The various types of education

[Douglas Loss <dloss@csrlink.net>]

Bill's post about the lessons that are taught at the lower grade levels
brought something to mind.  I think we have two fundamentally different
concepts of computer education here.  The one Bill was shown is education
_about_ computers--how to use them, what the various components do, etc.  The
 other one, and the one I think most of were thinking of, is education _with_
 computers--using computers to help teach about non-computer (or not
necessarily computer) related topics.  These are both valuable things, but
are quite different in the lessons to be taught and probably somewhat
different in the tools to be used.

For education about computers, I think we need to develop a good typing
tutor, similar to any of the many that are available for Mac/Win computers.
We also could use something along the lines of the old DOS Tutor programs,
but targetted to Linux.  I'm sending this message along to a fellow from the
Netherlands, Arnold Hendriks, who mentioned to me a while ago that he might
try to write such a tutorial program.  Arnold, I hope you're still
considering doing so (or have started).  I'm sure that if you have any
questions or requests for assistance we can come up with something.  Finally,
 a good computer-based-training (CBT) program to familiarize students with
the components would be useful.

--
Doug Loss            An idealist is one who, on noticing that
dloss@csrlink.net    roses smell better than cabbage, concludes
(717) 326-3987       that they will also make better soup.
                        H. L. Mencken