[geeks] OLPCs for sale...

[Mike Meredith]

On Fri, 16 Nov 2007 08:15:11 +0000, Mark wrote:
> Ahh the floppy disk, that lovable and reliable storage media we all  
> trusted implicitly... *cough* *cough* *cough* *collapses on floor*

:)

My early days in computer support were spent wiping off the biscuit
crumbs, and then trying to scrape most of the bits off a disk. At least
5.25" floppies *looked* fragile so most people took a little more care
with them.

> writing, even in exams), but it' is not the global solution. For
> instance, who here would know where to find something on the internet
> if they had never used it before and knew nothing about it? You'd ask
> someone, right? Right. 

Perhaps the wrong crowd to ask that question ... at least some of us
here were finding things on the Internet before there was somebody to
ask. *I* was the one people pointed Internet questions at, and I
certainly didn't have a teacher.

Self-discovery for some people is a far better way than classroom
teaching. If you throw OLPCs at every child who can read in a village,
there's a very good chance that some of those children will
'self-start' and begin to use it for something interesting. They will
also be the ones the other children will go to to find out how to use
the laptop.

> You need a teacher as well as a tool. A person
> needs a certain grounding and understanding of anything before they
> can use it or learn from it.I mean, what use is a book to someone who
> cannot read?

I don't think anyone is saying that an OLPC replaces a teacher for the
core skills.


-- 
Mike Meredith (http://zonky.org/)
  So I think I'm becoming a geek vampire. Damn. Hate when that happens.
                       -- Davezilla