I have no answer, but I want to make it clear that I find communication
between developers and teachers to be one of the most important problems
we face.
Dwarfed only by the problem of communicating with the children, who are
routinely firewalled away from us.
On Mon, November 28, 2011 2:58 pm, Carlos Rabassa wrote:
Versión en Español sigue al texto Inglés
I changed the Subject from / Cambié el tema desde Fwd: [IAEP]
Contemplating Your SLOBS Vote.
Sridhar,
I find your opinion very much interesting.
However, we are not discussing a universal scientific problem.
I have no doubts your comments apply to some of the teachers you know;
mine apply to the teachers I know, a different group, probably far away
from yours.
We are discussing the individual reasons why a large number of teachers,
in different locations all over the world, are not communicating with the
creators and developers of applications intended for them.
Walter initiated this discussion, asking for help to find a proper venue
for developers and educators to meet.
Teachers are good writers by trade and training.
Venues such as Facebook, Yammer and SalesForce, are suitable to consult
on a specific problem, reaching many individuals who might be able to
answer, offering an almost immediate answer.
Using a system like this, implies knowing how to explain the problem
clearly in a language understood by others in the group. It also
frequently tends to create many immediate answers from people with lots of
good will and good intentions but who offer answers that confuse the
person with the original problem more than helping.
My experience from reading the lists points to these main problems with
some mail lists, such as IAEP:
- Language - Teachers in the largest OLPC deployments speak Spanish, not
English. At least the instructions to sign up and to see the archives
should offer Spanish in addition to the current English and German.
OLPC-Sur, seems to reach more teachers. It offers instructions in
English and Spanish.
- Most systems faster than mail lists, usually produce messages with
sloppy language. We all tend to talk that way when in a hurry and among
friends. These messages are out of reach to anyone without an
extraordinary command of the language. It is frequently impossible for a
foreigner to understand or to translate for others.
- Insults: Anyone asking a question has to be ready to receive some rush
answers that some sensible, educated people might interpret as offensive.
Not everyone insults newcomers but, when an insult is written everyone
usually remains in silence, sort of implying it is ok to be rude. I am
not offended by insults. They just leave me very sad thinking how
unfortunate those issuing the insult are, how limited the world they live
in is. One of the most straight insults I ever received in these lists
came from a nice person who only seems to know the world of programming
Sugar applications. There are many other things to enjoy in this life.
There are many other things useful to education, educators and students.
- Fast wrong answers from individuals who seem more anxious to show-off
their knowledge rather than to test their answers before offering them to
others.
Translating a quick conversation is more than what I can do. I will be
glad to translate any well-thought, well-written page in English or
Spanish to the other language.
This offer applies to anyone in any of the lists I follow. A well written
paragraph is usually handled pretty well by automatic translators, thus
making it available to almost anyone in the world to read and understand.
Carlos
Begin forwarded message:
From: Sridhar Dhanapalan srid...@laptop.org.au
Date: November 28, 2011 3:18:21 AM GMT-02:00
To: Carlos Rabassa car...@mac.com
Cc: IAEP SugarLabs iaep@lists.sugarlabs.org, voluntarios y
administradores OLPC para usuarios docentes olpc-...@lists.laptop.org
Subject: Re: [IAEP] Contemplating Your SLOBS Vote
On 28 November 2011 08:47, Carlos Rabassa car...@mac.com wrote:
Walter,
The networking site you ask for, seems to be the IAEP list, located
at
http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep
Mailing lists are too cumbersome for most of our teachers. We've been
finding that Yammer works better for non-technical people. Its
Facebook-like interface feels less threatening, and there are lots of
other features that a mailing list cannot provide.
Sridhar
Versión en Español
Este diálogo lo comenzó Walter Bender,
El 18 Nov, 2011, at 11:10 AM, Walter Bender escribió:
¿Hay alguna red social en tu pais donde los maestros se reúnen? Si asi
fuese, podríamos frecuentarla . (He hecho esta pregunta muchas veces en
el pasado sin recibir respuesta. Tal vez Carlos o tu podrían
investigar?)
Lo continuó Carlos Rabassa, el 27 de Noviembre, respondiendo
Walter,
La red social por la que estás preguntando, parece ser la lista
