Re: [Dfey-nw-discuss] [Fwd: [GeekUp] Teaching Kids: sign-up now]

[Chris Hilliard]

smeg the iphone, give them all an eee pc (701?) running debian, with a
decent sized SD card and teach them how to use that - far cheeper and
more hackable/programable as well as giving them an entirely new
platform that they can use to do a lot of their other school work on.

idiots seem to rule our schools...

Thanks,
badspyro

On Fri, Dec 5, 2008 at 8:03 PM, Lucy <address@hidden> wrote:
> Wow, what a stupendous waste of money. All they need is to be given
> some old classroom pcs, a net connection and a few linux cds.
>
> Also, teaching programming is a little more involved that merely
> explaining what an integer is..
>
> Sometimes simplicity is best, but people seem to forget that so
> easily, especially when shiny things are available.
>
>
> 2008/12/5 Tim Dobson <address@hidden>:
>> I just spotted this, if anyone feels like commenting on this the thread is
>> available through the google groups web interface here:
>> http://groups.google.com/group/geekup/browse_thread/thread/2e6abeaedc918972
>>
>> Personally (as someone else has said) I find this idea of coding for
>> iPhones, a really locked down, closed and expensive platform, quite a
>> sobering idea...
>>
>> Yyour thoughts?
>>
>> Tim
>>
>> -------- Original Message --------
>> Subject: [GeekUp] Teaching Kids: sign-up now
>> Date: Fri, 5 Dec 2008 16:10:54 +0000
>> From: Paul Robinson <address@hidden>
>> Reply-To: address@hidden
>> To: GeekUp <address@hidden>
>>
>>
>> I've had a good day for the "let's get kids coding" project.
>>
>> Today I met an IT teacher at Newall Green High School near
>> Wythenshawe. This is an interesting school because whilst this is in
>> what is considered a relatively economically deprived area, they're
>> quite well kitted out with equipment. Even better, my contact is well
>> up for this, and they're delivering an ICT diploma which means there
>> is a group of just under a dozen kids (14-15 years old) who are
>> enthusiastic about technology.
>>
>> Because they've had some money for this ICT diploma there is basically
>> an iPhone for each of the kids (!) and they're doing training up at
>> the CLC[1] just outside the city centre for one day a week.
>>
>> Having had a chat with my contact, it would seem there are two
>> projects that would be good from the kids' perspectives:
>>
>> - Writing an iPhone app (no, I can't believe that's an option either)
>> - Writing a Facebook app (maybe RFacebook to do it with Rails? A PHP
>> framework?)
>>
>> There is obviously some theory that needs to be covered (Q: "Do you
>> think they'd know what an integer is?" A: "No, no way.."), but I'm
>> going to probably write that up and they'll have that covered before
>> these projects start.
>>
>> I also think we need to cover more than just code - UX, design, etc.
>> are all important factors in developing projects, and we want to make
>> this feel as "real" as possible.
>>
>> It would be great to get 3-4 developers with experience of one or both
>> of the above areas to get involved to do a whole day (a Thursday) some
>> time in February or March. If nobody else is up for this, I'm on my
>> own here...
>>
>> Also, I'm thinking the only way to make this scale is to "teach the
>> teachers" with some more advanced material. That would be a separate
>> session.
>>
>> If any of this is something you feel you can commit to, please let me
>> know off-list. I'm going to be giving this project a name, website and
>> a mailing list soon so I want to collect people who want in on the
>> ground floor.
>>
>> [1] http://www.centralmanclc.com/
>>
>> --
>> Paul Robinson
>>
>> http://vagueware.com :: address@hidden :: +44 (0) 7740 465746
>>
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>>
>>
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>> --
>> www.tdobson.net
>> ----
>> If each of us have one object, and we exchange them, then each of us
>> still has one object.
>> If each of us have one idea, and we exchange them, then each of us now
>> has two ideas.   -  George Bernard Shaw
>>
>>
>>
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