[Olpc-open] Olpc-open Digest, Vol 18, Issue 3

[Edward Cherlin]

On Dec 2, 2007 1:23 PM, Carolyn Turbyfill <cturbyfill at mac.com> wrote:
> you  also have to assume the parents can read, that they can see to
> read,
> that they have time and energy during the day to read, and that they
> have
> light at night to read.

I make none of those assumptions. As I wrote on OLPC News, I assume
that the computer will read to children and parents alike when
multilingual text-to-speech software is included. Karaoke-style
coloring of the text is also important to show what letter or syllable
is being pronounced. We know that children will learn to read if they
hear and see stories at the same time. Some unknown fraction of the
parents will also learn to read under those conditions, just is
illiterate Indians learn to read while singing along with captioned
Bollywood movies.

> On Dec 2, 2007, at 8:50 AM, Donna Auguste wrote:
>
> > We'll be using the XO in villages (Ethiopia and Tanzania) with middle
> > school children.  We have selected the XO after evaluating several
> > ebook
> > readers, since our original initiative was to provide ebooks.  (We
> > have
> > shipped tens of thousands of recycled U.S. schoolbooks to Africa over
> > the past five years, and decided last year that it's time to go
> > digital
> > and align the content with each country's Ministry of Education
> > approved
> > curriculum.)  The individual children in these particular village
> > schools do not have schoolbooks.  Schoolbooks cost more than the
> > schools, government, and families can afford.  The teachers have
> > schoolbooks (sometimes), and classrooms sometimes have a few shared
> > books, but there are far from enough schoolbooks for all of the
> > children
> > in the classroom and there are no books to take home.  There are no
> > books in the homes of most of these children -- the suggestion that
> > parents should read age-appropriate books to their children, etc
> > etc is
> > not relevant in many village situations I have experienced first-hand.
> > There is a wonderful oral tradition of storytelling, and the children
> > learn multiple languages at a very young age, and when the families
> > have
> > not been ravaged by HIV/AIDS there are multiple generations in each
> > family.  We are going to augment the children's education with one
> > laptop for every student in these two middle schools, core and
> > auxiliary
> > educational content pre-loaded on the memory cards, and language
> > study.
> > Perhaps interesting educational dynamics will emerge as these laptops
> > travel home each evening and weekend for use within the family
> > environment.
> >
> > Yes, we could choose instead to buy a classroom count of core
> > curriculum
> > schoolbooks and encourage the school to allow the children to take the
> > books home.  We think that the wide array of auxiliary content we can
> > include with each XO, and the skills the children will develop as they
> > learn to use this computer, are a better investment than a single
> > stack
> > of core-curriculum schoolbooks.  I'll let you know how it goes...
> >
> > -- Donna Auguste, donna at leavealittleroom.org
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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>
>
>
> Carolyn Turbyfill
> cturbyfill at mac.com
> 11449 Rothbury Square
> Fairfax, Va 22030
> Cell:  503-381-2808
> Home:  703-865-6410
> Cell:  703-598-7141
> Work:  703-225-2513
> Work Fax:  703-225-2501
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Edward Cherlin
Earth Treasury: End Poverty at a Profit
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Earth_Treasury
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."--Alan Kay