[Squeakland] Thank you to all who have gone before

[Mankovsky, Sheine]

Very please to hear about your exerience.  However, I don't know what a
skateboarder kid is.  Would you please tell me a little more about that.
Sheine

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	RATZEL, MARSHA [SMTP:MRATZEL at bv229.k12.ks.us]
> Sent:	Friday, November 07, 2003 8:18 PM
> To:	squeakland at squeakland.org
> Subject:	[Squeakland] Thank you to all who have gone before
> 
> It is with much hesitation that I write this, but also with great
> excitement.  I learned about Squeak this summer and then took the plunge
> with my students the past few weeks in experimenting with it.  We have
> experienced everything possible....from excitement to frustration.  My
> students have been so enchanted that they have gone home, downloaded it
> and played with it and come in and chattered away with what they figured
> out on their own...and then showed all of us what they learned. Does it
> get any better than that?  Don't think so.  We've worked to learn how to
> build scripts, tests, paint, and on and on and on.  We've tried almost all
> of the different green tiles and tried to see what they do....almost like
> the old math guess and check method.  Then we wrote down what they did.
> Pretty crude but we didn't know how else to attack it and it sort of
> worked.  Then we just jumped in and figured out which ones we could use to
> do the things we wanted to do to build the animation!
> s the kids wanted to create.  Barbie cars at the beach, rocket ships,
> Sonic the hedgehog, skateboarders, and on and on. We had a gallery showing
> today and they pretty much worked and we called it good.
>  
> Yet, it is so frustrating at the same time.  There isn't enough places to
> go to learn what to do and how to fix stuff.  And we've had tears when
> we've lost stuff or they've been so frustrated that they just gave up.
> One of my skateboarder kids just freaked and quit.  Hopefully he'll try
> again but I just didn't know what to do to help him anymore than I did.
>  
> But I count it all a victory because this Squeak is very cool and engages
> them like I haven't seen anything else do.  I am working so hard at
> getting one of our math teachers to let me integrate this into one of the
> modules they have.  I'm experimenting at home in my spare time and if I
> can come up with something, I think she'll be up for it.  Because I think
> the real excitement of this is really out in the math or science classroom
> instead of just in my animations....although they are great fun.
>  
> All of you who write on this list do things I don't understand.....that's
> OK because someday I will.  I thank you for having something like this for
> teachers like me who want to learn and having a place just to listen in on
> those of you who do get it.  And I wanted to share our small victory with
> you because it is inspired by what you write and I read.  So thank you.
>  
> marsha ratzel
> 
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