While of on the subject of ideas for programs.

[Malonowa <malonowa@wanadoo.fr>]

BANNER PROGRAM

Kids and teachers make banners and stick them on the wall. They do it
for subject work, they do it for school fairs - they do it just for fun
or to hide the stains from Billy's unfortunate little accident with
class hamster (But we won't go into that. And anyway, Billy's gone to a
different school now).

Banners are a real pain to print. First you've gotta design them , then
divide them up onto each page, print them out, stick them together. If
you've got a continuous feed printer it's a little easier - but how many
of those are there now. Hopefully at the end of, you've got a long
poster that's all stuck together nicely - gracing the wall in a nice
smooth line and not dancing up and down towards the ceiling.

So a banner printing program that makes this task easier might be a good
idea.

CARDS 'N' CALENDERS

Yep, we all do 'em. So something that can print calenders with pictures
on them and help design cards would make those festive seasons a little
more fun. You can call it , "The festive factory". I'm sure there's more
you could add to it as well. Maybe some HTML with instructions on doing
things like painting eggs, making tree decorations etc. etc.

ME

Teach some data handling and creative writing at the same time. A
program that asks the children questions about themselves. Hair colour,
eye colour, favourite food, type of abode etc. etc. Then prints out some
descriptive prose.

Teaches the concept of data and how you can use data when writing. Also
leads onto discussion/writing work about identity, human body,
environment, diet etc. etc.

THEN PROGRESS TO US

The whole class can enter data and the pupils can analyse this using
simple graphical queries. Data handling again - they could print simple
block graphs and pictograms to look at frequencies of eye colour for
instance.

A progression from me where the class discuss themselves and learn that
not only can you put data in a useful form for learning but you can have
lots of this data and get interesting information from it.

Leads to further discussion about the differences between themselves and
wider social issues - particularly in geographical locations where
ethnic origin is important. Why are some people taller, what about skin
colour? Is it important? Should so many of the class be eating lots of
sweets? Is it good for you? etc. etc.

The charts they'd print to get this data would cover maths.

SURVEYS

A survey program that prints tally charts and simple graphs.

Simply enter a little data.

Useful for those science projects when kids collect data on weather and
other topics. How they get to school. all sorts of things.

PAINT PROGRAM

We all know we need a simple paint program. But a one with useful
features for maths such as symmetry and is configurable so the teacher
can gradually introduce more advanced features.

PROGRAM LAUNCHER

A simple program launcher would be a good idea.

WORD LIBRARY/DICTIONARY

I don't know if this is possible in X. But could there be a program that
can contain a set of wordlists - topic related. That the teacher could
pre-configure so that students could quickly enter more difficult words
into their documents?

GOES WITHOUT SAYING THAT WE NEED WORDPROCESSORS FOR DIFFERENT AGES.

FIRST WRITERS

Simple wordprocessor with the majority of text formatting features
removed and the emphasis based on writing short sentences on each page
with maybe a graphic that they can put at N,S,E,W. Choose font size
only, small, medium, large. Attach a sound effect to each page.

Then they could for instance write about their day at the beach. With
sounds to illustrate what they're saying. Or they could read out their
own story to make an audio-visual presentation.

If you could move pages around easily then the program could be adapted
to help with sorting and sequencing exercises.

This has implications in the classroom for teaching things such as the
child brushed his teeth before he went to school. Young ones often give
accounts in the wrong order and understanding chronology forms the basis
of history in later years.

Teachers could use such a system to make little presentations about
things they're studying or just for things such as flashcards. Teaching
the alphabet - kids could sort the alphabet in the right order. Teaching
number bonds or multiplication tables.

The possibilities are endless.

FURTHER BEGINNERS HISTORY

The concept of now and then. Foundation for all history in later years.

Kids find it difficult to understand concepts such candles and oil lamps
were once used to light rooms but now we use electricity. They live in
the present and find it difficult to grasp that there was something
around before them.

This again, would be a sorting exercise which through drill and practice
would help them to understand.

TALKING BOOKS

What about a generic program that allows teachers/parents/ anyone to
quicly and easily create talking books with little animations and
explanations for hard words etc.

TELLING THE TIME

Differences between analouge and digital clocks.

Set the time. Compare two times. Give a digital time and set it on the
clockface etc.

CALCULATOR

A configurable calculator with big buttons and display.

NEWS SIMULATION PROGRAM

Teachers could use this program that posts events on the screen like
news bulletins so that pupils could explore the events that took place
around a time in history for example. Leads to discussion work,
chronology

You could use this in history, Religious studies, Literacy.

LOGO

But I'm already discussing that one - see the thread

But really you could write little programs on anything to do with
spacial awarenes, estimation etc..

Moving cargo between ships for example. Moving a character around a map
to see what's there with nice animations as a reward.

MATHS

Program that could guide a child through difficult concepts like long
division and long multiplication.

LITERACY

There was a great old program in England in the eighties called Tray.

You had different texts and the pupils had to enter a letter - it would
show up that letter right through the text and give them a score.

The idea was that they'd keep picking letters that the thought would
have the highest frequency to get the highest score.

Simple idea but a very effective teaching aid.


There's a few to get on with,

I'll post some more maybe tomorrow.

Roman.