Squeakfest Uruguay 2012 - Day 2, Randy's workshop

On the second day, we had several highlights, so I'll have more than one post for Day 2. The day started with Randy's workshop. Randy had the text of his projects translated into Spanish by Carlos Rabassa, he had learned some spanish phrases himself and he had Ricarco Moran to translate him on the first day and Sebastian Blanco on the second. That way, every teacher in the room could follow the workshop and there was a very interesting discussion. That is the best thing in a workshop, when participants get really involved in a topic.
Randy's projects are created in a certain way, derived from conclusions of the book "How people learn". There is an introductory text about the subject and then students are confronted by common preconceptions regarding it. A teacher needs to be able to lead a discussion about these preconceptions in the classroom, and give students ideas on how to prove what they think.
In this workshop, Randy presented a variety of projects about several topics. You can find his projects here: Squeak Courseware: Science

A picture from the second workshop.

Squeakfest Uruguay 2012 - Day 1

José Miguel García: Robotics and education

 

In his talk, Miguel explained how robots are being used in the schools in Uruguay. There are robotics kits in every school in Uruguay and teachers are starting to adapt to robotics programming. What he did and talked about were really great robotics courses with amazing results. 

We attended his workshop later at Squeakfest Buenos Aires, where we were supposed to build robots from materials like cardboard, woodenstrips, yarn and a NXT motor within two hours. At first, we were imagining what we would like to automate (without knowing about the materials). Then we learnde what materials we had available, so we had to refine our idea to something that could actually being done in the given time. And then came the tinkering and programming. We used TurtleArt to control the motor, we could easily have used PhysicalEtoys as well. It was about doing the whole design process from the idea to the finished project thinking like an engineer. 

This is how they do workshops with kids at schools!

 

Squeakfest Uruguay 2011- Day 2, Steve's Talk

I just eperienced a wonderful virtual talk from Steve Thomas. He was able to start it interactively with the audience, even while he could not see the audience and they could not see him. But they saw his screen, and he played a game with the audience, having them suggesting numbers to win a tictactoe. It was amazing to see how the audience loved his talk, the little surprises his projects give and all his wonderful examples.

You can find more of it here: http://mrstevesscience.blogspot.com/
and here http://etoys4teachers.blogspot.com/

Squeakfest Uruguay 2011- Day 2

We arrived around 8:30 at the university for Squeakfest and I tested the internet connection for our online talks. Thanks to Bert and the technicians at the university, we got it connected. So Steve's and Walter's talk should be no problem.
I started a bit later than planned, at 9:30 with my presentation. It went well, but was an unusual experience for me. Because Valentina had to translate, I could only say 1-2 sentences at once. Usually, I start talking and get going. Now I had to stop all the time. But the audiencesat sat there, nodding, so they seemd to understand and agree.
Right now, Randy and Ricardo are giving a talk together. This is very nice, Ricardo is showing his Speech Bubbles, graphing tools, etc. which he developed in the GSoC-project. Randy gives the pedagogical background, with Ricardo translating. It is very nice to see how well they work together!

Squeakfest Uruguay 2011

Squeakfest in Montevideo has started today at 7:30 pm. We are in Aula Magna of the Catholic University in Montevideo, a verynice room, it actually looks like a church (and probably is). There are about 100 people in the room at this opening night. Many more are expected tomorrow, when participants from other parts of the country wil arrive.
Mariana Herrera, who organized the conference, opened it at 7:30, then MSc. Ing. Catalina Fellaggiwelcomed us at the university. I was the first to give my welcome speech, which main objective was to thank Mariana for all the work she did to make this happen. Valentina, a 17-year-old friend of Mariana translated my talk, she is really amazing! Then Enrique Verdes from the Uruguayan Linux User Group talked about the importance and possibilities of free software. Finally, Monica Baez from Plan Ceibal welcomed everyone and talked about the importance of educating the children for the technological age. All these organizations supported Squeakfest and helped tomake it happen.
I already met several people, Lino Bessonart, who will conduct the Etoys workshops tomorrow and on Saturday. Ricardo Moran, Gonzalo Zabala and the whole group of "Physical Etoys" are here. After 2 years, I met Marta Voelcker from Porto Alegre again. Right now, she is talking about "Education, Technology and Skills of the 21st Century". Fortunately, she gave me an overview of her talk before, because she is speaking Portuguese. This is very similar to Spanish, so the participants will understand it. Her talk will set the broader context for the then following focus on Etoys.
The conference is supposed to end today around 9:30 pm. Then we will go to dinner, which I have learned is the usual time people in Uruguay go out to eat. But probably I'll stay some time longer and try out the internet connection for the online talks that are planned for tomorrow.

Squeakland week

These were the last two weeks:

#1. Uruguay is now the country with the most registered Etoys users in the world. Congratulations!

#2. Tim Falconer started a discussion "A school is not a building" on several lists, even on the developer chat on Monday this was the topic. [1], [2]

#3. We tested the next environments for online collaboration on the education team meetings. This time it was Skype and GoToMeeting. With Skype, the screen sharing didn't work. This week in GoToMeeting we had an audio chat and could share our screens, so this is working well. It was fun to show each other projects and play around! [3]

#4. Carlos Rabassa did send his notes from the "Digital Citizenship" conference he attended in Montevideo, with detailed feedback for individual presentations. [4]

#5. And here is a nice website with ideas for mathematical doodling, have a look and start your next Etoys project :) [5]

Fun with pattern blogs and transformation tools

Read this great blog from Steve!
http://mrstevesscience.blogspot.com