Hello everybody!
I hope you all had a nice Software Freedom Day last weekend! :) And the next FS related event is already approaching...
From Oct 11 to 17, there will be events throughout Europe where kids will learn to code [1].
You will notice that Free Software is not endorsed on the codeweek webpage in any way or form. If Free Software is explained or even mentioned is up to those who conduct the workshops. The good thing is that most organizers will be grateful for any helping hand they can get
We would like to encourage everybody to participate in one of the existing events to make sure that Free Software will not remain unknown to these kids. As they are already interested in coding, it would be a shame if they wouldn't learn about Free Software, don't you think?
BTW: It's not too late to order promo material [2] for this! :)
FSFE's edu-team [3] will be happy to answer questions and concerns and provide guidance or advise.
Please also share this with anyone who might be interested!
Thanks!
Guido
[1] http://events.codeweek.eu/ [2] http://fsfe.org/contribute/spreadtheword.en.html#promo-material [3] http://fsfe.org/activities/education/eduteam.en.html
Hello!
2014-09-26 1:43 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
We would like to encourage everybody to participate in one of the existing events to make sure that Free Software will not remain unknown to these kids. As they are already interested in coding, it would be a shame if they wouldn't learn about Free Software, don't you think?
My club here in Tampere will participate and the site koodikerho.fi will heavily promote free and open software. The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
Hello Otto,
On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 04:24:35PM +0300, Otto Kekäläinen wrote:
2014-09-26 1:43 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
We would like to encourage everybody to participate in one of the existing events to make sure that Free Software will not remain unknown to these kids. As they are already interested in coding, it
My club here in Tampere will participate and the site koodikerho.fi will heavily promote free and open software.
Great news! :)
The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
Wow, that's even better news! As you write "surprisingly", does that mean you won't tell us the secret how you did that?
Or is the education system and society in Finland just so awesome that girls aren't subliminally told tech stuff is nothing for them? I think I've got to visit you one day...
Anyhow, please keep us posted and share your experiences!
Greetings,
Guido
On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 18:53:50 +0200, Guido Arnold wrote:
Hello Otto,
On Fri, Sep 26, 2014 at 04:24:35PM +0300, Otto Kekäläinen wrote:
2014-09-26 1:43 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
We would like to encourage everybody to participate in one of the existing events to make sure that Free Software will not remain unknown to these kids. As they are already interested in coding, it
My club here in Tampere will participate and the site koodikerho.fi will heavily promote free and open software.
Great news! :)
The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
Wow, that's even better news! As you write "surprisingly", does that mean you won't tell us the secret how you did that?
Or is the education system and society in Finland just so awesome that girls aren't subliminally told tech stuff is nothing for them? I think I've got to visit you one day...
Given Otto's surprised I'd say it's more likely they haven't been told often enough yet that tech stuff isn't for them.
@Otto: and in the interest of that I would suggest not to show your surprise of how good they are whilst being girls. As a female classmate in CS once told me that she thought the constant surprise about how good she was (in spite of being a girl), was amongst the most off-putting behaviours she got exposed to.
Hello,
2014-09-26 19:53 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
Wow, that's even better news! As you write "surprisingly", does that mean you won't tell us the secret how you did that?
The goal was to reach to children young enough that they haven't yet "learned" the stereotypic role models that boys to tech and girls don't. It was suprisingly easy to achieve. In the group there is no trace of a sentiment that tech stuff or coding would be a boy thing.
Or is the education system and society in Finland just so awesome that girls aren't subliminally told tech stuff is nothing for them? I think I've got to visit you one day...
You're welcome! Ryanair and other cheap airlines fly directly to Tampere, so it is easy to come here :)
Hi all,
It's nice to hear about FS coding initiatives around Europe!
While I agree it's nice to get some of the codeweek.eu events free-software-minded, I believe that the coding week wasn't meant to be ethical in this way in the first place. Starting with the website (they use proprietary stuff like google maps) that promotes the idea that anyone and anything is welcome to join (including those promoting proprietary software and the idea that kids should be proprietary-software-dependent), trying to make look the event free software-ish doesn't help much. I agree that whoever attends a free software event in the coding week will benefit, but overall the week with proprietary software events (e.g. [1]) will just make free software look like a yet another legitimate option, thus completely bypassing the very essence of the free software movement.
I see others might disagree, but things fail when not built on solid grounds. The coding week doesn't seem to have solid grounds, at least free-software-wise. The week is there because of competitiveness, markets, leadership, entrepreneurship, and economy growth [2], and it's not there to form a society based on the ideals of emancipation and solidarity.
On 27/09/14 21:13, Otto Kekäläinen wrote:
Hello,
2014-09-26 19:53 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
Wow, that's even better news! As you write "surprisingly", does that mean you won't tell us the secret how you did that?
The goal was to reach to children young enough that they haven't yet "learned" the stereotypic role models that boys to tech and girls don't. It was suprisingly easy to achieve. In the group there is no trace of a sentiment that tech stuff or coding would be a boy thing.
Stereotypes aside, are there any recommendations about how to communicate with children about the benefits of Free Software?
Hi
On 28 de septiembre de 2014 09:39:33 GMT+02:00, Daniel Pocock daniel@pocock.pro wrote:
On 27/09/14 21:13, Otto Kekäläinen wrote:
Hello,
2014-09-26 19:53 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly
the
majority is girls!
Wow, that's even better news! As you write "surprisingly", does that mean you won't tell us the secret how you did that?
The goal was to reach to children young enough that they haven't yet "learned" the stereotypic role models that boys to tech and girls don't. It was suprisingly easy to achieve. In the group there is no trace of a sentiment that tech stuff or coding would be a boy thing.
Stereotypes aside, are there any recommendations about how to communicate with children about the benefits of Free Software?
I have a 5 years old son. Since he began to play games in the mobile/computer, I've said to him that there are programs that only the one that wrote them can change or fix, and other programs, the free software ones, which can be changed, translated or fixed by anybody that knows how to. So I can translate the free software ones to Spanish, for example, and other friends take out ads, or find a solution when the program hangs (children are good stress testers, they learn quickly that devices hang!) But with the ones that are not free, we cannot do it even if we know how, because the writer does not allow us. So if he wants anything he has to go to him or her (not to me) to ask for it.
Regards Laura Arjona
Discussion mailing list Discussion@fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/discussion
Hello Daniel,
On Sun, Sep 28, 2014 at 09:39:33AM +0200, Daniel Pocock wrote:
Stereotypes aside, are there any recommendations about how to communicate with children about the benefits of Free Software?
I usually use the recipe analogy to explain Free Software to children which works pretty well as far as I can tell.
- You are not restricted to make 'eatable' stuff -> e.g. salt dough, cucumber mask, etc. - If you have the recipe instead of (just) the end product, you can learn a lot from it. - If your guests liked the food, you are free to hand the recipe to them if you wish. - If you don't like basil, you can leave it out or substitute it with something else like parsley.
And after the four freedoms, the analogy can go on:
You don't like to cook? Fine, hand the recipe to your personal chef de cuisine (usually a parent ;) ).
Do you really want to eat canned food every day?
How do you know what's really in the can?
Sometimes I also point out to them that their parents probably tell them that they need to learn to share (their candy with others or whatnot) and that sharing is a good thing. Proprietary software prohibits this.
And then I point out that with FS they _may_ share, but they don't have to. At this point I hope they realize that _they_ are in charge: Proprietary software prohibits sharing; parents demand sharing; FS gives _them_ the choice -> empowers them.
And speaking of empowering: I made the experience that 'moving parts' get them really excited. It doesn't have to be robots or drones, a simple "eject" on the command line may make them freak out already, especially when they do it per ssh on a remote machine (preferably in the same room so they can see it).
As soon as they realize that their "commands" can change the physical world (anywhere), they feel that they can do whatever they want (which is true in a sense).
I love to see this excitement and am looking forward to more tips on how to teach FS to children here!
Greetings,
Guido
Hi Guido,
* Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org [2014-10-01 02:23:05 +0200]:
I usually use the recipe analogy to explain Free Software to children which works pretty well as far as I can tell.
I also often use this analogy.
[...]
- If you don't like basil, you can leave it out or substitute it with something else like parsley.
At this part if often add “or if you are allergic against xy”.
Best Regards, Matthias
PS: What about using this analogy on an education leaflet?
<aside> For children new to software in a classroom situation learning to program, one approach is not to (explicitly) and instead set fun programming projects in an environment in which sharing (code and other knowledge) is easy. They will share and help each other quite naturally - internalising most of the benefits as they do. Later, when the topic of "proprietary software" inevitably arises, you can explain that concept: e.g. "... [sadly,] some people ... don't share as we do ..." and then reflect on the benefits of libre software.</aside> On 1 Oct 2014 02:23, "Guido Arnold" guido@fsfe.org wrote:
Hello Daniel,
On Sun, Sep 28, 2014 at 09:39:33AM +0200, Daniel Pocock wrote:
Stereotypes aside, are there any recommendations about how to communicate with children about the benefits of Free Software?
I usually use the recipe analogy to explain Free Software to children which works pretty well as far as I can tell.
- You are not restricted to make 'eatable' stuff -> e.g. salt dough, cucumber mask, etc.
- If you have the recipe instead of (just) the end product, you can learn a lot from it.
- If your guests liked the food, you are free to hand the recipe to them if you wish.
- If you don't like basil, you can leave it out or substitute it with something else like parsley.
And after the four freedoms, the analogy can go on:
You don't like to cook? Fine, hand the recipe to your personal chef de cuisine (usually a parent ;) ).
Do you really want to eat canned food every day?
How do you know what's really in the can?
Sometimes I also point out to them that their parents probably tell them that they need to learn to share (their candy with others or whatnot) and that sharing is a good thing. Proprietary software prohibits this.
And then I point out that with FS they _may_ share, but they don't have to. At this point I hope they realize that _they_ are in charge: Proprietary software prohibits sharing; parents demand sharing; FS gives _them_ the choice -> empowers them.
And speaking of empowering: I made the experience that 'moving parts' get them really excited. It doesn't have to be robots or drones, a simple "eject" on the command line may make them freak out already, especially when they do it per ssh on a remote machine (preferably in the same room so they can see it).
As soon as they realize that their "commands" can change the physical world (anywhere), they feel that they can do whatever they want (which is true in a sense).
I love to see this excitement and am looking forward to more tips on how to teach FS to children here!
Greetings,
Guido
-- Guido Arnold Free Software Foundation Europe http://blogs.fsfe.org/guido [] Edu team & German team OpenPGP Key-ID: 0x51628D75 [][][] Get active! XMPP: guido@jabber.fsfe.org || http://fsfe.org/support/?guido
Discussion mailing list Discussion@fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/discussion
* Otto Kekäläinen otto@fsfe.org [2014-09-26 16:24:35 +0300]:
2014-09-26 1:43 GMT+03:00 Guido Arnold guido@fsfe.org:
We would like to encourage everybody to participate in one of the existing events to make sure that Free Software will not remain unknown to these kids. As they are already interested in coding, it would be a shame if they wouldn't learn about Free Software, don't you think?
My club here in Tampere will participate and the site koodikerho.fi will heavily promote free and open software. The club started 2 weeks ago and we have 13 children fron the 3rd grade (9-year olds), they are progressing nicely and surprisingly the majority is girls!
That sounds very good! If you can afterwards blog about it, that would be very nice!
Thanks, Matthias
Hi Guido,
I started http://jecode.org in France last november with two other founders. Our small community is very active, with people committed to coding clubs all over France. While not specifically focus on free software, there is a strong culture of preferring free software when we can, and the founders themselves are free software activists.
So I can only stress again the importance for free software activists to join forces and conduct workshops, participate to the discussions, translate learning materiel, publish free/CC-by(-sa) tutorials, etc.
All the best,
On 25/09/14 23:43, Guido Arnold wrote:
I hope you all had a nice Software Freedom Day last weekend! :) And the next FS related event is already approaching...
From Oct 11 to 17, there will be events throughout Europe where kids will learn to code [1].
You will notice that Free Software is not endorsed on the codeweek webpage in any way or form. If Free Software is explained or even mentioned is up to those who conduct the workshops. The good thing is that most organizers will be grateful for any helping hand they can get
Thanks for this! Coderdojo in my area are not aware I think. Sadly they have an event on the 11th of october about the use of scratch and I am not around. I have however promised to give them promotional material fsf (and fsfe!).