Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
Hi, Actually the model for the website/wiki already exists. It is DART at the Bering Straits School District. They have married mediawiki with their own software to provide a killer tool. The standards, lesson plans, etc. are in a wiki. DART maintains a data base which allows teachers to see/record the status of each of their students in each area of each subject/strand. Having the curriculum standards in a wiki makes it trivial for each deployment to set that up for their own requirements cross linked to anything relevant. Tony Berry wrote: >From Michael's questions: > > * Is there anything we could spend our time on which would yield a > > greater > > return on investment? The most helpful thing I can think of right now would be a special-purpose website/wiki only for curricula. Each curriculum should map to a course in moodle.sugarlabs.org. We need to start the process of mapping standard curricula to the open-source resources (quizzes, readings, activities) that are available in some sort of intelligible order. Then an interested developer or educator could start plugging in the holes. Really, all is needed is some kind of special-purpose wiki mapped to moodle. No special software. The hard and incredibly *unsexy* work is uploading the n curricula from X states/countries and mapping it to sequenced materials. We can talk about quality, pedagogy ad infinitum but the vast majority of teachers don't have a starting point to even provide mediocre education beyond what they are currently provided by their own governments. ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
On Thu, 19 Feb 2009, Tony Anderson wrote: > Hi, > > Actually the model for the website/wiki already exists. It is DART at > the Bering Straits School District. They have married mediawiki with > their own software to provide a killer tool. The standards, lesson > plans, etc. are in a wiki. DART maintains a data base which allows > teachers to see/record the status of each of their students in each area > of each subject/strand. > > Having the curriculum standards in a wiki makes it trivial for each > deployment to set that up for their own requirements cross linked to > anything relevant. > > Tony > > Berry wrote: > > >From Michael's questions: > > > > * Is there anything we could spend our time on which would yield a > > > greater > > > return on investment? > > The most helpful thing I can think of right now would be a > special-purpose website/wiki only for curricula. Each curriculum should > map to a course in moodle.sugarlabs.org. We need to start the process of > mapping standard curricula to the open-source resources (quizzes, > readings, activities) that are available in some sort of intelligible > order. Then an interested developer or educator could start plugging in > the holes. > > Really, all is needed is some kind of special-purpose wiki mapped to > moodle. No special software. The hard and incredibly *unsexy* work is > uploading the n curricula from X states/countries and mapping it to > sequenced materials. We can talk about quality, pedagogy ad infinitum > but the vast majority of teachers don't have a starting point to even > provide mediocre education beyond what they are currently provided by > their own governments. This is *exactly right*. I've hoped to have more time to devote to this effort, but my day job has be stretched pretty thin. But this is exactly where we need to go. --g -- Got an XO that you're not using? Loan it to a needy developer! [[ http://wiki.laptop.org/go/XO_Exchange_Registry ]] ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
Hi all. Thank you Michael and Pia for this.. I have to say that although these questions and concerns are indeed needed , they are only counting one side of the history, like asking what would be the best for OLPC to give or the resources that OLPC can give..this is bad centered, OLPC deployments need more independence, the deployments run by governments need to have straightforward relations with the volunteers, and volunteer driven small deployments need more independence to manage it's own resources and address and resolve the concerns and questions stated here. If the deployments manage to have more independence from OLPC central, i can assure you that OLPC resources wouldn't be so needed as they are now, and can be focused in other tasks. SugarLabs is taking this focus for it's deployments, to have federated Local Labs with some common ground rules but with the possible maximum independence. This independence guarantees real empowerment, distribution of task and efforts, it's not only what SugarLabs can give to Local labs but also what Local Labs can give to SugarLabs, in my opinion and experience this is the best way that SugarLabs can support deployments. For more info: http://sugarlabs.org/go/DeploymentTeam http://sugarlabs.org/go/Local_Labs Rafael Ortiz On Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 12:14 AM, Michael Stone wrote: > Folks, > > Pia Waugh (greebo) and I have spent a fair bit of time in the last month > talking and thinking about what we can do in the next few months to best > support present and future olpc-ish deployments (typically with XOs, > typically > running Sugar) and we'd like to share some of our thoughts with you. These > thoughts are presented in draft form in order to solicit your feedback, > which > is eagerly awaited, and will likely be incorporated into future drafts. > > Regards, > > Michael > > -- > > 1. Motivation > > We think that many deployment-related needs are not being adequately met, > particularly in the areas of: > >* knowledge-sharing and the ability to benefit from others' mistakes. > >* volume and quality of aid available for conducting deployments. > >* bandwidth, latency, and SNR of channels to other communities which > work > with deployments; e.g. other deployments, educators, software teams, > distributions, researchers, consultants, and volunteers > > 2. Use Cases > > We're particularly interested in addressing these situations and needs: > > D1) I'm running a deployment... >a) ...and I need help! Who shares my problem? Who can help me? >b) ...and I want to do more! Who/what can I work with? >c) ...and I want to share! Where do I go? What is needed? > > D2) I need to talk to people deploying XOs. >a) Where do I go? >b) What can I expect? > > D3) I'm working on a deployment plan. >a) Where to I start? >b) What have I forgotten? >c) Am I using best practices? >d) Can I get a review? > > D4) I need to know... >a) real deployment numbers, >b) maps, >c) examples, >d) photos, >e) techniques, >f) contact info, >... > > 3. Existing Resources for Use Cases > > Before we started, there were three basic mechanisms for addressing these > use > cases: > >1) read the Deployment Guide and the Deployments page(s): > > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Deployment_Guide > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Deployments > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Deployments_support > >2) ask olpc-techsupp...@laptop.org. (Only available to large > deployments?) > >3) poke people on IRC. > > These three mechanisms are problematic because none of them can be relied > upon, > alone or in combination, to adequately address any of the use cases listed > above. > > 4. New Resources for Use Cases > > So far, we've created two new resources which help bridge the gap: > >4) weekly deployment support meetings, with minutes at > > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Deployment_meetings#Meeting_notes > > which get aggregated each month into > >5) a Deployment FAQ, > > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Deployment_FAQ > > similar in form and spirit to the G1G1 > > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Support_FAQ > > We think that these two new resources, in combination with the pre-existing > resources, will help us provide the next level of support for our use > cases. > > 4. Projects > > We presently have several ongoing (interrelated) projects which you might > like > to become (more deeply) involved in: > >P1) Keep improving the deployment support meetings > >-- so far, so good! > >-- your participation in these meetings is our best current source > of new > content for the Deployment FAQ and for... > >P2) Organize material captured in the meetings as FAQ entries > >-- t
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
On Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 6:14 PM, Michael Stone wrote: > 6. Questions: > * Does this analysis hold water? Seems to make sense, and looks like the strategies are quite rational. >* Is there anything we could spend our time on which would yield a > greater return on investment? I think you (plural you) are doing a good job overall, but I'm on the sidelines. The only thing I'd suggest is to avoid building too many "deployment specific" channels (irc, lists, etc). If the relevant discussions happen on the -dev channels, autistic devs like me are then forced to listen to the chatter of the most important members of the community. And that's a good thing. (ie: I'd prefer to see more traffic on server-devel -- and I'd actually rename it to 'server'.) > * Are there any fixable roadblocks which prevent group from >participating? > >(e.g., pervasive use of IRC for meetings?) I'm not an irc junkie but I am hoping people know to _also_ ask on the list if they think I can help. On irc you get the answers of the people that are there, which may or may not intersect with the people who know about your question... cheers, m -- martin.langh...@gmail.com mar...@laptop.org -- School Server Architect - ask interesting questions - don't get distracted with shiny stuff - working code first - http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Martinlanghoff ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
On Thu, 2009-02-19 at 09:45 -0500, Greg Dekoenigsberg wrote: > On Thu, 19 Feb 2009, Tony Anderson wrote: > > > Hi, > > > > Actually the model for the website/wiki already exists. It is DART at > > the Bering Straits School District. They have married mediawiki with > > their own software to provide a killer tool. The standards, lesson > > plans, etc. are in a wiki. DART maintains a data base which allows > > teachers to see/record the status of each of their students in each area > > of each subject/strand. > > > > Having the curriculum standards in a wiki makes it trivial for each > > deployment to set that up for their own requirements cross linked to > > anything relevant. > > > > Tony tony, Right on, I still haven't spent the time reviewing DART that it deserves. -- Bryan W. Berry Technology Director OLE Nepal, http://www.olenepal.org ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
Hello, I'm one of the project people at Bering Strait School District that has been working with DART. Although I've exchanged some emails with Gregdek and Jef about DART's ability to track standards progress, and link needs to a MediaWiki instance, they have not seen the latest version of the system. The newest features and bug fixes really expand the DART / Wiki combination into complete student information AND collaborative curriculum development system for managing our school district. We are about the size of Great Britain, but with less than 2,000 students. The system runs well, and is very, very stable. Down time for us has been almost a non-event. Training and roll out has been mostly unnecessary, and handled with an hour so "overview", and a few PDF tutorials for teachers and students. A bit more for school administrators. We get a very, very low number of Help Desk requests compared to our other software packages in use. The most training has to go toward editing the wiki system, not to DART itself. Our current version has been our official system since August, and has vastly improved "modules" that can be activated to track organizational performance and functioning, such as a "Dashboard", Improvement Planning, standardized test data analysis, and improved individual learner tracking. I'm sorry to say that we're woefully short of help right now, and scrambling to finish an installer package and an updated demo server so we can share these features with groups like this. To be honest, it's just our school ditrict at the moment working to develop the project. Others have expressed an interest, but have not been able to help with programming or design work. As soon as our installer package is done, we need an admin setup screen that will allow easier setup for adjusting language CSS, logos and turning modules on or off by need. That will spur a wider adoption base that will get some more partners, I think. We have a table at CoSN conference in Austin in March, and will handing out information to like minded school districts and organizations...if we can find some! Like CATB says, "Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow". We'd LOVE to have some others interested in moving this project forward, and I can set up a DimDim demo session in a week or so if there is interest in seeing the existing build. Finally, on the collaborative development of our curriculum we are up to about 11,000 pages. We are hoping to work with Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) to test their fantastic WikiDashboard tool with DART and our Open Content Curriculum. This will allow us to track and measure the impact of individual contributions to the curriculum in visual manner, and provide all users with a "meta" view of that content as it develops. This is PERFECT for use in a curriculum system. http://www.technologyreview.com/web/22076/page1/ http://wikidashboard.parc.com/ Teachers and students have created a number of spin off projects just this year in the wiki that may interest educators doing OLPC rollouts, such as Inupiaq and Yup'ik multimedia dictionaries: http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Category:Yupik_dictionary http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Meteghluk http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Category:Inupiaq_dictionary Thanks, folks, and please feel free to contact me at jconci...@bssd.org if you need more information, and thanks for the kind words in this thread. Regards, Johncn -- View this message in context: http://n2.nabble.com/RFC%3A-Supporting-olpc-ish-Deployments---Draft-1-tp2351291p2360168.html Sent from the It's an education project, not a laptop project. mailing list archive at Nabble.com. ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
On Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 6:33 AM, Tony Anderson wrote: > Hi, > > Actually the model for the website/wiki already exists. It is DART at > the Bering Straits School District. They have married mediawiki with > their own software to provide a killer tool. The standards, lesson > plans, etc. are in a wiki. DART maintains a data base which allows > teachers to see/record the status of each of their students in each area > of each subject/strand. Thank you. I will check that out. Earth Treasury is creating a Web site for its projects in infrastructure (electrical generation and storage, Internet), digital textbooks, and microfinance. We intend to collect curriculum materials from around the world, and offer to create teaching materials that integrate Sugar software and XO hardware capabilities. Volunteers will be welcome to scratch any of their own itches, and we will offer to create the most urgently needed materials on contract with Ministries of Education, aid agencies, or anybody else with funding. > Having the curriculum standards in a wiki makes it trivial for each > deployment to set that up for their own requirements cross linked to > anything relevant. > > Tony > > Berry wrote: > > >From Michael's questions: > > > > * Is there anything we could spend our time on which would yield a > > > greater > > > return on investment? > > The most helpful thing I can think of right now would be a > special-purpose website/wiki only for curricula. Each curriculum should > map to a course in moodle.sugarlabs.org. We need to start the process of > mapping standard curricula to the open-source resources (quizzes, > readings, activities) that are available in some sort of intelligible > order. Then an interested developer or educator could start plugging in > the holes. > > Really, all is needed is some kind of special-purpose wiki mapped to > moodle. No special software. The hard and incredibly *unsexy* work is > uploading the n curricula from X states/countries and mapping it to > sequenced materials. We can talk about quality, pedagogy ad infinitum > but the vast majority of teachers don't have a starting point to even > provide mediocre education beyond what they are currently provided by > their own governments. > > > ___ > IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) > IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org > http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep > -- Silent Thunder (默雷/धर्ममेघशब्दगर्ज/دھرممیگھشبدگر ج) is my name And Children are my nation. The Cosmos is my dwelling place, The Truth my destination. http://earthtreasury.net/ (Ed Cherlin) ___ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Re: [IAEP] RFC: Supporting olpc-ish Deployments - Draft 1
Dear Johncn, The bssd wiki is the best thing I have seen in a while. Congrats on what you've accomplished so far. I would love to take part in a session next week to see a demo of what you are developing. As for the Yupik and Inupiaq dictionaries -- they are quite nice. Have you been in touch with anyone from the Inupiaq Wiktionary? Piolinfax may be a helpful resource for expanding such projects. http://ik.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:AllPages http://ik.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Piolinfax Regards, SJ (And: have a great time at cosn. is anyone else on the list going?) On Fri, Feb 20, 2009 at 12:24 PM, Johncn wrote: > > Hello, > > I'm one of the project people at Bering Strait School District that has been > working with DART. > > Although I've exchanged some emails with Gregdek and Jef about DART's > ability to track > standards progress, and link needs to a MediaWiki instance, they have not > seen the latest > version of the system. > > The newest features and bug fixes really expand the DART / Wiki combination > into complete > student information AND collaborative curriculum development system for > managing our school district. > We are about the size of Great Britain, but with less than 2,000 students. > > The system runs well, and is very, very stable. Down time for us has been > almost a non-event. Training and roll out has been mostly unnecessary, and > handled with an hour so "overview", and a few PDF tutorials for teachers and > students. A bit more for school administrators. We get a very, very low > number of Help Desk requests compared to our other software packages in use. > The most training has to go toward editing the wiki system, not to DART > itself. > > Our current version has been our official system since August, and has > vastly improved "modules" that can be activated to track organizational > performance and functioning, such as a "Dashboard", Improvement Planning, > standardized test data analysis, and improved individual learner tracking. > > I'm sorry to say that we're woefully short of help right now, and scrambling > to finish an installer package and an updated demo server so we can share > these features with groups like this. To be honest, it's just our school > ditrict at the moment working to develop the project. Others have expressed > an interest, but have not been able to help with programming or design work. > > As soon as our installer package is done, we need an admin setup screen that > will allow easier setup for adjusting language CSS, logos and turning > modules on or off by need. That will spur a wider adoption base that will > get some more partners, I think. We have a table at CoSN conference in > Austin in March, and will handing out information to like minded school > districts and organizations...if we can find some! > > Like CATB says, "Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow". We'd LOVE to > have some others interested in moving this project forward, and I can set up > a DimDim demo session in a week or so if there is interest in seeing the > existing build. > > Finally, on the collaborative development of our curriculum we are up to > about 11,000 pages. We are hoping to work with Palo Alto Research Center > (PARC) to test their fantastic WikiDashboard tool with DART and our Open > Content Curriculum. This will allow us to track and measure the impact of > individual contributions to the curriculum in visual manner, and provide all > users with a "meta" view of that content as it develops. This is PERFECT > for use in a curriculum system. > > http://www.technologyreview.com/web/22076/page1/ > > http://wikidashboard.parc.com/ > > Teachers and students have created a number of spin off projects just this > year in the wiki that may interest educators doing OLPC rollouts, such as > Inupiaq and Yup'ik multimedia dictionaries: > > http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Category:Yupik_dictionary > http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Meteghluk > http://wiki.bssd.org/index.php/Category:Inupiaq_dictionary > > Thanks, folks, and please feel free to contact me at jconci...@bssd.org if > you need more information, and thanks for the kind words in this thread. > > Regards, > > Johncn > -- > View this message in context: > http://n2.nabble.com/RFC%3A-Supporting-olpc-ish-Deployments---Draft-1-tp2351291p2360168.html > Sent from the It's an education project, not a laptop project. mailing list > archive at Nabble.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
