| Tag Archives: raspberry pi

Mail Call

by Clarence Fisher

When I went to pick up my mail the other day, there were two little white boxes waiting for me inside of an envelope.

They looked like this:

When I opened them up, this is what I found:

A Raspberry Pi. Two of them actually. At $35 each I ordered two of them. That’s a teaspoon above the board to give you some sense of scale. I knew they were small, but I didn’t know they were as small as they are.

These little machines have a lot of potential. Google is giving out 15000 of them to kids in the UK.

I’ve told the kids in my class about them. I’ve told them that they are coming. I honestly think they are more excited about them then they were about the new imacs that we started the year with.

Coding, computer programming and global connections in classrooms aren’t new. But at $35 each, these little machines just might open up this world to a few more people.

Raspberry Pi Education Manual

by Clarence Fisher

I just can’t leave the Rapsberry Pi project alone.

I still don’t have one yet, but they keep putting out cool stuff that continues to amaze me.

New on their site is a pdf manual that really is aimed at students but would be great for teachers as well. I love the attitude of the whole project.

This is taken from the first few pages of the manual:

“This user manual is different. Don’t expect a dry-as-dust description of how
to plug things in or where to find your serial number. And you certainly won’t learn
how to create a spreadsheet or a presentation. That’s really not computer
science, it’s something else entirely.

Instead, think of this manual, along with your Raspberry Pi, as a
“computer science set”. Have you ever been given a chemistry set? With a
chemistry set, you can make lots of bangs, smells and odd-coloured goop to
learn all about elements, molecules and compounds.

We’re not going to make odd-coloured goop, but we will use experiments
to discover how to program a computer to create your own games and animations,
how to make graphics appear on screen just by typing in the right code (just like
the developers of your favourite games do), how to get a cat to do your maths
homework for you, and much more.”

Spend $25 and get a “computer science set?”

Very cool stuff.

Codecademy After School

by Clarence Fisher

I’m interested in initiatives like Scratch, Raspberry Pi and Codecademy. Projects that attempt to lay bare the bones of computing for anyone who cares to spend the time learning something new.

One of the issues of picking these projects up in schools is the lack of experience that many teachers have with the content. If we aren’t experienced programmers ourselves, how are we supposed to teach these skills to our kids?

A valid point.

Codeacademy has worked to tackle that with something they are calling Codecademy After School (pdf). A full curriculum that could be used in a classroom or as an after school club, no coding experience necessary. While I was glad to stumble on to these pdfs, I do think they need some work and some support. They can use “rounding out” to ensure that students would be engaged with all of the things they are being asked to do. Overall, a great beginning though and they look like they would be easy to use with a group of students.

By the way, I also took a look at the Raspberry Pi forums and was happy to see that they have a growing community of teachers contributing to the education section of their site. Lots of great stuff there to check out as well.

Is Easy Good?

by Clarence Fisher

I’m getting a new set of laptops for my classroom. While I’ve been fortunate over the years to have pretty good access to machines over the years with different sets of Asus eee pcs, Dell netbooks and a couple of desktops, this will be the first time that I should be close to being a 1:1 classroom.

We are also getting a new server in our building along with a badly needed wireless upgrade so downtime in the classroom is hopefully going to be significantly reduced.

I’m excited. As much as I like my ipad, given the choice between getting tablets or laptops, I’d still far rather have a set of laptops in my classroom.

Laptops will give us access to a full range of creative software. I’m planning a software image that will include:

- Google Chrome
- Open Office
- Scratch
- Blender
- Pencil
- Audacity
- Google Earth
- Stencyl
- Dropbox

I’ve got a half dozen solid little Canon cameras that will shoot both stills and video along with a full set of headphones and a couple of Flip cameras. I should be set up for the next few years.

The models at play in the edtech world are changing. Tablets get a lot of press of course. Apps and ipads have largely replaced netbooks from a few years ago. I’m also still hugely interested in models of low cost computing like the Raspberry Pi project. Globally and long term, I think that model has much more potential to promote global change, connectedness and understanding compared to much more expensive models.

These different models of possibility always need to force us step back and take a look at where they may lead us.

In late June of this year, the Globe and Mail newspaper published a story under the title:

“Are we Breeding a Generation of App-Loving, Web Addicted Digital Idiots”

A great title I thought. Certainly provocative if nothing else.

In this story, Sang-Jin Bae, who teaches animation at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, argues that we entering an era of the digital illiterate. An era where people who can SMS, use Facebook, a host of apps and Instagram, but who are even unfamiliar with things like Word, Excel, or any piece of software that requires in depth knowledge or any coding.

I’ve been wondering about this myself. I quite often have kids come to my classroom who have been carrying a mobile phone for a few years and are intense users of Facebook and wouldn’t dream of being separated from their ipods. Yet, for some of them, even fairly simple software like WordPress can be difficult.

I think there is value in difficulty, in challenge.

I’m not saying that there is simply value in something being difficult. But there is value in learning the “behind the scenes” stuff that we normally don’t see when we pick up our ipads.

This is ipad vs. Raspberry Pi.

These are two different worlds. In the app world we concentrate on consuming the best information that we can from around the world. Sure, there are apps that get us to take pictures, make some music or video, but this isn’t really what this machine is for. In the Raspberry Pi, Linux or OLPC world, you concentrate on coding, on connections, on digging deeper to make things work. These two worlds certainly cross and someone is sure to leave a comment here telling me about all of the great things there class has produced using ipads. I can acknowledge that. There are many others who say that the technology simply needs to work so that it gets out of the way so that we can concentrate on the real content in the classroom. I can acknowledge them as well. But I’m still going to push back.

I’m still going to point people to Douglas Rushkoff’s great book Program or be Programmed. I’m still going to demand that I want things like Stencyl, Scratch, Blender and Audacity on the machines I’m getting for my classroom. This is also why I’m willing to let my own kids at home spend extra time on their laptops if they are writing, or making music, or editing pictures or videos and not just playing video games or even doing homework.

Easy isn’t always good; for many different reasons. But in the case of technology, where we have so many skills to learn about looking after our content, rating the reliability of content, making international connections to gain a wider perspective on the world and learning what makes our machines tick, I think that models of computing in schools and classrooms that only concentrate on easy can also be dangerous.

Education for Uncertain Times

by Clarence Fisher

I’ve been fortunate to see David Warlick speak at conferences several times. More important than this, I’ve sat with him and enjoyed a meal together and spent some time together on a few occasions. During each of these times, one message he has constantly conveyed is the idea that, for the first time in history, we are educating our students for uncertain times.

I’ve been thinking about this more these days.We are educating our students to live during a period of history when science, technology, trade and our understanding of global living and networks change on almost daily basis.

What do classrooms look like to accomodate an understanding of the Arab Spring? Anonymous? Daily protests in Montreal? Growing organs? $3000 laptops and $25 desktop computers? Global travel? Incredible wealth living alongside breathtaking poverty?

How do we teach for the times we are in and prepare our students for the times ahead? This isn’t simply a hypothetical question. It actually needs to be quite central to what we on a daily basis. What does a unit plan look like for uncertain times? A single lesson? Educating for uncertain times involves thinking about the curricula that we teach, the resources we use and the goals of our lessons. Who makes these choices? How do we choose? How do we see clearly through all of the choices that are available? How do we see clearly through all of the politics and hype of change?

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lightmash/3183278318/sizes/m/in/photostream/

Consumerism and Producerism

by Clarence Fisher 7 Comments

I’ve been holding on to this post for a week or so, rolling it around in my head trying to connect a few dots before clicking the publish button.

It’s got to do with Apple, and SOPA and Raspberry Pi and education and learning and on and on and on…..

It started with the education event that Apple hosted on January 19th. At this event Apple unveiled iBooks2 and iBooks Author. After several weeks of hype and people breathlessly awaiting the great advancement that Apple would give us in education – we got interactive textbooks. Interesting as a business model, interactive texts and textbooks are definitely something that students are interested in, and something that is probably inevitable given how students are becoming used to working with text.

But these are certainly not a ground breaker. And in fact, the details of the end user agreement have created huge amounts of controversy as it becomes clear that using iBooks Author ties you into the loop of using an Apple product to produce the text that can only be sold (or given away) through the iBookstore and then can only be read on iBooks 2 enabled devices such as iPads. Some folks are wondering if this tight loop will survive an antitrust case. Others are wondering how many schools are going to be able to afford to buy into this model. For make no mistake, buying into this model is something that is going to cost. Apple has grown into a massive company. 13 billion dollars in income in the final quarter of 2011. One of the largest and most successful corporations in history. (Its hard to remember that only a decade ago (or so) they were the underdog and were in fact in very real danger of becoming bankrupt.)

And this is where the danger is.

We need to remember that Apple is a corporation. They are going to do what is right for them and their shareholders first. They are more concerned with profits and shareholder value than they are with learning and doing what is good for students. This struck home to me after David Warlick left this comment on this post I had written previously about redefining edtech:

“What concerns me, Clarence, is that technology seems to be advancing to the point that it can behave just like a textbook. I think that we’re approaching a tipping point where edtech truly fuses with the operation and image of education.

But! ..will that tipping point come at the arrival of a technology that fits education as we know it?

..or will the tipping point come as we clearly articulate and adopt a new image of teaching and learning that reflects a new environment — resulting in part from technological advances.

Do we digitize education or do we transform it…”

As time goes by, many corporations are giving us tools that allow us to do what we’ve always done in education rather than producing tools that will help and encourage teachers to transform what happens in classrooms. There is a far larger market for digital textbooks than there is for a tool that will allow us to connect with folks who think in new and different ways than we do.

Which brings me to the final step. This article in the Globe and Mail was published on January 18th, the day that the SOPA protests had darkened a lot of the web. It brings to light an interesting division in society and technology. That of producerism and consumerism:

“Consumerism is the well-known, American-invented philosophy of defining oneself by brands of consumption. I wear Nike, therefore I am an athlete. I drive a Suburban, therefore I am outdoorsy. I drink Starbucks, therefore I am cultured.

Producerism is the less-well-known French alternative philosophy of defining oneself by their output of production. I paint, therefore I am an artist. I draft legal arguments, therefore I am a lawyer. I throw cobblestones, therefore I am a protester.”

How do these philosophies fit into what we believe about education? How do they effect what we do in our classrooms?

Do we believe that we are preparing students for the future simply because our district has spent thousands (possibly even tens or hundreds of thousands) on iPads or Smart boards, or Macbook Pros or whatever shiny gadget has gathered societies attention for the moment?

It makes me wonder, is our current form of education being legitimized, digitized and standardized by corporations, teachers and districts heavily invested in preserving the status quo? Education simply cannot be focused on the consumption of products and information at the expense of creativity, connection and community.

In the last few years as the edtech industry has matured we have seen a blossoming of companies willing to provide services for schools. But we’ve also seen the opportunity to use tools that are cheaper and allow us to focus on creation and community instead of on consumption.

Where do we want the emphasis placed in our classrooms and for our learners?

Redefining Edtech

by Clarence Fisher 6 Comments

I think I bought my first computer in 1998. It was a big beige desktop box from Dell. I had a machine for probably two years before that; but I had received it as a gift from an uncle who was buying a new one. This was the first machine I had ever bought on my own.

I really can’t remember much about it besides the fact that I had paid $2 499 for it.

Now I look at things like the OLPC tablet that is going to cost about $100 (or the Datawind UbiSlate which is going to cost approximately $35 if you are an Indian student) and the machine soon to be available from Raspberry Pi for approximately $25 and it gives me pause to wonder what the future of edtech might look like.

For the same price as my original desktop I could get a dozen Raspberry Pi setups (and yes… I understand that I still need monitors, mice, etc) and twenty OLPC tablets that would go far in teaching the kids in my class both information access and digital literacy skills as well as giving them access to a programming / coding / creative environment.

All for the price of my one old desktop.

I hope we take advantage of these opportunities; but I worry that we won’t. I worry instead that we will chase after the newest, best designed, slickest machines that come with a full textbook and set of teacher photocopiable worksheets. We will buy what is best marketed at us to help raise test scores. We’ll buy what we’re told is easy to use. If we buy into that type of edtech we become consumers and fail to see the power we can help our students to have as creators. If we go that route there is danger that we are locking our students into a place where form is more important than function. Into a place where they are simply consumers of information and not active participants and creators of text, of global understanding and connections.

These low priced machines must make technology a tougher business to be in, but they also give us a chance to redefine the goals we have for our schools and for our students. Is it more important that they are able to pull a shiny new machine out of their bags that has been sold to them via a multi million dollar marketing scheme, or that they gain the skills they need to play a role on a changing globe.

Tablet Time

by Clarence Fisher 1 Comment

Tablets have taken the world by storm. This isn’t a secret. I’ve probably seen as many ipads in the past year in people’s bags as I have laptops. People that would never carry a laptop have no problem being seen with a tablet. While there are certainly a lot of tablets out there, you can probably argue that there is an ipad market, and then a bunch of others.

In October, Wired released stats saying that 97% of all tablet internet traffic is produced by people using ipads and another site stated that over 80% of all tablets sold are made by Apple. That may be changing slightly this Christmas season, but these stats are probably basically still true.

I’ve spent my time with two different tablets this fall and neither of them are ipads. I’ve got an Asus eee transformer and now my son has a new Blackberry Playbook that he received for Christmas. Both of these machines have performed well. The eee pad hooks to the Android Market, is responsive, has a great display and flips between applications easily. The new Playbook has only been around for a few days, but I have to admit – I like it. It is a bit smaller (a 7 inch screen compared to the standard 10), but it is well designed and feels nice in your hands. It doesn’t feel like a cheap piece of plastic. It has a great screen and runs RIM’s own operating system which is proving easy to learn and allows for full multi tasking. It handles flash content easily and renders the web quickly. It’s downfall comes in the size of its applications market. RIM is obviously a 3rd player in the tablet wars and it shows in what is available. Big news last week when Angry Birds hit Blackberry’s App world, months after the Android Market and the App store. No movies to rent. I can’t find a decent WordPress app. While there are certainly thousands to look through, some of the standard ones are simply not there. Plenty of rumours about RIM allowing access to the Android Market (which would solve all of their problems), and about people jailbreaking their Playbooks, but nothing official from RIM yet.

Both of these devices have been great to have around to pick up when you need to get online quickly to find a piece of information or to post to twitter, etc. but I’m still having trouble seeing them as machines to do anything other than read and surf from. I can’t see them as creative platforms.

I know districts have spent millions on tablets, I know people will disagree with me, telling me stories of all of the wonderful things they have done (or had their kids do), but I’m still not convinced. Don’t get me wrong, I like the ones I’ve lived with for the past few months. I think they are great devices and are getting to be powerful multimedia platforms. But what place should they have in our classrooms? Are we aiming only at an education based on the consumption of media and information? If every student (or classroom) could have tablets and laptops, then I think we are getting somewhere. But we all know that with budgets like they are, that isn’t happening in most schools any time soon. I am interested instead to see where schools are going to go with devices like the new Raspberry Pi initiative. That interests me. What can we do with low price (or no price) software like WordPress, Gimp and Scratch? How can we help kids use platforms like Youtube and Figment to share what they make? We’ve only scratched (no pun intended) the surface of possibilities. Do we want students to be consumers of information or creators and community builders? I know which I’d rather see and I’m worried about the priorities that I have been seeing.

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