Changing Minds: Computers, Learning, and Literacy

Notes from my Beginner Computer Literacy Class Part 1 - Alex’s Writing Journal

Helping the uninitiated navigate this brave new digital world

‘I hate what AI is doing to the minds and happiness of the young’: Katherine Rundell on the view from the classroom

Education is at a crossroads, argues the author and academic. Should we embrace new technology in the name of efficiency, or is it time to fight back?

» Apple, Carmen Sandiego, and the Rise of Edutainment The Digital Antiquarian

If there was any one application that was the favorite amongst early boosters of personal computing, it was education. Indeed, it could sometimes be difficult to find one of those digital utopianists who was willing to prioritize anything else — unsurprisingly, given that so much early PC culture grew out of places like The People’s Computer Company, who made “knowledge is power” their de facto mantra and talked of teaching people about computers and using computers to teach with equal countercultural fervor. Creative Computing, the first monthly magazine dedicated to personal computing, grew out of that idealistic milieu, founded by an educational consultant who filled a big chunk of its pages with plans, schemes, and dreams for computers as tools for democratizing, improving, and just making schooling more fun. A few years later, when Apple started selling the II, they pushed it hard as the learning computer, making deals with the influential likes of the Minnesota Educational Consortium (MECC) of Oregon Trail fame that gave the machine a luster none of its competitors could touch. For much of the adult public, who may have had their first exposure to a PC when they visited a child’s classroom, the Apple II became synonymous with the PC, which was in turn almost synonymous with education in the days before IBM turned it into a business machine. We can still see the effect today: when journalists and advertisers look for an easy story of innovation to which to compare some new gadget, it’s always the Apple II they choose, not the TRS-80 or Commodore PET. And the iconic image of an Apple II in the public’s imagination remains a group of children gathered around it in a classroom.

The Second Brain That Grows Smarter and Lives on your Computer

How a spark from Andrej Karpathy, app called Obsidian, and “The Curator”, the app I built are changing the way I think.

Care at the Edge of Automation – Topos Institute

Technologies don’t just solve problems, they change us. We invent technologies, and they invent us in turn, shaping our lives and worlds. This is the phenomenon that Terry Winograd and Fernando Flores, in Understanding Computers and Cognition (1986), called “ontological design.” It matters now more than ever—along with a second lesson they saw clearly. Technological research is always guided (and sometimes misguided) by deep ontological assumptions about, e.g., the nature of cognition, agency, and communication. If we are to create technologies that truly serve human flourishing and care, we must bring these hidden assumptions into the open and question them at their roots.

Telepath: building a new kind of computer

So, we made a thing: Let’s back up: for as long as I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with computers, fascinated not just by what they can do but what they could become. Like many, I took my early inspiration from science fiction. I dreamed of someday having something like the Enterprise’s computer. And why not? Science fiction has always driven scientists, engineers, and inventors to create real things that change the world.

Callysto: Bringing Jupyter and Computational Thinking to the K-12 Curriculum

Cybera and the Pacific Institute for Mathematical Sciences are participating in the new national CanCode program, to develop coding and digital skills from kindergarten to grade 12.  With the launch of the Callysto project, we are creating tools and frameworks that help teachers bring computational thinking into their math, science, social sciences, and humanities courses - giving students the analytical skills needed to comprehend the digital world. Leveraging the Jupyter 'All-in-One' Science Platform to put friendly yet powerful compute tools in classroom settings, we are creating showcase modules and workshop training for K-12 teachers to incorporate data and computing into the broad curriculum.  At this presentation, you will learn about how Callysto will:  Bring computational thinking to classrooms through K-12 teacher training  Create opportunities to participate in free workshop training sessions and content creation  Help K-12 teachers gain public recognition for participating in this educational training project Note: This presentation is related to our 2017 BCNET presentation on "Bringing The Thunder: Deploying Jupyter Notebooks For Research, Education, And Innovation." View Slidedeck

Towards Critical Artificial Intelligence Literacies

Critical Artificial Intelligence Literacies (CAILs) is the collection of ways of thinking about and relating to so-called artificial intelligence (AI) that rejects dominant frames presented by the technology industry, by naive computationalism, and by dehumanising ideologies. Instead, CAILs centre human cognition and uphold the integrity of academic research and education. We present a selection of CAILs across research and education, which we analyse into the following non-orthogonal dimensions: conceptual clarity, critical thinking, decoloniality, respecting expertise, and slow science. Finally, we note how we see the present with and without a wider adoption of CAILs — a fundamental aspect is the assertion that AI cannot be allowed to drive change, even positive change, in education or research. Instead cultivation of and adherence to shared values and goals must guide us. Ultimately, CAILs minimally ask us to contemplate how we as academics can stop AI companies from wielding so much power.

Optimistic Computing

I recently made two new friends: Abhinav Omprakash and Dawn Walker. Abhinav said I’m an optimist and I should write about it. Dawn said I shouldn’t try to coin any new terms. I should know better, but this essay follows Abhinav’s recommendation — and credits Dawn, in the very likely event I should have followed her advice instead. I have been alive for approximately four decades. Each of those decades was witness to its own fun brand of computering.

Amelia Wattenberger

I create things on the web, explore novel interfaces, turn data into meaning, and empower devs with AI.

Edufuturists

Edufuturists bring a bold, innovative approach to education, challenging the status quo and advocating for personalised learning experiences that develop critical skills. We inspire educators and learners alike to embrace technology, foster real-world relevance, and promote lifelong learning for a rapidly changing future.

Academia: What Was "Digital Literacy"?

Short Shelf Lives Make For Bad Curricular Planning

an elegy for the pencil

how computers changed the way we write

I Love the Computer

An exploration of how I became a massive geek.