Re: [xmca] Direct Instruction: observations at Djarragun college, Cape York, Australia

[Bill Kerr <billkerr@gmail.com>]

Michael Glassman:
"I don't think you can think of it as a continuum.  Legos were simply not
designed for instruction and they don't work in terms of instruction."

Nice point. I have used LEGO with disadvantaged kids and the best thing was
to just model it. ie. start building myself and having fun, they all joined
in of course.

Makes me think that I have to look closer at the nature of my alleged
continuum. I think the Dennett reference addresses this, see  my reply to
Helen. We import representation of tools into our inner environment. I also
remember an essay by Doug Hofstadter on the nature of creativity:
Variations on a Theme  as the Crux of Creativity, in his book Metamagical
Themas. I think such a continuum could be constructed even though it might
end up looking a bit crooked!

On Sat, May 12, 2012 at 10:26 AM, Michael Glassman <MGlassman@ehe.osu.edu>wrote:

> Hi Bill and Huw,
>
> I think you need to think of Lego toys which is the concrete manifestation
> of the Logo program (which I think is a primary reason Logo is so well
> remembered - well that and it was the impetus for the personal computer).
>  If you put down Legos in front of a child you sort of lose their - what -
> valence?  affordances? if you ask the child to somehow logically put them
> together.  In that case they are just multi-colored Lincoln logs.  Children
> tend to really experience Legos when the design of whatever they are
> building emerges from the activity.  The pictures on the front of the boxes
> get parents to buy them, but that is not at all what the children are
> interested in (to the frustration of parents who believe they are going to
> have this great pirate fort, which they wind up building themselves while
> the child goes and plays with an empty box).  The same is true of
> instruction - it just loses the purpose of Legos and annoys the hell out of
> the child (if it didn't we would have Lego classes everywhere with parents
> bribing teachers to get in).  I don't think you can think of it as a
> continuum.  Legos were simply not designed for instruction and they don't
> work in terms of instruction.
>
> Michael
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu on behalf of Bill Kerr
> Sent: Fri 5/11/2012 8:41 PM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Subject: Re: [xmca] Direct Instruction: observations at Djarragun
> college,Cape York, Australia
>
>
>
> Huw Lloyd:
>
> > Seymour Papert drew attention to these systemic issues in "The Children's
> > Machine": the isolation of computing in schools as a means to prevent the
> > curriculum's remediation.  The book is a mature revision of his original
> > efforts.
> >
>
> I recently reread Ch 8: Computerists. It says:
>
> In Artificial Intelligence (AI), my work with Marvin Minsky struggle
> against "logic" as the basis of reasoning and against all forms of
> "particulate" and "propositional" representation of knowledge (165)
>
>
> I thought this struggle against was too strongly put. It's not really
> dialectical, there needs to be some sort of interpenetration b/w logic and
> relationship. Note also the heading to chapter 7: Instructionism versus
> Constructionism. Why versus? It is better to look at the interplay b/w
> instructionism and constructionism.
>
> I then went back to Minsky's book Society of Mind and reread his Ch 18:
> Reasoning. He makes the case there that common sense is more robust than
> logic. But I didn't get the same sense of either / or that creeps into
> Papert's book.
>
> My own experience in teaching disadvantaged students was that it was better
> for the teacher to walk the whole continuum - all the way down to
> behaviourism and all the way up to constructionism.
>
> Papert is a beautiful writer but not all of his arguments are valid IMO,
> although many of them are.
>
>
> On Fri, May 11, 2012 at 9:33 AM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> > On 10 May 2012 10:02, Bill Kerr <billkerr@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > On Thu, May 10, 2012 at 8:26 AM, Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com
> > > >wrote:
> > >
> > > > As I understand it view points research (Papert, Kay and others) are
> or
> > > > were involved in ways to scale teaching approaches (presumably
> > > > constructionist teaching approaches).
> > > >
> > > > Yes and that has continued with the one laptop per child project
> (OLPC)
> > > as
> > > well. But Alan Kay has pointed out
> > > (a) most teachers don't understand the ideas behind logo (or etoys)
> > deeply
> > > enough
> > >
> > > *Q: What have you found to be the greatest obstacle in your work?*
> > > A: I think the most difficult part is helping the helpers. Logo was a
> > great
> > > idea and it failed. It didn't fail because computers couldn't do Logo,
> > and
> > > it didn't fail because Logo software was bad. It failed because the
> > second
> > > and third waves of teachers were not interested in it as a new thing,
> and
> > > virtually none of them understood anything about mathematics or
> science.
> > > It's very hard to teach Logo well if you don't know math. ...
> > > http://www.squeakland.org/resources/articles/article.jsp?id=1004
> > >
> > >
> > In the history of attempted pedagogic ideas I think it had a good many
> > successes.  If it was a real failure we wouldn't know about it.  There
> are
> > plenty of ecological circumstances to explore too with respect to the
> > survival or regeneration of these projects, such as Mike's ruminations in
> > Cultural Psychology.
> >
> >
>
> > Seymour Papert drew attention to these systemic issues in "The Children's
> > Machine": the isolation of computing in schools as a means to prevent the
> > curriculum's remediation.  The book is a mature revision of his original
> > efforts.
> >
> >
> > >
> > > (b)  no one has yet developed a computer user interface that  could
> teach
> > > children to read in their native language
> > >
> >
> > It's an interesting thought experiment, but why is it necessary?
> >
> > In terms of a constructionist frame, reading would be something that one
> > does as part of a personally desired activity.  Reading about how, what,
> or
> > why for instance.  Having an online computer facilitates that.
> >
> > [...]
> >
> > It is considerations such as these that has caused me to look beyond the
> > > OLPC to a method that would work with the most disadvantaged group in
> > > Australia.
> > >
> >
> > Personally I wouldn't go anywhere near uptake without addressing
> question 1
> > below.  Q2 is more of an aside.
> >
> > 1.  What kinds of communication and development can take place?  What
> else
> > is being communicated?  Is it really to their advantage?
> >
> > 2.  How much of DI is an effort to realise a particular temperamental
> > (semiotically derived) preference (and therefore blindness)?  The
> > wishfulness of "direct" seems quite strong and there are plenty of traps
> > that Zig looked like he was flirting with in the video I watched.
> >
> > Thanks for the good posts, Bill.  I hope this is an additive.
> > Huw
> >
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