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This page is updated each week (usually on Monday morning) with notes from the Sugar Labs community. (The digest is also sent to the community-news at sugarlabs.org list, blogged at walterbender.org, and archived here.) If you would like to contribute, please send email to walter at sugarlabs.org by the weekend. (Also visit planet.sugarlabs.org.)
Sugar Digest
1. I mostly look forward rather than back, so it is not often that I think about my time at the MIT Media Lab. But I had three occasions to think about it in the past week. I joined Yumi Mori and Toshi Takasaki in Tokyo last week to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Pangaea, a project they started while I was director of the lab. I met some old friends, including K. Nishi, a pioneer in electronic publishing and Bernie Kirsher, who started the rural school program in Cambodia that was the catalyst for our founding One Laptop per Child program. Next, I gave a lecture at Kyoto University at the launch event of a new research program meant to bring Japanese industry and the university's design school together. I dusted off an old presentation, The Seven Secrets of the Media Lab and then went on to describe how the same principles of design apply to Sugar: the foundation for learning is the same, whether you are 8 or 80. Finally, I was reminiscing with John Maeda, president of RSID and former colleague at MIT, about Jerome Wiesner. Jerry was the true visionary behind all of the programs in the arts at MIT, a proponent of "STEAM" rather than STEM [ 1, 2 ] since the 1960s. Jerry's one-sentence mission statement for the Media Lab, still has relevance:
"Technology in support of learning and expression by people and machines"
2. In anticipation of next week's events in Paraguay (See items 3 and 4 below), I wrote a short manifesto about learning. Claudia Urrea will be fleshing it out with me, but I include a rough draft here:
"A good reason that kids should learn to paint, compose, play music, act *and* program computers is that each form of expression require deep commitment, careful thought, reflection, sensitivity to external and often unanticipated stimuli *and* build upon a young person's remarkable capacity for intensity. They also allow a kid to spend intense periods of time inside of their own head." -- Gary Stager
Motivation is a key factor in education: how do we motivate children to learn and how do the mechanisms of motivation impact how and what children learn. Typical of most schools is the use of "carrots and sticks" (rewards and punishment, in the form of grades, stickers, and stars, and, in some places, literally the stick in the form of corporal punishment). This approach results in children learning to be adept at avoiding the stick, keeping their heads down, reciting the correct answers. Creativity and intellectual risk-taking are drilled out of them, as is the love of learning. An alternative approach, grounded in the literature, is to use autonomy, mastery, and a sense of purpose as motivators: children become practitioners of creative problem-solving, on the path to entrepreneurial pursuits.
In the early 1960s, while studying with Jean Piaget, Seymour Papert had the insight that computation was a "thing to think with". He and his colleagues created Logo -- the first programming language for children -- in order to bring computational thinking to schools. (Early versions of Logo controlled a robot that raised and lowered a pen as it moved forward, left, and right on the floor. This robot resembled a turtle; consequently the turtle became synonymous with Logo.) For the next 40 years, Papert and his colleagues at MIT explored the use of Logo (and other tools) while developing a pedagogy that combined computation, personal expression, and authentic problem-solving in pilot programs around the world. Many of these pilots involved 1-to-1 computing, in order to ensure that the computer could be used as readily as a pencil by each child, in exploring and expressing. (As early as the 1980s, we were doing 1-to-1 computing in Senegal, Pakistan, and Colombia.)
In 2005, a team of researchers from MIT founded the One Laptop per Child program in an effort to provide every child with the opportunity to engage in the pedagogy of computational thinking. We pioneered the development of low-cost hardware for computation, sensors, and a durable form-factor suitable for both classroom and beyond-the-classroom exploration. We coupled the hardware with software that provides the scaffolding needed to encourage children and teachers to "imagine and realize" and "critique and reflect" upon their creations. Central to this effort is programming: Turtle Art, Scratch, Etoys, and other programming environments are made freely available to every child. Our goal is not to raise a generation of computer scientists, but rather, a generation of children who are comfortable with the discipline of computational thinking and able to apply this discipline to problem-solving in a wide range of domains: children who can invent their own future.
An important characteristic of the tools we provide is that they are not black boxes: children are free to delve deeply into the tools, see how they work, and even modify them. We do this by utilizing free and open-source software (FOSS), AKA Software Libre. We provide the license to use and modify the tools. We also provide the necessary scaffolding to enable them to make use of this license. Children are given the opportunity to make their own tools. With this opportunity comes a sense of ownership and responsibility. Thus we immerse children in a culture that values autonomy, mastery, and a sense of purpose.
We have been working in Paraguay in collaboration with Paraguay Educa and colleagues at ANU since 2007. Here we have found a community of educators well versed in the pedagogy of contructionism. They have had positive and pronounced impact on how computation is used in the classroom and in extra-curricular activities that has had far reach. We have also found talented practitioners. (An example of the quality of their efforts is Dextrose, a branch of our Sugar learning platform, which was conceived and developed in Paraguay and is used by more than 500000 children in Uruguay, Australia, Nepal, etc.) And we have also seen creativity in the teachers we work with in Caacupé. In the course of our collaboration, they have demonstrated not just the ability to apply our tools, but also to invent new ones, e.g., the Caacupé Abacus.
Looking ahead, in order to bring computational thinking to all the children of Paraguay, we need to: (1) provide Guarani language support (Sugar and Turtle Art are easily translated -- learning in one's first language has demonstrable impact); (2) adapt to local culture (both in terms of content and pedagogy); and (3) rethink the mechanisms we use to motivate children to become active and expressive in their learning. Together we also need to create a space of growth for the remarkable learning community in Paraguay so that they can make a difference in Paraguay, and consequently have a reason to stay in Paraguay. Together, we will raise a generation of problem-solvers; confident that they can be entrepreneurial; inventing the future Paraguay.
3. International Turtle Art Day will be on October 12. Pacita Peña and Cecilia Alcala will be hosting an event in Caacupé and there will be other events around the world sharing ideas and resources. Brian Silverman and Artemis Papert will be featured guests. There are guides to holding a Turtle Art Day event available in English and Spanish. (Tip of the hat to Claudia Urrea, who has led this effort.)
4. Another Turtle Art Day event will be held on October 15 in Montevideo, organized by José Miguel García. Details soon. We also have a Turtle Art Day planned for Malacca on November 16.
5. From 10-13 October, there will be an EduJam!, in Asunción. On the 13th, we will hold a hack-a-thon, and hopefully make some headway on some of the open issues with Sugar on Android. We will also take advantage of the occasion of so many Sugar oversight board members (Gonzalo, Claudia, and me) in one place to hold a SLOB meeting (on Sunday morning).
Tech Talk
6. We are wrapping up Sugar 100 and need all hands helping with both closing a few outstanding tickets and helping with testing. Gonzalo has prepared a new image (Fedora 18) for OLPC AU that can be used for testing in XO-4 hardware.
Sugar Labs
7. Please visit (and contribute to) our planet.
An archive of this digest is available.
Planet
The Sugar Labs Planet is found here.
Sugar in the news
| 14 Aug 2013 |
ABC Color – Programar ayuda a los niños a pensar
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| 08 Aug 2013 |
News1 – Interview with former MIT Media Lab director (in Korean)
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| 12 Jul 2013 |
RIT – ‘Sky Time’ video game selected for White House Champions of Change event July 23
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| 28 Apr 2013 |
BBC Mundo – Los programadores adolescentes premiados por Google
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| 07 Feb 2013 |
el Neuvo Herald – Joven uruguayo brilla como programador y es distinguido por Google
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| 06 Feb 2013 |
el Observador – Joven uruguayo gana la competencia Google Code (Also see GCI press interviews)
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| 07 Sep 2012 |
NDTV – One Laptop Per Child initiative a hit in rural India
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| 08 Jul 2012 |
Estado de S. Paulo – Para educar
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| 24 Apr 2012 |
Pacific Standard – OLPC Redux
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| 12 Apr 2012 |
Huffington Post – Hult Global Case Challenge: One Laptop Per Child
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| 30 Mar 2012 |
newswise – “Sugar on a Stick” Helps Kids Learn How to Learn
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| 11 Jan 2012 |
Boston Herald – One Laptop Per Child screening $100 tablet
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| 10 Jan 2012 |
ars technica – Crank, bicycle, and waterwheel: hands-on with the OLPC XO 3.0 tablet
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| 08 Jan 2012 |
The Verge – OLPC XO 3.0 tablet preview: impressions, video, and pictures
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| 07 Jan 2012 |
The Verge – OLPC XO 3.0 tablet: an 8-inch tablet for $100, with Android and Sugar options for the children
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| 23 Dec 2011 |
Miller-McCune – One Laptop Per Child Redux
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| 18 Oct 2011 |
BDU – Robotics in Uruguay (video)
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| 11 Aug 2011 |
Berlin.de – Gewinner des Berliner Landeswettbewerbs zu Open Source stehen fest
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| 25 Jul 2011 |
CCC Classic – Garmin-sugarlabs development cycling team at Crit starting line
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| 25 Jul 2011 |
CCC Classic – Garmin-sugarlabs development cycling team after Crit
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| 13 Apr 2011 |
framablog – L'expérience Sugar Labs préfigure-t-elle une révolution éducative du XXIe siècle?
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| 05 Apr 2011 |
Businesswire – The Government of Peru Expands the One Laptop Per Child Program with Local Manufacturing
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| 31 Jan 2011 |
Sundance – A Day in the Life – Peru
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| 01 Dec 2010 |
velonation – Sugar Labs to back Garmin-Cervelo’s development team in unique arrangement
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| 28 Oct 2010 |
UCR – Nuevas tecnologías deben estar al alcance de todos los niños y niñas
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| 05 Oct 2010 |
xconomy – One Ecosystem per Child
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| 08 Sep 2010 |
FLOSS Weekly – Sugar Labs
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| 09 Aug 2010 |
ABC digital – Indicadores constatan el impacto positivo en el aprendizaje de niños
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| 23 Jun 2010 |
ABC digital – Xo para todas las escuelas de Caacupé
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| 21 Jun 2010 |
La Nacion – “Buscamos que los niños no solo usen softwares, sino que puedan crear uno”
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| 20 Jun 2010 |
UltimaHora.com – La laptop une a padres, alumnos y docentes
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| 15 Jun 2010 |
The H – OLPC XO-1.5 software updated
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| 10 Jun 2010 |
engadget – Sugar on a Stick hits 3.0, teaches us about a new kind of fruit
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| 27 May 2010 |
Pro Linux DE – Sugar on a Stick v3 freigegeben (German)
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| 27 May 2010 |
NY Times – One Laptop Per Child Project Works With Marvell to Produce a $100 Tablet
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| 27 May 2010 |
PC World – OLPC Rules out Windows for XO-3
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| 03 May 2010 |
WXXI: Mixed Media – Interview with Walter Bender (audio)
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| 03 May 2010 |
Linux Magazine – OLPC Computers for Palestinian Refugee Children
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| 14 Apr 2010 |
National Science Foundation – XO Laptops Inspire Learning In Birmingham, Alabama (video)
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| 02 Apr 2010 |
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| 15 Mar 2010 |
nbc13.com – Birmingham City students opt to spend spring break in class, XO computer camps (video)
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| 18 Feb 2010 |
LWN – Karma targets easier creation of educational software
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| 05 Feb 2010 |
iprofesional – La PC barata de Negroponte desembarca en la Argentina para pelear contra Intel
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| 14 Jan 2010 |
AALF – Open Systems for Broader Change
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| 03 Jan 2010 |
Educacion 2.0 – PLAN CEIBAL, El Libro
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| 14 Dec 2009 |
xconomy – Sugar gets sweeter
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| 10 Dec 2009 |
ars technica – Sugar software environment gets sweeter with version 2
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| 09 Dec 2009 |
Wired – New Sugar on a Stick Brings Much Needed Improvements
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| 08 Dec 2009 |
engadget – Sugar on a Stick OS goes to 2.0, gets Blueberry coating and creamy Fedora 12 center (video)
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| 07 Dec 2009 |
Teleread.org – Sugar on a Stick: What it means for e-books and education
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| 27 Nov 2009 |
CNET Japan – 「コードを見せて、もっと良くなるよ」と言える子どもが生まれる--Sugar Labsが描く未来
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| 16 Nov 2009 |
zanichelli – software libero a scuola
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| 12 Nov 2009 |
opensuse.org – openSUSE 11.2 Released
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| 07 Nov 2009 |
My Broadband News – Mandriva 2010 packs a punch [and Sugar]
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| 06 Nov 2009 |
GhanaWeb – Open education and an IT-enabled economic growth in Ghana: Musings of a dutiful citizen
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| 26 Oct 2009 |
Linux Magazine ES – Software Libre como apoyo al aprendizaje
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| 09 Oct 2009 |
interdisciplines – OLPC and Sugar: mobility through the community
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| 08 Oct 2009 |
IBM developerWorks – 10 important Linux developments everyone should know about
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| 01 Oct 2009 |
OLPC France – Interview Walter Bender au SugarCamp
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| 25 Sep 2009 |
The Inquirer – One Laptop per Child marches on
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| 18 Sep 2009 |
Groklaw – The Role of Free Software in Education
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| 18 Sep 2009 |
Reuters – Sugar Labs and Free Software Foundation Celebrate Software Freedom Day
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| 17 Sep 2009 |
ICTDev.org – Dream Again with One Laptop per Child
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| 26 Aug 2009 |
Latinux – Azúcar en una memoria USB
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| 03 Aug 2009 |
Wired: Geek Dad – Inventing a New Paradigm: SugarLabs and the Sugar UI
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| 30 Jul 2009 |
Zanichelli – Sugar on a Stick: imparare insieme
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| 23 Jul 2009 |
Everything USB – RecycleUSB.com - Donate your Flash Drives for a Good Cause
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| 22 Jul 2009 |
OLPC France – Sugar : mauvaise presse et mise au point
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| 13 Jul 2009 |
Spiegel Online – Das zuckersüße Leichtbau-Linux
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| 07 Jul 2009 |
ComputerWorldUK – Gran Canaria Desktop Summit: a Study in Contrasts
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| 06 Jul 2009 |
Windows Forest – USBメモリなどから“OLPC”用のOSを利用できる「Sugar on a Stick」が無償公開
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| 02 Jul 2009 |
Howard County Library – Sugar on a Stick
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| 27 Jun 2009 |
Deutschlandfunk – Süßes für die Kleinen: Sugar ist Linux speziell für Kinder (in Deutsch)
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| 26 Jun 2009 |
EduTech – Sugar on a stick, and other delectables (praise for the lowly USB drive)
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| 26 Jun 2009 |
ars technica – Sugar on a Stick brings sweet taste of Linux to classrooms
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| 24 Jun 2009 |
BBC – OLPC software to power aging PCs
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| 24 Jun 2009 |
Technology Review – $100 Laptop Becomes a $5 PC
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| 15 Jun 2009 |
TechSavvyKids – Episode 10 FOSSVT: Sugar on a Stick (audio)
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| 10 Jun 2009 |
LWN.net – Sugar moves from the shadow of OLPC
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| 27 May 2009 |
LWN.net – Activities and the move to context-oriented desktops (subscriber link)
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| 27 May 2009 |
Business Wire – Dailymotion Launches Support for Open Video Formats and Video HTML Tag
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| 01 May 2009 |
Guysoft – Nokia N810 Running OLPC Sugar
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| 29 Apr 2009 |
El Mercurio – Así se vivió la fiesta del software libre
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| 27 Apr 2009 |
ostatic – Sugar on a Stick: Good for Kids' Minds (and School Budgets)
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| 25 Apr 2009 |
Free Software Magazine – The Bittersweet Facts about OLPC and Sugar
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| 24 Apr 2009 |
ars technica – First taste: Sugar on a Stick learning platform
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| 22 Apr 2009 |
Betanews – Beta of Live USB Sugar OS opens
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| 27 Mar 2009 |
Mass High Tech – Google promotes summer open-source internships
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| 18 Mar 2009 |
Metropolis – A Good Argument
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| 16 Mar 2009 |
Laptop Magazine – Sugar Labs’ New Version of Sugar Learning Platform Is Netbook and PC Ready
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| 16 Mar 2009 |
Market Watch – Sugar Labs Nonprofit Announces New Version of Sugar Learning Platform for Children, Runs on Netbooks and PCs
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| 14 Feb 2009 |
OLPC Learning Club – DC – Learning Learning on a Stick
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| 05 Feb 2009 |
xconomy – Sugar Beyond the XO Laptop: Walter Bender on OLPC, Sucrose 0.84, and “Sugar on a Stick”
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| 26 Jan 2009 |
Linus Magazine – Sugar Defies OLPC Cutbacks
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| 19 Jan 2009 |
Feeding the Penguins – The status of Sugar, post-OLPC
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| 16 Jan 2009 |
OLPC News – Sugar on Acer Aspire One & Thin Client via LTSP
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| 12 Jan 2009 |
Bill Kerr – thoughts about olpc cutbacks
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| 07 Jan 2009 |
ars technica – OLPC downsizes half of its staff, cuts Sugar development
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| 06 Jan 2009 |
OLPC News – An Inside Look at how Microsoft got XP on the XO
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| 30 Dec 2008 |
OLPC News – Sugar Labs Status at Six Months
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| 22 Dec 2008 |
The GNOME Project – Sugar Labs, the nonprofit behind the OLPC software, is joining the GNOME Foundation
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| 16 Dec 2008 |
Feeding the Penguins – Sugar git repository change
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| 14 Dec 2008 |
NPR – Laptop Deal Links Rural Peru To Opportunity, Risk (Part 2)
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| 13 Dec 2008 |
NPR – Laptops May Change The Way Rural Peru Learns (Part 1)
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| 09 Dec 2008 |
SFC – Sugar Labs joins Conservancy
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| 31 Oct 2008 |
Linux Devices – An OLPC dilemma: Linux or Windows?
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| 10 Oct 2008 |
Feeding the Penguin – Sugar on Ubuntu
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| 21 Sep 2008 |
Groklaw – Interview with Walter Bender of Sugar Labs
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| 17 Sep 2008 |
Bill Kerr – Sugar Labs
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| 16 Sep 2008 |
Open Source – Sugar everywhere
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| 28 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – An answer to Walter Bender's question 22
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| 20 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – Sugarize it: Intel Classmate 2
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| 08 Aug 2008 |
Investor's Business Daily – 'Learning' Vs. Laptop Was Issue
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| 06 Aug 2008 |
OLPC News – Twenty-three Questions on Technology and Education
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| 18 Jul 2008 |
Bill Kerr – evaluating Sugar in the developed world
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| 28 Jun 2008 |
OLPC News – A Cutting Edge Sugar User Interface Demo
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| 18 Jun 2008 |
PC World – OLPC Spin-off Developing UI for Intel's Classmate PC
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| 17 Jun 2008 |
Datamation – If Business Succeeds with GNU/Linux, Why Not OLPC?
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| 11 Jun 2008 |
LinuxInsider – The Sweetness of Collaborative Learning
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| 06 Jun 2008 |
Bill Kerr – untangling Free, Sugar, and Constructionism
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| 06 Jun 2008 |
Open Education – Walter Bender Discusses Sugar Labs Foundation
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| 06 Jun 2008 |
BusinessWeek – OLPC: The Educational Philosophy Controversy
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| 05 Jun 2008 |
Code Culture – The Distraction Machine
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| 05 Jun 2008 |
BusinessWeek – OLPC: The Open-Source Controversy
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| 27 May 2008 |
The New York Times – Why Walter Bender Left One Laptop Per Child
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| 26 May 2008 |
ars technica – OLPC software maker splits from X0 hardware, goes solo
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| 22 May 2008 |
BetaNews – Linux start-up Sugar Labs in informal talks with four laptop makers
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| 16 May 2008 |
OSTATIC – OLPC's Open Source Sugar Platform Aims for New Hardware
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| 16 May 2008 |
PCWorld – Bender Forms Group to Promote OLPC's Sugar UI
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| 16 May 2008 |
MHT – Bender jumps from OLPC, founds Sugar Labs
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| 16 May 2008 |
News.com – Sugar Labs will make OLPC interface available for Eee PC, others
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| 16 May 2008 |
Feeding the Peguins – The future of Sugar
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| 16 May 2008 |
Sugar list – A few thoughts on SugarLabs
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| 16 May 2008 |
xconomy – Bender Creates Sugar Labs—New Foundation to Adapt OLPC’s Laptop Interface for Other Machines
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| 16 May 2008 |
BBC – '$100 laptop' platform moves on
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| 15 May 2008 |
OLPC wiki – Dual-boot XO Claim: OLPC will not work to port Sugar to Windows.
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| 16 May 2008 |
Softpedia – Bender Launches Sugar Labs for Better Development of OLPC's Sugar UI
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Press releases
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