Hello, I managed to mispost a message to (discussion AT lists fsfe org), instead of this list. I hope it is ok to post it again, here. So here it is:
---------------------------------------------------------------- Hi, everybody!
This is my first post to this list I want to salute especially Georg Greve, who helped me become a new FSFE fellow.
Today I am writing to draw attention to an idea, educating children to take part in a free software project, that first appeared on this blog
http://www.dbzer0.com/blog/2008/01/15/to-parents-a-free-as-in-freedom-exerci... under the title "A free (as in “freedom”) exercise for your children"
I belive this is a must read for any parent, and, while I am not a parent myself I belive promoting it would also help our community a lot.
Also needed would be a community guide for parents looking for suitable tasks for their children. That could take into account children contributors as young as 9-10 years old.
The idea presented helps children learn many things: * collaborate with other children * make something with a purpose * making children famous and thus being proud of what they have done * help children let off their energy and ethusiasm.
Here I give another quote from the post:
"Now, when I say free software, do not assume immediately that I am talking about C++ coding (unless of course your child has the appropriate tendencies for hacking). What I am talking is recognizing where it’s talents lie and then selecting an appropriate project to do. Kids come with many kinds of them, but in this example we can discuss about three of the most common: Arts, Music and Maths (since these are the ones I can see as candidates, but feel free to correct me if I am mistaken)
So you know what your progeny is good at, I would assume; perhaps it has a great knack for drawing, or perhaps it loves music and wants to learn to play, in any case, it should give you a hint on what it likes to do.
The trick is now to find a project that the child will enjoy participating in, for if the exercise becomes a chore, we’ve already lost half the battle I’m afraid.
In my mind, a perfect candidate would be the aforementioned Battle for Wesnoth http://www.wesnoth.org/home game which is, to my knowledge, always happy to receive Art, Music and more campaigns. Of course this suggestion is not restrictive and you can choose something else, closer to its preferences. I only chose that for it family content, easy play style and excellent community."
Bogdan
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OFFTOPIC: Matthias Kirschner answered to my previous post and raised an issue regarding that idea. I do not know if it would be ok to repost his message here, in this message, or if I should include it in a separate mail to the list, or maybe he could himself repost his message. Could you help me with an advice? I do not want to clutter/ make a mess of other people's inboxes.
I am eager to respond to his mail.
Cheers. Bogdan