24 teachers start OLPC training

[Bryan Berry]

Hey Edward,

Papert built on the theories of Piaget and Vygotsky. Co-learning,
experiential learning - these ideas were pioneered by Piaget and
Vygotsky. David Cavallo and Edith Ackermann talked extensively of Piaget
and Vygotsky at the OLPC Learning conference I attended in January.

I am particularly a big fan of Vygotsky as I agree with him that
learning is fundamentally a social process and that culture plays a
large role in our social interactions, hence learning.

All of our materials are in Nepali. I hope to post them in a publicly
accessible place later. Right now we are in a crunch because we start
the pilot at Bashuki and Bishwamitra very shortly.

"Constructionism" is a broad term that encompasses ideas from many
different theorists and many different elements such as:

social cognition
co-learning
scaffolding
Experiential learning


The single best resource I have found is this web site:

http://www.funderstanding.com/engaging_kids.cfm

and especially this page
http://www.funderstanding.com/theories.cfm


Bipul Gautam wrote a nice, short post about some of Piaget's theories on
our blog:
http://blog.olenepal.org/index.php/archives/200


On Tue, 2008-04-01 at 22:38 -0700, Edward Cherlin wrote:
> 2008/3/31 Bryan Berry <bryan.berry at gmail.com>:
> > 24 teachers from Bishwamitra and Bashuki schools started 4-day long OLPC
> > training organized by OLE Nepal.
> >
> > http://blog.olenepal.org/index.php/archives/193
> >
> > At the start of the Nepali school year, OLE Nepal will distribute 150
> > laptops to children in grades two and six at Bashuki and Bishwamitra
> > schools. Teachers from both schools are currently in four days of training
> > how to use the laptops in the classroom.
> 
> Can you tell us what the training materials are and where to access
> them? Are they in Nepali? Can we get English translations? For
> example, we have nothing in the Wiki about this:
> 
> "On the morning of the second day Bipul focused on the theories of
> Piaget and Vygotsky that underpin constructionism. The afternoon of
> the second day returned to the activities in the XO and how they
> reflect the ideas of Piaget and Vygotsky."
> 
> In fact, it is the first I have heard of the connection between Piaget
> and Vygotsky and the XO. Which of their publications are most
> relevant? Who knows about any of this? The Constructionism page in the
> Wiki is feeble.
> 
> > OLE Nepal has developed a completely open-source set of learning activities
> > for both grades. Mahabir Pun, OLE Nepal's Director of Networking has set up
> > Internet access for both schools.
> 
> Excellent.
> 
> > We regularly update our blog with more details
> >  http://blog.olenepal.org/
> >
> > Bryan Berry
> > Systems Engineer, OLE Nepal
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> >  Devel mailing list
> >  Devel at lists.laptop.org
> >  http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/devel
> >
> >
> 
> 
>