Activity hosting application: Time

[Jason Rock]

On Feb 4, 2008 2:57 PM, Yoshiki Ohshima <yoshiki at vpri.org> wrote:

>  Hi, Jason,
>
> > Translating the 12 hour to 24 hour notation of the submission to
> whichever the other player is using shouldn't be a
> > problem.  Also the game isn't time zone dependent.
>
>  Translating these isn't a big problem technically, yes.  Again, I
> was just thinking that that wouldn't be the kick-ass feature for an
> educational clock activity.
>
>  (When I attended a conference in France, the organizer wrote "20h30"
> on the blackboard and said "the night session begins at
> twenty-thirty".  Some in the audience reponded: "And, what time is it
> exactly?")
>
> >      Do you envision that these two kids connect to each other when they
> >     don't understand what the other's language and find a good time of
> the
> >     day when they can connect, and discuss about an artificial and
> >     abstract concept like time?
> >
> > True, perhaps discussions would be less helpful, but I think the time
> game is still something that would help.
>
>  My point is that to get kids understand the sense of time, the
> programmer doesn't have to build a single "the game"; like what you
> have on the wiki page, in a game, a kids walks up to the blackboard
> and write something.  There, if the activity has simple yet flexible
> interaction, they can make more "games".  So, the good focus for a
> programmer would be to provide such a interface.


but how one would go about providing that interface?

>
>
> > I think the natural time clock should be close enough to the actual
> appearance outside so that the children will connect
> > the ideas.
>
>  I wouldn't count on it that much (you know how China deals with
> timezones, and how summer is like in high-latitute places, right?).


We were looking for a way to change the position of the sun based on the
longitude and latitude and time of year(xearth seemed promising).  I'm
actually not sure how china deals with time zones, but as long as the
laptop's system time is correct, I don't think that should be a problem.

>
> It would be nice there is *also* an abstract form of explanation.
>
> >  Also, the clock can be updated to the time it is right now.  Thus in
> that way it should be its own
> > explanation.
>
>  Ah, but stuff like "60 seconds is 1 minute", "60 minutes is 1 hour",
> "24 hours is a day", "but the face only has 12 numbers", etc. are not
> that "discoverable".


Hopefully that would be something they would notice with moving the clock
hands and seeing the digital clock change to 59 seconds/minutes before 00

>
>
> >      It appears that you are a high-school student... That is really
> >     great!  Please don't take above as discouragement.  I'm really
> trying
> >     to encourage people who are trying to make educational activity (as
> >     you know, there aren't many for XO.)  It is really valuable to see
> >     that somebody (who is young and close to the target age group!)
> think
> >     about making activity.
> >
> > I am a senior at IMSA, and am aware of the development process, so I
> know your comments aren't discouragement.
>
>  Thanks!
>
> >      Do you know Kathleen Harness?
> >
> > Should I?
>
>  Well, she is helping Etoys activity contents development, and her
> group at http://www.squeakcmi.org/index.php is for example hosting an
> "OLPC meeting" (as on the web).  Also, she was on a local newspaper
> recently.
>
>  When I attended a conference in Chicago, a presenter from UIUC gave
> a talk.  In the talk, she showed a blank map of Illinois and started
> with a remark: "Welcome to Chicago!  But do you know that, outside
> Chicago, there is a larger area called Illinois?"  For an outsider
> like me, Illinois is one thing so I thought you might know her.^^;


I see your point, but seeing as cooperation in the olpc project started with
the new year, I don't have any connections outside of the IMSA chapter.

>
>
> -- Yoshiki
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.laptop.org/pipermail/devel/attachments/20080204/65cd4b47/attachment.html>