[Edu-sig] socratic methods

Mon, 9 Oct 2000 10:30:25 -0400

Hi Michal

OK.

I have come across some of what you are describing - but often called 'Mind
Maps' which is popularized [coined?] by Tony Buzan in his work. His best
know book is:

The Mind Map Book : How to Use Radiant Thinking to Maximize Your Brain's
Untapped Potential
by Tony Buzan
Paperback Reprint edition (March 1996)
Plume; ISBN: 0452273226
Searching at Amazon will show more books by Tony Buzan and others writers..

The system you mention implies some nice nuances which often get glossed
over in the more populist mind-map 'market'. There is room for real
improvement - and some juicy research to do.

I suppose one axis is UML and Pattern thinking. A good new book I found last
week:
A UML Patten Language by Paul Evitts
ISBN 1-57870-118-X
Unlike some of the other OOPS Pattern software books, this one strikes a
better balance between abstraction and practical steps - imho stays much
closer the  spirit on Christopher Alexander's original books 'A Pattern
Language' , 'The Timeless way of Building' and 'Notes on the Synthesis of
Form'

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN%3D0195019199/theisisgroup00A/002-4848
534-5812817
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN%3D0195024028/theisisgroup00A/002-4848
534-5812817
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674627512/ref=sim_books/002-4848534-
5812817

Some excerpts oriented towards Pattern Language use in education
http://www.bigbangworkshops.com/html/pattern_language.htm
[some good Alexander links at the bottom of that page]

There are many references now to interface design inspired by Alexander.
For example:
http://www.maplefish.com/todd/papers/experiences/Experiences.html
or
http://c2.com/ppr/catsfate.html
or
http://www.acm.org/sigchi/chi97/proceedings/short-talk/gca.htm
[warning some of these may make you crazy..]

Meanwhile, there are lots of web pages directly about Mind maps. Most of
these derive from Tony Buzan's work.

A book/ seminar
http://www.mindmap.de/brainland.engl.htm

Some papers and articles
http://www.sci.mus.mn.us/sln/tf/nav/tfmindmaps.html
http://www.mindtools.com/mindmaps.html
http://www.thenakedpc.com/articles/v03/10/0310-04.html

http://www.ozemail.com.au/~caveman/Creative/Mindmap/Radiant.html

http://www.acm.org/sigchi/chi97/proceedings/poster/mil.htm

An XML Librarian's perspective
Mind Maps: Hot New Tools Proposed for Cyberspace Librarians
http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jun99/humphreys.htm

At the hard core extreme and for inspiration there is this book studying the
internal brain mechanisms:
The Hippocampal and Parietal Foundations of Spatial Cognition
by N. Burgess (Editor), Kathryn Jeffery (Editor), John O'Keefe (Editor)
Paperback (February 1999)
Oxford University Press; ISBN: 0198524528

I haven't read this but it may well probably fascinating

One that I have and would recommend __highly__ is:

Dynamic Patterns : The Self-Organization of Brain and Behavior (Complex
Adaptive Systems)
by J. A. Scott Kelso
Paperback - 360 pages Reprint edition (March 1997)
Bradford Books; ISBN: 0262611317

"For the past twenty years Scott Kelso's research has focused on extending
the physical concepts of self- organization and the mathematical tools of
nonlinear dynamics to understand how human beings (and human brains)
perceive, intend, learn, control, and coordinate complex behaviors. In this
book Kelso proposes a new, general framework within which to connect brain,
mind, and behavior.

Kelso's prescription for mental life breaks dramatically with the classical
computational approach that is still the operative framework for many newer
psychological and neurophysiological studies. His core thesis is that the
creation and evolution of patterned behavior at all levels -- from neurons
to mind -- is governed by the generic processes of self-organization. Both
human brain and behavior are shown to exhibit features of pattern-forming
dynamical systems, including multistability, abrupt phase transitions,
crises, and intermittency.
"

You may think this is going overboard for your application, adn may well be
correct. But mind maps are fascinating because they tap into many aspects of
our cognition, learning, perceptions. Thinking about how to model a system
can go way beyond a simple stripped down smart paintbox interface.

Some available mind-map software
http://www.inspiration.com/
http://www.mindman.com/

ZigZag
http://www.xanadu.net/zigzag/tutorial/ZZwelcome.html
http://www.xanadu.net/zigzag/
"locally rational, globally paradoxical,
yet somehow comprehensible. "
[I just found this and it looks like there are some _very_ unique ideas
here: not surprising considering where it's hosted]

Before making a Python version, you should definitely play with ''The
Brain':  http://www.thebrain.com/
It is among the most innovative interactive mind-map-like software
interfaces I know of. Their focus is not for mind-mapping directly, instead
focus is on meta-links and focus-based information interfaces. But you'll
literally 'see the connection' when you play with it.

I am personally interested in all kind of maps. I think visually, spatially,
dynamically. I use pen and paper to sketch for myself constantly as a
thinking tool, but also regularly as support in conversation. I am certainly
interested to work with you on this one.

I imagine in an educational python context, would be to have command line
access to a mind-map causal tree connective type structure. One needs a few
basic drawing tools, but need them to be interactive so one can organize
them in rapid ways. But one also would like to be able to send messages
between them, and be able to view the structure as XML or in some nested
dictionary type class instance. The end result must be very simple to use.
Should be supported by a versatile 'socratic' python engine capable of
connecting to any other modules or systems.

### I am generally very wary about rigid cause and effect.. I think such a
tool may be useful in schools to model philosophy and to also thus reveal
the paradoxes and innate problems with cause+effect thinking as well as its
great engineering virtues.. top-down / bottom-up. Programming depends deeply
on cause-effect structures.. Life ? hmm well that is not so simple.. :-)

Some important existing Python graphics toolkits to look for both design
ideas, and for use as implementation components include:

Gato - Graph Animation Toolbox
http://www.zpr.uni-koeln.de/~gato/index.html

PIDDLE -  Plug-In Drawing, Does Little Else
http://piddle.sourceforge.net/

PMing 0.0.1a -  Tiny wrapper to the ming library (to output swf files).

Sketch 0.6.3 -  Sketch is a vector drawing program for Linux and other
unices, intended to be a flexible and powerful tool for illustrations,
diagrams and other purposes.
http://sketch.sourceforge.net/

vtk - Visualization ToolKit -  Vtk is a high-level graphical visualization
toolkit with support for Python.
http://www.kitware.com/vtk.html

Enjoy!

- Jason
________________________________________________________________
Jason CUNLIFFE = NOMADICS['Interactive Art and Technology'].DesignDirector

----- Original Message -----
From: Michal Wallace <sabren@manifestation.com>
To: <edu-sig@python.org>
Sent: Monday, October 09, 2000 1:53 AM
Subject: [Edu-sig] socratic methods

>
> Hi,
>
> I'm new here, but I've been lurking a while, and it seems this list is
> a really awesome mutli-disciplinary sort of community.  I'm really
> impressed with all you bright people on here and the quality of
> discussions.. :) Anyway, I thougt I'd bring this up:
>
> Any of y'all ever read the theory of constraint books by Eli Goldratt?
> He teaches (perfectly logical but quite unconventional) business
> practices through socratic methods and story. Here's a quick example:
>
> http://www.goldratt.com/chpt11.htm
>
> One of his big things is a set of thinking tools (described in a novel
> called "It's not Luck").. The idea is you figure out the cause-effect
> relationships that lead to a current undesireable situation, and
> work your way back to the core issues. This is called a current
> reality tree. I made one for myself not too long ago:
>
> http://www.sabren.com/upgrade/charts/CRT20000930.gif
>
> Once you understand the current system, you can map out a future
> reality tree that shows in precise logical steps what you want to
> happen. Then you build a transition tree to connect the two.
>
> The interesting thing is that you can also think of it as a teaching
> tool. You can map out trees of current and desired thinking habits,
> and build a transition tree that leads logically from one way of
> thinking to another.
>
> Now it takes a great deal of human thought to come up with these
> trees, but once they've been mapped out, just about anyone can follow
> them.  (Look at the link above. The if/then flow goes from bottom to
> top unless there's an arrow pointing the other way)
>
> I think it would be really cool if a computer could be programmed
> with a tree like this to teach people using the socratic method.
>
> That is, it asks the user questions, and based on the answer either
> helps the user to understand things better, or progresses along the
> tree to the next step..
>
> I don't know too much about computer aided instruction, but I know
> I've never seen a computer that used socratic methods to inform
> people.. They usually present information rather than ask questions.
> (or if they ask questions, it's like a test, not a conversation)..
>
> Anyway, I'd like to build a system like this to help with my own
> thinking and to help other people. The system's called plato [python
> logic and truth objects; it'll have a lot of prolog concepts in there,
> and double as a general mechanical-reasoning library for other python
> programmers]
>
> Anyway, is anyone interested in helping, or at least discussing it on
> this list?  :)
>
> Cheers,
>
> - Michal
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> www.manifestation.com  www.sabren.com  www.linkwatcher.com  www.zike.net