rob:<br><div style="margin-left: 40px;">
meanwhile school maths seems a formulaic, excessively abstract thing;<br></div><br>there's an amazing critique of school maths circulating at the moment called Lockhart's lament<br><a href="http://www.maa.org/devlin/devlin_03_08.html">http://www.maa.org/devlin/devlin_03_08.html</a> (pdf 25pp)<br>
<br><div style="margin-left: 40px;">"This beautifully written lament takes some powerful swipes at school
maths, textbooks, our suppression of the drama of maths history, our
collective cultural ignorance of maths (we think we know but we don't)
and supplies some great examples of real maths teaching (the triangle
in a box problem, the sum and difference of two numbers problem)"<br>- <a href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2008/03/what-is-maths-paul-lockharts-simplicio.html">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2008/03/what-is-maths-paul-lockharts-simplicio.html</a><br>
</div><br>Computers are not mentioned in this critique but Rob's brilliant idea of combining line rider with cartesian graphing would be another way of addressing this issue<br><br>If a project can be a game as well so much the better - but some games have game overhead issues that are not particularly educational. There is overlap b/w projects and games but they are not the same thing. Scratch is about projects but nevertheless the game tag is very large on the scratch site.<br>
<a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">http://scratch.mit.edu/</a><br><br>One problem with gamemaker is that through its name and design the almost irresistible agenda becomes "make a game" - well what if that is not what the educational leader wants to do at that particular time?<br>
<br>btw I liked the comment from the girl who "seemed suspicious that maths was generally useless and I was making this up" - it seems possible that she might be in the process of changing her mind about the nature of maths<br>
<br>Scratch does not have text processing - there is a good summary of its strengths and weaknesses here (along with some other programming languages):<br><a href="http://livingcode.org/2008/the-importance-of-visual-programming">http://livingcode.org/2008/the-importance-of-visual-programming</a><br>
<br><div style="margin-left: 40px;">"It also has some pretty severe limitations: no user-defined blocks, no
return values, no file interaction (so no high scores), no network
interaction, no dynamic object creation, the program cannot draw on
sprites (only on the background), no string variables or any real
string handling. It is a great environment for learning to think
creatively within its constraints, but my kids also bump up against its
limits pretty quickly."<br></div><br><br>-- <br>Bill Kerr<br><a href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/</a><br><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Mar 6, 2008 at 1:20 PM, Costello, Rob R <<a href="mailto:Costello.Rob.R@edumail.vic.gov.au">Costello.Rob.R@edumail.vic.gov.au</a>> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">What of LineRider - game or project ?<br>
<br>
As experienced, looks like pure game, but written as project by a<br>
student<br>
<br>
"This is a project i did for illustration class.<br>
Its not a game, its a toy. What i mean is there are no goals to achive<br>
and there is no score."<br>
<a href="http://fsk.deviantart.com/art/Line-Rider-beta-40255643" target="_blank">http://fsk.deviantart.com/art/Line-Rider-beta-40255643</a><br>
<br>
<br>
And the site it comes form is full of art experiments<br>
<a href="http://fsk.deviantart.com/" target="_blank">http://fsk.deviantart.com/</a><br>
<br>
how would you classify an equation visualiser being added in?<br>
( <a href="http://www.thinkingcurriculum.com/thoughts/" target="_blank">http://www.thinkingcurriculum.com/thoughts/</a> )<br>
<br>
One student said, in year 8 impulsive manner, when he first saw it, it<br>
"spoilt the game"<br>
<br>
I said to students that the person who originally made LineRider was<br>
good at maths and I was trying to help them see that<br>
<br>
How do you know that? asked one girl (seemed suspicious that maths was<br>
generally useless and I was making this up)<br>
<br>
We opened up the flash files and we looked at some of the functions in<br>
LineRider- functions for calculating length of line segments etc - not<br>
far off what they're (meant to be) doing at yr 8<br>
<br>
re, the appeal of Art / programming - I'd like to decompile these<br>
<a href="http://www.levitated.net/gravityIndex.html" target="_blank">http://www.levitated.net/gravityIndex.html</a> and show where the maths is<br>
<br>
the issues I see here are access and cross disciplinary approaches - not<br>
much point doing this if we can't spend the time playing and<br>
experimenting - could teach a whole course this way I think<br>
<br>
meanwhile school maths seems a formulaic, excessively abstract thing;<br>
how did we get to the point where its not mixed with science or<br>
technology or ICT - (ie this sort of ICT) approach?<br>
<br>
Not saying Flash is the way - actionscript syntax might be a bit of an<br>
obstacle - but maybe ..... I think it needs something that allows<br>
program to can be language as well as concrete symbol/icon -<br>
<br>
can Scratch do language?<br>
<br>
Cheers<br>
Rob<br>
<br>
------------------------------------------------------------------------<br>
--------<br>
<div class="Ih2E3d"><br>
I have to agree with you Bill. This year I am going to guide students<br>
towards projects with a broader perspective, ala "create something that<br>
will<br>
make the world a better place to live in".<br>
<br>
Last week I have some year 10 IT girls that are exploring the<br>
construction<br>
of a creative dance type solution using Scratch. (Starting from the<br>
handy<br>
worksheet that you so kindly shared on this list! Thankyou :-) Whilst<br>
some<br>
didn't like their work, perhaps because it lacked the gaming elements<br>
that<br>
others were building. A couple of us spotted the more creative, art<br>
installation that these girls were trying to program.<br>
<br>
Regards Roland<br>
<br>
</div><div class="Ih2E3d">On 18/02/2008, Bill Kerr <billkerr at <a href="http://gmail.com" target="_blank">gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
><br>
> I think it's better that we ask our students to create projects rather<br>
> than games<br>
><br>
> This represents a trade off between motivation (games are more<br>
motivating<br>
> for some) and a curriculum based more on educational principles<br>
><br>
> more ...<br>
> <a href="http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2008/02/projects-or-games.html" target="_blank">http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2008/02/projects-or-games.html</a><br>
><br>
> --<br>
> Bill Kerr<br>
><br>
<br>
<br>
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