[Squeakland] Thank you to all who have gone before

[Doug Clapp]

eToys, in my opinion, needs an accomplished Squeaker who will claim and own
and love that code.

doug


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "RATZEL, MARSHA" <MRATZEL at bv229.k12.ks.us>
To: <squeakland at squeakland.org>
Sent: Friday, November 07, 2003 7:18 PM
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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