Changes

=== Sugar Digest ===

=== Sugar Digest ===

1. Collect, Select, Reflect: I had a timely visit from Prof. Evangeline Harris Stefanakis this week. Stefanakis is the author of <i>Multiple Intelligences and Portfolios: a Window into the Learner's Mind</i>. We met to discuss ways in which we could further the support for portfolio assessment within the context of a Sugar deployment. Some of her observations include that a portfolio is not just a collection of work, but also a way of organizing that work into a presentation. (Note the obvious connection to the heated discussions on narrative and the Journal/datastore.) We discussed a number of simple scaffolds that we could add either directly to the Journal or build into a Portfolio Activity, for example, the inclusion of a "who am I?" section, where the learner is prompted to describe who they are across a multitude of prespectives: who am I as a linguist... as an artist... as a friend... We also discussed how we could enhance the use of tags by prompting the learner when their work is saved: What did you do? How did you do it? What did you learn? Is it portfolio worthy? Providing some structure—with multiple entry-points—helps bootstrap the portfolio process. We should consider different structures for different levels of development within the early, elementary, and middle-school years. A "Madlibs"-like format—that can be reauthored by a teacher or student—may be a reasonable place to start. Also, a scaffolding that encourages periodic review would also be beneficial to the learner. We plan to come up with a more tangible set of design criteria in the coming weeks. But it is helpful to discuss the Journal as a tool for reflection, not just as a replacement for the file system.

1. Collect, Select, Reflect: I had a timely visit from Prof. Evangeline Harris Stefanakis this week. Stefanakis is the author of <i>Multiple Intelligences and Portfolios: a Window into the Learner's Mind</i>. We met to discuss ways in which we could further the support for portfolio assessment within the context of a Sugar deployment. Some of her observations include that a portfolio is not just a collection of work, but also a way of organizing that work into a presentation. (Note the obvious connection to the heated discussions on narrative and the Journal/datastore.) We discussed a number of simple scaffolds that we could add either directly to the Journal or build into a Portfolio Activity, for example, the inclusion of a "who am I?" section, where the learner is prompted to describe who they are across a multitude of perspectives: who am I as a linguist... as an artist... as a friend... We also discussed how we could enhance the use of tags by prompting the learner when their work is saved: What did you do? How did you do it? What did you learn? Is it portfolio worthy? Providing some structure—with multiple entry-points—helps bootstrap the portfolio process. We should consider different structures for different levels of development within the early, elementary, and middle-school years. A "Madlibs"-like format—that can be reauthored by a teacher or student—may be a reasonable place to start. Also, a scaffolding that encourages periodic review would also be beneficial to the learner. We plan to come up with a more tangible set of design criteria in the coming weeks. But it is helpful to discuss the Journal as a tool for reflection, not just as a replacement for the file system.

2. LiveCD/LiveUSB updates: Carolyn Meeks and Marco Pesenti Gritti continue to work on improvements to the bootable Sugar USB. Marco has a new Fedora-based LiveCD image (http://www.sugarlabs.org/~marco/sugar-livecd-1marco.iso) and is working on a CD that will launch a USB image (since many older machines are not configured by default to boot off of a USB drive). Sebatian Dziallas and Luke Macken have created an updated version of the Fedora/Sugar LiveCD (http://sdz.fedorapeople.org/olpc/sugar-spin.iso_ and has made a LiveUSB creator available (http://sdz.fedorapeople.org/olpc/liveusb-creator-3.0.zip)—you can run liveusb-creator on Windows XP to generate the latest Sugar spin on a USB key. Meanwhile, Carolyn continues to visit schools, testing builds, and gathering data as to the best ways to do simple, low-risk Sugar deployments in schools without the resources to buy dedicated laptops.

2. LiveCD/LiveUSB updates: Carolyn Meeks and Marco Pesenti Gritti continue to work on improvements to the bootable Sugar USB. Marco has a new Fedora-based LiveCD image (http://www.sugarlabs.org/~marco/sugar-livecd-1marco.iso) and is working on a CD that will launch a USB image (since many older machines are not configured by default to boot off of a USB drive). Sebatian Dziallas and Luke Macken have created an updated version of the Fedora/Sugar LiveCD (http://sdz.fedorapeople.org/olpc/sugar-spin.iso_ and has made a LiveUSB creator available (http://sdz.fedorapeople.org/olpc/liveusb-creator-3.0.zip)—you can run liveusb-creator on Windows XP to generate the latest Sugar spin on a USB key. Meanwhile, Carolyn continues to visit schools, testing builds, and gathering data as to the best ways to do simple, low-risk Sugar deployments in schools without the resources to buy dedicated laptops.