Thoughts on the world of open source
Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is a great read. Engaging and overlooked story which has recently been made into a motion picture. This is America at it’s greatest and a wonderful story of how women of color surmounted impossible odds to become engineers and leaders in the space race.
I first read the quote, “Every wall is a door” by Ralph Waldo Emerson on the wall of a Facebook friend. It continues to be one of my favorites. Just yesterday we got some unhappy news. When bad news comes it invites a response and more often that not I’m prone to think of the misfortune. There is a lot wisdom concerning news like this. Romans 8:28 says. “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” Another favorite expression is: “never put a question mark where God puts a period.” Life is full of paradox. In fact I’ve come to regard these paradoxes as a sign of blessing. As I was getting my tea made this morning I reflected on the many blessings in my life.
A little over three years ago I had become depressed at the thought of retiring. I thought my life was over. But in the three years hence I have become a frequent contributor and community moderator at Opensource.com. I have re-entered the classroom teaching and learning about Lego Mindstorms and robotics in general. I’ve taught programming and digital citizenship classes to children and adults. I have become active in the EdCamp movement and look forward regular communication on social media with those friends. I’ve become a successful grant-writer and that has allowed me to give back to the community in ways I could never have imagined. I’ve learned about nutrition and wellness through involvement at The Warming House , Genesis House and the Catholic Charities Food Pantry in Franklinville. Through the interest and work providing sustenance for those less fortunate has led to deeper involvement and learning about organic farming, open source agriculture and other life giving initiatives. I recently agreed to be an animator for justice, peace and the integrity of creation for the St. Kateri Tekakwitha Region of the Secular Franciscan Order and created a website to aid in that process.
What once seemed like the end of the road has become a gateway to new life and new purpose. I am grateful for these opportunities to live, love and grow.
The Art of LEGO MINDSTORMS EV3 Programming by Terry Griffin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Great book. I’m teaching a EV3 robotics and programming class and this is my main text. It’s a fantastic resource for teachers and students. Great diagrams too.
This year I got a great opportunity to work with a unique group of students in an after school program at St. Bonaventure University. I am fortunate to work with Dr. Anne Foerst, a computer science professor at St. Bonaventure. Together we applied for and received a grant from National Grid to teach STEM to a group of middle school girls who applied to our program from area school districts. Inspired by my mother’s struggles to break the glass ceiling and reach out to girls who are an underrepresented group in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
My Mom graduated from D’Youville College in Buffalo magna cum laude in 1947 majoring in science and mathematics. She returned to her native New York City and applied for teaching jobs but was told she couldn’t get one because she was a woman. Then Mom went on to get her Masters in Mathematics and Science at Fordham University. Mom worked her way through Fordham as a graduate assistant. She eventually returned to Buffalo and got a teaching job at D’Youville College. I told Mom recently that she was part of my inspiration for getting involved with our efforts to promote STEM skills to these girls at St. Bonaventure.
I spent the summer learning how to work with and program Lego Mindstorms EV3 robots. Our grant enabled us to purchase seven complete kits and to invite fourteen girls to the St. Bonaventure campus for a two-hour class that meets once every three weeks. We’ve been meeting since late August with these girls and they are making great progress. I’ve seen them blossom as learners and leaders and they come to our sessions with a great enthusiasm for learning. At this week’s class we taught the girls how to program the color sensor. One the girls solved a problem I hadn’t assigned but by doing so showed great insight and application. She was clearly operating at the higher levels of Blooms Taxonomy. I asked her about her thinking and application and how she arrived at this unique solution to the problem. She replied, “I figured it out last time by just tinkering.” Then she said, “Is this science, because i’m failing science in school.” Dr. Foerst said, “This isn’t science, this is FUN.” It was a poignant moment and it really warmed my heart because this girl now knows she is a scientist and a successful one too.
Recently my friend John came to me with a problem. His Windows 8 notebook computer which is only about three years old was getting tired and not running well. He wanted to know what my suggestion was. I said, “Get a Chromebook!” He wanted to know what that was and I did a bit of explaining but nothing really succeeds until a user experiences ChromeOS on a Chromebook. John picked up his new Acer 15.6 inch Chromebook at the local Wal-Mart. It’s a modest unit with only 2 gigabytes of RAM but any Chromebook veteran realizes that more than enough memory. Once the Chromebook was out of the box it only took about five minutes of minimal instruction to get John up and running. He soon realized that this inexpensive laptop was way faster than the Windows laptop it replaced. John wanted to know about antivirus and was happy to know that he didn’t need any. It always pleases me when I can help steer a friend in the right direction. What pleases me most is that Chromebooks are just another example of the power of Linux.
If you’re looking for a fresh educational perspective and an invitation to build a school educational program that’s the embodiment of the maker culture then you ought to read “The Open Schoolhouse: Building a Technology Program to Transform Learning and Empower Students.” Recently written and published by Charlie Reisinger who is the technology director at Penn Manor School District in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
There is also a deeper ethical problem: reliance on closed source proprietary software teaches students a lesson of dependence on secret technology they are powerless to examine, study, share, and improve upon. If the social mission of schools is to amplify student potential, disseminate knowledge, and prepare students to have an impact on the world, then schools have a duty to help kids be free thinkers and self-reliant architects of their futures.
Reisinger, Charlie (2016-09-29). The Open Schoolhouse: Building a Technology Program to Transform Learning and Empower Students (Kindle Locations 304-307). Kindle Edition.
This book is a real invitation to think differently about how we educate our students and how you can use open source software and open source principles to invite student participation in the educational process.
Today while I was at the All Things Open Conference I thought, “we need more educational technology people here.” There is a wealth of information shared about open source projects and technologies and most of them should be on the radar of anyone that’s teaching today’s students. This morning I listened to an excellent presentation by Mark Russinovitch who is the CTO of Microsoft Azure. Mark spent about thirty minutes explaining the what and why of Microsoft’s involvement with Linux kernel development and it s presence in other open source software projects including Python.
In 2015 it is irresponsible not to expose students to Linux and open source and most of today’s internet of things and cloud applications run on open source platforms. In fact in one of the sessions I attended at this year’s conference there was a seventh grade boy from a Raleigh, NC area school district. He was so engaged in the presentation that he asked the presenter a very good question at the end of her presentation.
Throughout the conference I heard great presentations from the National Center for Women in Information Technology, Girl DevelopIT, GitHub 101, and Openstack 101. My personal favorite among all those sessions which were most appropriate to educational technology was Charlie Reisinger’s lightning talk about his one-to-one Linux laptop program at Penn Manor High School in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Charlie said that today’s students who are often called digital natives risk their futures by failing to learn skills that are highlighted in the program at Penn Manor which emphasizes hands on work with assembling and supporting Linux laptops. Many well meaning school districts undercut their students learning by forcing them to use tablets and other closed systems which don’t allow students to learn by tinkering and coding.
In a few days I’ll be boarding a flight that will take me to Raleigh-Durham International and eventually to the All Things Open Conference which is next week. As I was driving home tonight I thought of the journey that began nearly twenty years ago that brought me to this point. I thought of my experiences with Linux and open source software and the many servers and desktops I’ve built and rebuilt over the years that foreordained this trip. On Sunday I’ll be attending a meeting of community-moderators of Opensource.com in Red Hat Tower. None of this was on my radar in the days when I used to piece together old computers in storage closets at my place of employment and install a variety of Linux distributions on them. I thought of my efforts to have Red Hat Linux approved as a software standard for use in public schools of Western New York State almost eleven years ago. I’m thrilled at the prospect of meeting others from all over the world who also believe that the present and future hold unlimited potential for those individuals and entities who use open source software. When I retired from public education a couple of years ago I thought I had reached the limit of my endeavors with Linux and open source software.
Emerson once said, every wall is a door,” and my retirement opened a door to unimagined possibilities. One of those possibilities has been my participation in the wonderful enterprise of Opensource.com as a community moderator. In the past ten months I’ve learned a lot about writing, interviewing and participation. I’ve learned about more than software and hardware. I’ve learned about being a part of a wonderful open organization. I’ve been welcomed, empowered and encouraged by a unique team of individuals who have helped me to realize that I still have much to give.
What is a Bar Camp? That’s what I wanted to know a week ago. Lots of reading about them but no experience. That changed about 11:00 am yesterday morning as I sat in Room 1400 at The Golisano Computer Center at Rochester Institute of Technology. I saw first hand why this is an unconference because prior to 11:10 am there was no schedule for the day. Instead on a wall in a hallway was a list of rooms and time slots from 11:00 am to 4:00 pm with an hour for lunch. I came expecting to be surrounded by geeks and I was. But, I was also surrounded by a lot of other free thinkers who came to present on a myriad of topics including “How not to talk to an atheist.” That was the last talk I attended. The first talk I listened to was a guy who talked about how to live with perfectionism and how to recover from it. Along the way there was a presentation on Open Maps and my own presentation about my experience writing for Opensource.com and how I found a way to give back to the open source community. I want to thank the organizers of BarCampRoc. I know I’ll be back and encourage others to consider BarCamps and EdCamps. There is an EdCamp coming to Central New York this summer. Follow this link to more information about EdCampCNY.
That’s part of the title for a course of study I signed up for today. It’s being offered through the University of Maryland. This is my first course with Coursera. I’m an entrepreneur and the owner of my own business and I’m looking for opportunities to grow professionally. The course is being taught by Dr. James Green. I’ve taken graduate courses on line before so this is not an entirely new experience. However, this is the first time I’ve taken any courses at the University of Maryland. I’ve been following Coursera on Twitter for over a year and reading about them on educational technology blogs. Coursera is a Massive Online Open Course or MOOC and I’ve been interested in how MOOCs could shape our educational future.