On Sun, Apr 10, 2016 at 1:01 AM, Adam Holt <h...@laptop.org> wrote: > On Sat, Apr 9, 2016 at 10:33 PM, Dave Crossland <d...@lab6.com> wrote: > >> >> On 9 April 2016 at 11:26, Caryl Bigenho <cbige...@hotmail.com> wrote: >> >>> I also agree that $500 does seem excessive, and even inappropriate >> >> >> FWIW, I thought it was small; it is under minimum wage for some places. >> > > Some teachers I work with in Haiti make less than this amount in an entire > year :( When the TripAdvisor grant's defining 2013 document said "Sugar > Labs is a 100% volunteer project" that may have been the case, but it is > evidently no longer the case today. Mako's point about volunteer > motivations ( > https://mako.cc/writing/funding_volunteers/funding_volunteers.html) > becomes all the more critical if we go too far flaunting nebulous > Trump-told-me salaries in the faces of our hardest working volunteers, > across the poorest places on earth (many on these mailing lists) when that > breaks our global solidarity rather more than Leading Us Forward. > > Walter and Devin Ulibarri chose to invest $3579.68 of Sugar Labs' money > going to Thailand's Constructionism 2016 (Feb 1-5) for a very good reason > -- to do exactly that, Lead Us Forward. >
(Correction: that's of course $3977.42 of Sugar Labs' money prior to the 10% deduction payable to SFConservancy for accounting/legal/administration. My mistake.) As that purpose does not yet appear at http://planet.sugarlabs.org, Sugar > Labs' community should help Walter and Devin articulate this through > community channels that bring this impact to life, easing all our work of > honoring TripAdvisor's request/requirement for (1) "Board-Approved Annual > Budget", (2) biennial assessment if it has not already been submitted for > August 2015, and (3) final 3-year report to be submitted August 2016. > > A preview from Feb 9: > > '4. I [Walter Bender] just returned from Constructionism 2016 (See [3]), a > "bi-annual > gathering of researchers and practitioners of the constructionist learning > philosophy is intended to be a place to showcase lessons learned, > innovative learning tools, new case studies, and novel approaches that has > been happening throughout the world." A number of Sugar Labs community > members were there, including Cynthia Solomon, Claudia Urrea, and Devin > Ulibarri. Devin and I spoke about Music Blocks and along with Cynthia and > Claudia, we ran several workshops for children and teachers. Lots of great > feedback and many new and renewed connections. (Our host, Khun Paron, has > been an advocate for Sugar for almost a decade.) The entire conference was > videotaped and will be posted online soon. Be sure to watch Cynthia's > keynote address in which she reviewed the history of Constructionism, which > has had a great influence on the design and development of Sugar. > > 5. Music Blocks is a fork the Turtle Blocks program that we began last year > during GSoC. Our goal is for Music Blocks to be an open-ended, yet > musically relevant tool—one that invites learners to explore fundamental > musical concepts that are both intrinsic to music yet transcendent of a > specific discipline. > > The structure of our workshops included the concept of a "Power Piece". A > power piece is a melody or a song that is taught because it is powerful and > becomes more powerful as it is taught. Children took phrases of some > familiar music as a basis of exploring and manipulating the music through > programming. > > As a result of feedback from the workshops, I have made a number of > improvements to Music Blocks [4]. It is much more robust and internally > consistent. Please do try it (there is a guide at [5]) and give me > additional feedback.' > > [4] https://walterbender.github.io/musicblocks > [5] > https://github.com/walterbender/musicblocks/blob/master/guide/README.md > > A postscript from March 25: > > '3. Devin Ulibarri and I had the opportunity to speak at LibrePlanet [2]. > Our topic was "Education needs Free/Libre Software needs education." [3] > > <blockquote>ABSTRACT: The bad news is that educational technology has > largely failed to deliver on its promise. Its focus on efficiency rather > than on learning has resulted in a further reinforcement of education as a > system of instruction to curricula rather than one of student-driven > construction of knowledge. > > The good news is that Free/Libre Software is the starting point towards a > solution&emdash;not just because it tends to focus on putting powerful > tools into the hands of its end-users, but also because Free/Libre Software > espouses a culture of doing and sharing in a context of critique, > reflection, and personal responsibility. > > In this session, we will review some tangible ways in which Free/Libre > Software is having and can have a positive impact on education and some > things we can and should be doing better. We will then discuss strategies > for advocating for Free/Libre Software in education systems both in the US > and globally. The next generation of computer users are in school today. We > need to ensure that the next generation is empowered to take advantage of > the opportunities afforded by Free/Libre Software.</blockquote> > > Unlike the session on Free/Libre Software at EdFoo, which was sparsely > attended, there was standing-room only for our session. The recording > should be on line within a few weeks. > > It occured to me afterwards that one simple call to action would be for > every member of the Free/Libre Software community to adopt a teacher (or be > open to being adopted, e.g., Devin, a music teacher, has adopted me). We > need to make our voices heard.' > > [2] https://libreplanet.org/2016/ > [3] > https://wiki.sugarlabs.org/images/c/c7/Education-needs-free-software.pdf > > Who can help Walter/Devin turn the above into more colorful (better yet > musical) blog post(s) that appear at http://planet.sugarlabs.org if not > beyond, to Lead Us Forward? > > -- > Unsung Heroes of OLPC, interviewed live @ http://unleashkids.org ! > > -- > Unsung Heroes of OLPC, interviewed live @ http://unleashkids.org ! >
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