On 7/17/07, Guido van Rossum <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 7/16/07, kirby urner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Yet I got fan mail as well. > > > > I trust others on this list to give Sven the sound sober advice > > he's looking for. I specialize in various brands of polemics -- > > not to the exclusion of technical content though. > > But do polemics have a place on a list dedicated to promoting *Python* > in education? The list name is meant to be [email protected], not > mere edu-sig -- it's not about education(al politics) in general.
Understood. That same posting went to the Math Forum (Sven's email redacted, but edu-sig is world-readable), where it received some sober replies (a subscriber in Alaska dove head first into Python). That's where more hard work of the Math Wars is really going on (I kept trying to recruit Arthur, we could have used his insightfulness). So here's this guy in Belgium teaching informatics and math, and racking his brains for informatics examples that *aren't* at all that math flavored. Sounds all too familiar, no? When I look back from CP4E being a success, I have to ask: how did we get here? Obvious answer: we didn't simply surrender to champions of the status quo curricula. We needed (and presumably got) some new flavors. Plus, if history is any guide, new flavors will arise. The question is not "will change occur?" but "which changes will the Python community champion?" Just OLPC? But what about the E in CP4E? I see that E as making OLPC a *subset* (albiet an important one) of a much bigger effort (one that joins energies with other open source communities in a positive, constructive way (not: we are the only best first language, we will kill you)). Anyway, for the next weeks, I'll will go back to simply describing how I teach Python in the field, which is what I did today, and about OSCON, where CP4E is my topic (and the Ubuntu conference, if there's much Pythonic and educationally significant that I learn). And as usual, I'll do more in my blogs than here, to spell it all out in great detail. Anyway, let's see what others bring up, in terms of how CP4E became a reality. I'm not the only talented spin doctor among us. Kirby > > I am seeing signals that there's been too much politics and not enough > Python or education on this list. While discussion of educational > politics is a worthy cause, I want to present a strawman that excludes > its discussion on this list. I have seem more than one mailing list go > up in flames over education politics -- understandably a touchy issue > so perhaps best discussed elsewhere. I have also seen lists saved by a > strict rule forbidding such destructive topics (enforced by a > moderator reminding posters and readers of this rule when the topic is > accidentally brought up again). > > -- > --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/) > _______________________________________________ > Edu-sig mailing list > [email protected] > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig > _______________________________________________ Edu-sig mailing list [email protected] http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
