an experienced educator and respected TIC consultant, that I shared the links with had equally disturbing concerns: Lack of cultural differences- that is a frightening world. I don’t agree with Negroponte that this is where we are headed and it frightens me that he sees that as not just possible but part of what he is doing. I did like the Sierra images. ... One idea that comes to mind is the potential change in culture (not one culture) based on connecting villages that were otherwise disconnected. I have often wondered about this with the infusion of technology into cultures that have otherwise been disconnected from these advances. This has been seen in cultures with shaman and the lack of youth who want to learn the tradition of the shaman in a village. The one race comment is frightening. It reminds me of another time and place not too long ago. Sorry to rain on everybody's parade, but this all seems so very anglo-centric. Won't everyone be surprised when we actually are all speaking one language and it is 汉语? Caryl ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] Peru, OLPC and Wikipedia
Caryl A little more research by me the interviewed social Darwinist is Robert Wright, the author of Nonzero http://www.nonzero.org/ The filmmaker is Righteous Pictures http://righteouspictures.com/ Wright seems to believe that there is a higher purpose to biological and social evolution, that in some way, we will be fulfilling our destiny if we become one globalised culture. Righteous Pictures' mission seems to be an end to genocide, they presumably believe that a unified global culture will put an end to genocide. So to put it simply, the movie could be viewed as marketing spin, put together by people whose mission is overlapping but not the same as OLPC or Sugarlabs. Tony ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
