X-Git-Url: https://codewiz.org/gitweb?p=wiki.git;a=blobdiff_plain;f=blog%2F2010%2F03;h=3e3bf2b5beb0c61bc7fc49f1118cc2d057992011;hp=10ee6edb491522d80ad85347bc7103c4dfcb099e;hb=5f3524432ca1e6d4adb54e57bd3d12eca3c636e8;hpb=5b99147c32a65d97cd927d502a18fde349b1715f diff --git a/blog/2010/03 b/blog/2010/03 index 10ee6ed..3e3bf2b 100644 --- a/blog/2010/03 +++ b/blog/2010/03 @@ -1,3 +1,158 @@ +== Fri, Mar 12 - Interview with //Los Scratcheros// == + +|| {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/scratcheros/00008.jpg | maxwidth=480 | The "Scratcheros": Nadia, Benedicto and Alberto}} || {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/scratcheros/1.00011.jpg | maxwidth=480 | Albertito, our youngest volunteer, helping one of our trainers }} || + +Today I spent some time with three siblings of Caacupe who has impressed me and the educators very +much with their original creations in Scratch. Scratch is not a school subject, these kids are +learning it on their own driven by their own passion. + + * **What's your name?** + * B: Benedicto + * N: Nadia + * A: Alberto + + * **How old are you?** + * B: 12 + * N: 11 + * A: 9 + + * **How did you learn Scratch?** + * B: We tried all the functions. First, we'll try one function, and see what it does. + * N: Like he said, we experimented with all the functions and check the results. + * A: By looking at the animations of the games bundled with Scratch + + * **What job would you like to do when you're done with school?** + * B: Software engineer + * N: Paediatrician + * A: Nada... ;-) + + * **Do you like Turtle Art? What can you do with it?** + * B: Si. I can create rectangles and other geometrical shapes. + * N: Mostly geometric shapes + * A: Only basic shapes: square, triangle... + + * **How much time do you spend with your laptop every day?** + * B: A few hours. + * N: 6 hours, more or less. + * A: Same for me. + * (Mother's note: they don't use the laptop enough in school!) + + * **Nobody is teaching you, yeah? You're learning everything on your own?** + * B: No, with my sister. We try all activities, and when we find one we like, we spend some time on it together. + * N: I learned the basics of Turtle Art at the trainer's course. + * A: Yes, I learned it there too. + + * **What other activities do you like besides Scatch and Turtle Art?** + * B: //Ablar con Sara// [Speak] and //Super Vampire Ninja Zero//, //Máquina de discos// (Jukebox). + * N: //eToys//, to edit photos. I need someone to teach me all the rest. + * A: //Grabar// (Record), to take videos, interview people... + + * **What would you like to add to Sugar?** + * B: The "Snake" game + * N: Strategic games + * A: ...hmm... + * (Mom: They need an automatic spell checker... and a **screensaver**, of course). + + * **What's the most annoying problem for you with Sugar?** + * B: Can't use the "robot" function in //Ablar con Sara// ( + * N: I want bigger fonts in //Pintar// (Paint). + * A: //Escribir// (Write ;-) + + * **Would you like to learn a little bit of Python with Pippy?** + * B: Very well! + +Then Benedicto and I got started. Python is easy, you can explain the basics to a smart kid in less than 30 minutes. +I've shown him a few Pippy examples, describing the code briefly before running it, then making small changes to make +Benedicto grasp the possibilities. From his questions and comments, I'm pretty sure that he could figure out the +concepts despite my very poor Spanish fluency and my usual disorganized style. + +Nadia shows plenty of design talent: she uses Sugar to create short stories featuring her friends. She +cookie-cuts their photos and uses Scratch to animate them on fantasy backgrounds with music, sound +effects and text. Recently, she started creating line-art versions of the photos using eToys, so her +new creations look more like cartoons. To my surprise, Benedicto mentioned the Happy Tree Friends, +a splatter-gore cartoon which makes even South Park seem politically correct. Appropriate for his +age or not, it's a common hacker trait. + +Nadia also created a platform videogame in which a dog needs to jump around to find the way out from +each level, while a bouncing arrow chases him. Technically simple, but shows sensitive use of +game-design principles. I'm not sure if the code is entirely new or comes in part from pre-existing +Scratch games. It doesn't matter: in Free Software, remixing other people's work is the rule. + +We updated Benedicto's and Nadia's laptops to [[http://oficina.paraguayeduca.org/~bernie/py-xo1/ | F11-XO1 Paraguay, build 65]], +which contains the latest release of [[http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/0.84/Notes | Sugar 0.84]]. Benedicto had been previously +testing my build 45, revealing some bugs in networking and activities. + + +== Mon, Mar 8 - Children like Sugar, for the wrong reasons == + +|| {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/cats/00001.jpg | maxwidth=480 | CATS, Fernando's XO repair lab in Caacupe }} || {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/cats/00029.jpg | maxwidth=480 | Kids asking to install Sugar 0.84 in front of Cyber Nick's lab }} || + +The owner of **Centro de Assistencia Tecnica y Soporte (CATS)**, the XO support center of +[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caacup%C3%A9 | Caacupé]], wrote: + +{{{ +On March 8 2010 14:51, Raúl Gutiérrez Segalés wrote: +> Fernando, +> +> How is the migration to Fedora 11 going so far? Approximate number +> of machines to date? + +Raul, the truth that it's going smooth so far, the boys are very excited +about the new version, and the rumor is spreading fast. +I think so far my team updated 120 laptops, more or less. + +FG +}}} + +(Google translation with my manual corrctions) + +I witnessed it with my own eyes: every day, children start lining up outside of CATS' door +early in the morning, and keep coming all day long, until the evening. All of them ask +for the new version, bui in interesting ways: a little boy said: + + "//Quiero poner ventanas coloradas//" (I want colored windows). + +They're obviously referring to the Gnome desktop, also known as "//salva pantallas//" (screensaver). +Another kid admired his freshly installed Gnome desktop and proudly declared: "//Ahora tienen Windows!//" +(now I have Windows). In Spanish, therre's no ambiguity on the meaning of the word Windows. + +Power of brand. It doesn't rmatter if it's the actual Windows, or even if it really does +anything useful at all. It's new, it's colored and it's what adults are using. Oh, and it +also comes with a screensaver which makes it irresistible. + +So, what do we do? Quick! Let's add a cool screensaver to Sugar! :-) + +Of course not, but could we do anything to appeal more to kids? By now, I think I've observed +our young users closely enough to be able to guess what they're really missing in Sugar: + +
+more configurability. +
+ +Yeah, dozen of scientific studies showed how users almost never customize the desktops beyond +setting a background image. Kids, however, are a lot more passionate about their precious +laptop than the average office clerk using Windows. They //do// cover the exterior of +their laptops with colorful stickers. + +|| {{pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/escuela_691_profesora_gudelia_cabrera/00048.jpg | maxwidth=480 | Shy girls hide behind their Barbie-fashioned laptops }} || {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/caacupe/scratcheros/00003.jpg | maxwidth=480 | A sugar "hack" (zoom in to see the ASCII art detail) }} || + +Believe it or not, many of these kids also set their Home View with the random icon layout +(aka "the Negroponte layout"), because it lets them drag icons around and arrange them in +clever ways. I could take many screenshot to prove it, but I particulatily like this one +abusing Sugar's user name field to create a drawing on three lines. These kids do not live +in the middle of Silicon Valley; it is very likely that they rediscovered the technique +of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASCII_art | ASCII art]] completely on their own. +The original idea was passed along and successively refined by several anonymous artists. + +Finally, what was the gray-scale palette supposed to mean in our UI? I was explained it once, +and it seemed to make some sense, but now I forgot. And, whatver the reason was, kids are +unlikely to agree with us. + +Let's give our users a control panel applet for customizing colors as they wish, or they'll +switch to Gnome //en masse//. I can't blame them, either. What would you have done when +you were 8? + + == Tue, Mar 02 - Charla @ Facultad Politecnica == Today I gave an opening talk at the [[http://www.pol.una.py/ | Facultad Politecnica de la Universidad Nacional de Asuncion]]. @@ -7,11 +162,9 @@ The title was "//Empoderar a los estudiantes con el Software Libre//" (//Empower * [[http://people.sugarlabs.org/bernie/sugar/slides/sugar-paraguay-v6-es.pdf | Spanish, PDF]] * [[http://people.sugarlabs.org/bernie/sugar/slides/sugar-paraguay-v5-en.odp | English, OpenDocument]] (older version with fewer slides and some factual errors) -{{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/00043.jpg | maxwidth=640 }} -{{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/todos-son-maestros-y-alumnos.jpg | maxwidth=640 | Everyone is a learner and a techer}} -{{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/la-base-pedagogica-de-sugar.jpg | maxwidth=640 | The pedagogical base of Sugar}} -{{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/00048.jpg | maxwidth=640 }} +|| {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/la-base-pedagogica-de-sugar.jpg | maxwidth=500 }} || {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/todos-son-maestros-y-alumnos.jpg | maxwidth=500 }} || +|| {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/00048.jpg | maxwidth=500 }} || {{ pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica/00043.jpg | maxwidth=500 }} || See [[pictures/sugar/deployment/paraguay/facultad_politecnica | all the photos ]] in my Codew'z photostream. -Note: I'm not really affiliated with MIT, and I'm not even an engineer, but I'm very flattered ;-) +Note: I'm not really affiliated with MIT and I'm not even an engineer, but it's a flattering mistake ;-)