Looking for a defined path to learn Rev (for new users)

[Jim Bufalini]

Hi Judy,

Your points are all well taken and true - for kids. But if you read
Alejandro's original post, you will see that he is designing a course
outline for his fellow teachers who already program in more traditional
language(s), which one or ones I don't know, and he is wanting to "convert"
them over to rev. This is the issue I was addressing and why I talked about
the importance of addressing the paradigm shift first.

Aloha from Hawaii,

Jim Bufalini



> 
> On Thu, 19 Nov 2009, Jim Bufalini wrote:
> > It seems to me that your are trying to lead horses to water, who are
> neither
> > thirsty nor want to drink. ;-)
> 
> But the staggering amount of public funds that have been dumped into
> computers in the classroom requires that they really ought to either
> get
> thirsty really quickly or be force-fed the water.
> 
> Here's a sad, sobering read:
> 
> http://www.hull.ac.uk/php/edskas/Cuban%20article%20-%20oversold.pdf
> 
> Yes, it was written some time ago, but I've not really seen any studies
> that indicate that things have changed for the better.  In my
> children's 4
> years in the public school system, there were a number of computers
> present in each classroom.  Mostly they never got used.  Or, if they
> did
> get used, it was for something completely stupid, like reading a story
> online.  My niece and nephew, in the third grade, were required to use
> PowerPoint to present their vocabulary and spelling words.  Yet another
> stupid use of computers in education.  I've seen school district
> technology implementation plans for using computers to teach math --
> how?
> Have the students type up word problems and type up the answers.  DUMB
> DUMB DUMB!
> 
> Or, in the case of I believe it may have been LA Unified, they
> forced the kids to use math education software that was SO BAD that
> hundreds of math educators and mathematicians signed an online petition
> saying that it was the worst educational software they'd ever seen.
> So,
> why was the school using it?  It had been somebody's pet project and
> the
> district was threatened with the loss of NSF funds if they didn't use
> the
> software, which the NSF had underwritten.
> 
> My children's first grade teacher, when I asked her about the computers
> (she's the one who had them reading stories online), and I made a joke
> about PowerPoint, her response was "gee, I wish I knew how to do that
> in
> class!"  I wanted to weep.  PowerPoint.  For 6 year olds.  When there
> was
> so much more that was possible to do with computers in education MORE
> THAN
> TWENTY YEARS AGO.
> 
> > But you raise an interesting point. We talk about the world embracing
> > revTalk and revlets because the language is so easy. And, indeed it
> is. But,
> > when I think back to when I first found rev, the major paradigm shift
> was
> > not the language, but the concept of stacks and cards and how this
> equated
> > to a windowed GUI. And, had I not had 15 years of extensive
> programming
> > experience in another rev, called Revelation, which is PICK on the PC
> and
> > which is very, very similar to rev in that it is a scripting language
> with
> > chunks, no variable typing, compiling is at the individual script
> level, so
> > you run and program at the same time, and many, many other
> similarities, I
> > would have also probably had to go through a paradigm shift with the
> concept
> > of chunks and where to put or organize scripts.
> 
> --And, of course, this is exactly why it is perhaps a better audience
> for
> using this particular program, because cards and stacks of cards are
> things they already understand from the real world whereas typed data
> and
> where to put your semi-colons and how to indent your curlicue brackets
> are
> not.  They have no pre-existing models by which to be confounded.
> 
> > The leap is in the structure and not the language. So while I think
> your
> > "course outline" rightfully starts out with stacks and cards, I
> think, more
> > than how to create, the focus in the beginning needs to be on the
> "theory"
> > of stacks and cards and how these equate to the structures they are
> already
> > familiar with.
> 
> --That would be none.  And none is a good thing ;-)
> 
> > Next, needs to be the theory of chunks and variables and then
> followed by
> > theory of scripting and where to place blocks of code and what makes
> this
> > all work or ties it all together, which is the message path. Also,
> before
> > you get into objects you need o cover the theory behind commands and
> > functions and how, in general, scripts are organized.
> 
> --At this point, they've either run screaming to the hills to fire up
> PowerPoint or their eyes are glazed over or they're asleep.
> Guaranteed.
> They need short, sweet project-based learning that allows them to
> immediately begin using whatever little they've learned to date.
> 
> > I think without making this paradigm shift first, a programmer used
> to top
> > down or OOP programming will just feel like a stranger in a strange
> land and
> > will not "hear" your lessons on buttons and fields because he will be
> > sitting there still trying to get his bearings. So, I think you need
> focus
> > on the lay of the land first. Once a programmer has this down pat,
> the rest
> > is easy and almost doesn't have to be taught because there is so much
> > documentation that can easily be looked up for syntax and details.
> 
> --Here's the problem:  Teachers do not want to be turned into
> programmers.
> Who cares if they do in 15 lines what you'd do in 3?  Admire your
> elegantly-crafted 3 lines, certainly.  Laugh at my 20, certainly (well,
> okay, laugh discretely).  But, at the end of the day, I'm pleased that
> I
> *can* make little things that help my children.  They don't care how
> many
> lines it took ;-)  And there's no reason why kids in the classroom
> should
> care either, as long as it works and meets some need.
> 
> Judy
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