From urnerk at qwest.net  Fri Dec  2 00:06:34 2005
From: urnerk at qwest.net (Kirby Urner)
Date: Thu, 1 Dec 2005 15:06:34 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Recap of 2 Python classes
Message-ID: <20051201230640.B29B11E4010@bag.python.org>

Quiet around here.

So I did two classes for 8th graders, 7 to go.  One was pre-Thanksgiving and
included some play with Google Earth.  Did you know you can share Places
using XML files (.kml)?  Example:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<kml xmlns="http://earth.google.com/kml/2.0">
<Placemark>
  <name>Climatron</name>
  <LookAt>
    <longitude>-90.2588032444306</longitude>
    <latitude>38.61412902659804</latitude>
    <range>191.4235683380654</range>
    <tilt>-8.190895111017013e-011</tilt>
    <heading>0.01079095337023216</heading>
  </LookAt>
  <styleUrl>root://styleMaps#default+nicon=0x307+hicon=0x317</styleUrl>
  <Point>
    <coordinates>-90.2588032444306,38.61412902659804,0</coordinates>
  </Point>
</Placemark>
</kml>

Just go File | Open and bring it in (e.g. test.kml).

Anyway, every kid has IDLE going, and the first thing I had them do is ask
for the type of a lot of primitive objects e.g.

>>> type(10)
<type 'int'>
>>> type('cat')
<type 'str'>

Then I dove into collection types (lists, dictionaries and strings).  Shall
we call strings a collection type?  They're a lot like lists, aren't they?

I use the collection types to introduce dot notation.

Kids seem to like the ability to manipulate strings more than anything.
Numbers are maybe too ordinary or less cool in some way.

Next week, we'll be looking at functions for the first time.

Anyway, pretty hum drum.  I'm posting more about math/cs at the Math Forum
than in any Python list, since the concepts are pretty familiar around here.
It's the math teachers who're still somewhat innumerate.

Kirby



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Fri Dec  2 01:18:22 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Thu, 01 Dec 2005 16:18:22 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] I've just started reading this paper
Message-ID: <dmo3s3$2rl$1@sea.gmane.org>

I've just started reading this paper (wish it covered Python):

   Lowering the barriers to programming: A taxonomy of
       programming environments and languages for novice programmers
ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR)
Volume 37 ,  Issue 2  (June 2005)
Caitlin Kelleher, Randy Pausch
http://portal.acm.org/tipsvc.cfm?id=1089734&sess=%27%2BL%2F%2DP%5CK%2B30O%24%0A

If anyone else wants to grab a copy and chat about it after reading,
let me know.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From urnerk at qwest.net  Fri Dec  2 21:24:35 2005
From: urnerk at qwest.net (Kirby Urner)
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2005 12:24:35 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] I've just started reading this paper
In-Reply-To: <dmo3s3$2rl$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <20051202202440.3EFE61E4017@bag.python.org>

> If anyone else wants to grab a copy and chat about it after reading,
> let me know.
> 
> --Scott David Daniels
> Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org

Downloading now...  I anticipate having some comments.

Kirby



From damonbryant at msn.com  Fri Dec  2 23:19:29 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2005 16:19:29 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
Message-ID: <BAY115-F371352D3DBD5CB0630133ABE4C0@phx.gbl>

Hey folks!

Lindel Grandel and I have been working on some Python questions for 
potential use in high schools, college, and employment. If you are 
interested in taking one of the online tests go to
http://www.adaptiveassessmentservices.com and self-register to take one of 
two Python tests: one is Declarative (knowledge of built-in data types and 
functions) and the other is Procedural (application of loops, import, 
functions,...,etc.). I would like to know what you think. Thanks in advance!

Damon



From vceder at canterburyschool.org  Fri Dec  2 23:37:56 2005
From: vceder at canterburyschool.org (Vern Ceder)
Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2005 17:37:56 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F371352D3DBD5CB0630133ABE4C0@phx.gbl>
References: <BAY115-F371352D3DBD5CB0630133ABE4C0@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <4390CCC4.6010005@canterburyschool.org>

In my opinion, you would get more responses if the testing system 
accepted a browser/OS combination other than IE/Windows....

Cheers,
Vern Ceder (using Firefox and Ubuntu Linux)

damon bryant wrote:
> Hey folks!
> 
> Lindel Grandel and I have been working on some Python questions for 
> potential use in high schools, college, and employment. If you are 
> interested in taking one of the online tests go to
> http://www.adaptiveassessmentservices.com and self-register to take one of 
> two Python tests: one is Declarative (knowledge of built-in data types and 
> functions) and the other is Procedural (application of loops, import, 
> functions,...,etc.). I would like to know what you think. Thanks in advance!
> 
> Damon
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Edu-sig mailing list
> Edu-sig at python.org
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig

-- 
This time for sure!
    -Bullwinkle J. Moose
-----------------------------
Vern Ceder, Director of Technology
Canterbury School, 3210 Smith Road, Ft Wayne, IN 46804
vceder at canterburyschool.org; 260-436-0746; FAX: 260-436-5137

From urnerk at qwest.net  Sat Dec  3 04:50:36 2005
From: urnerk at qwest.net (Kirby Urner)
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2005 19:50:36 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <4390CCC4.6010005@canterburyschool.org>
Message-ID: <20051203035041.A19481E4009@bag.python.org>

Similar comment.  I'm on Windows but don't want to be tested by a service
that won't let me use FireFox.  I have tests too.

Kirby


> -----Original Message-----
> From: edu-sig-bounces at python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces at python.org] On
> Behalf Of Vern Ceder
> Sent: Friday, December 02, 2005 2:38 PM
> To: damon bryant
> Cc: edu-sig at python.org
> Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
> 
> In my opinion, you would get more responses if the testing system
> accepted a browser/OS combination other than IE/Windows....
> 
> Cheers,
> Vern Ceder (using Firefox and Ubuntu Linux)



From damonbryant at msn.com  Sat Dec  3 05:06:29 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2005 22:06:29 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <MC5-F260U6zvMp9bhSi0004afb7@mc5-f26.hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F2777C7DBAD63EC9F97D9F5BE4F0@phx.gbl>

I tweaked it now where all other browsers and OS combinations can access the 
computer adaptive tests. Performance may be unpredictable though.

Damon

>From: "Kirby Urner" <urnerk at qwest.net>
>To: "'Vern Ceder'" <vceder at canterburyschool.org>,  "'damon bryant'" 
><damonbryant at msn.com>
>CC: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: RE: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2005 19:50:36 -0800
>
>Similar comment.  I'm on Windows but don't want to be tested by a service
>that won't let me use FireFox.  I have tests too.
>
>Kirby
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: edu-sig-bounces at python.org [mailto:edu-sig-bounces at python.org] On
> > Behalf Of Vern Ceder
> > Sent: Friday, December 02, 2005 2:38 PM
> > To: damon bryant
> > Cc: edu-sig at python.org
> > Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
> >
> > In my opinion, you would get more responses if the testing system
> > accepted a browser/OS combination other than IE/Windows....
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Vern Ceder (using Firefox and Ubuntu Linux)
>
>



From urnerk at qwest.net  Sat Dec  3 16:44:32 2005
From: urnerk at qwest.net (Kirby Urner)
Date: Sat, 3 Dec 2005 07:44:32 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F2777C7DBAD63EC9F97D9F5BE4F0@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <20051203154440.460881E4009@bag.python.org>

> I tweaked it now where all other browsers and OS combinations can access
> the computer adaptive tests. Performance may be unpredictable though.
> 
> Damon

OK, thanks.  Worked with no problems.

As an administrator, I'd be curious to get the actual text of missed
problems (maybe via URL), not just a raw percentage (I got 90% i.e. 2 wrong
-- probably the one about getting current working directory, not sure which
other).

The problems seemed to get much easier in the last 5 or so (very basic
syntax questions).  The one about "James"=="james" returning -1 is no longer
true on some Pythons (as now we have boolean True).

The font used to pose the questions was a little distracting.  I vastly
prefer fixed width fonts when programming.  I know that's a personal
preference (some actually like variable pitch -- blech).  Perhaps as a
future enhancement, you could let the user customize the font?

Anyway, a useful service.  I could see teachers like me wanting to use this
with our classes.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Kirby


-- 
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.11/191 - Release Date: 12/2/2005
 


From damonbryant at msn.com  Sat Dec  3 18:19:48 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Sat, 03 Dec 2005 11:19:48 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY0-MC2-F12KudyJNg006e64ed@bay0-mc2-f12.bay0.hotmail.com>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F25F7069F233F3C1C2A44E2BE4F0@phx.gbl>

Kirby:

Thank you for your feedback!

You completed the Declarative measure.  I am also interested in your 
feedback on the Procedural test in which Python application or procedural 
questions are administered. Questions on this part are coded and displayed 
as they appear in the IDLE with highlighted key words and indentation for 
nested code. I think the longest code problem is about 20 lines.

I appreciate your comment on the ability to specify font type/size because 
I'm currently working to accommodate persons with disabilities and others 
who may have difficulty viewing the text.

Linda Grandel and I have an experimental site that we use for research and 
educational purposes; we are going to trial some Python questions for a 
class of her colleagues but are having some difficultly translating the 
testing in a short period. This is a long-term project.

We have the goal of developing a worldwide database of Python test norms in 
an effort to track progress on the spread and proficiency of the language in 
different countries. Although it is a great idea, it is too large for a 
dissertation research project. If you are interested in trialing it with 
your class, perhaps we can collaborate.

You did notice that towards the end, questions got easier for you. The test 
algorithm is adaptive but the question bank from which the items are pulled 
is not that large. In other words, the test presented items that were most 
appropriate for you when you began the test. As you got more items correct 
you got harder questions. In contrast, if you initially got questions 
incorrect, you would have received easier questions. Because the bank is so 
small (I do have plans of expanding it when I get some more time on my 
hands), you exhausted the bank of difficult questions and began to receive 
easier items. The opposite would have happened to an examinee of very low 
ability.

My goal is to administer a computer adaptive Python test where examinees 
will only receive questions that are most appropriate for them. In other 
words, different examinees will be tested according to their ability. This 
goes back to Binet's idea of tailored testing where the psychologist 
administering the intelligence test would give items to an examinee based on 
previous responses. In the present case, it's done by computer using an 
artificially intelligent algorithm based on my dissertation. By expanding 
the question bank, I'll be able to reach that goal.


>From: "Kirby Urner" <urnerk at qwest.net>
>To: "'damon bryant'" <damonbryant at msn.com>, vceder at canterburyschool.org
>CC: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: RE: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Sat, 3 Dec 2005 07:44:32 -0800
>
> > I tweaked it now where all other browsers and OS combinations can access
> > the computer adaptive tests. Performance may be unpredictable though.
> >
> > Damon
>
>OK, thanks.  Worked with no problems.
>
>As an administrator, I'd be curious to get the actual text of missed
>problems (maybe via URL), not just a raw percentage (I got 90% i.e. 2 wrong
>-- probably the one about getting current working directory, not sure which
>other).
>
>The problems seemed to get much easier in the last 5 or so (very basic
>syntax questions).  The one about "James"=="james" returning -1 is no 
>longer
>true on some Pythons (as now we have boolean True).
>
>The font used to pose the questions was a little distracting.  I vastly
>prefer fixed width fonts when programming.  I know that's a personal
>preference (some actually like variable pitch -- blech).  Perhaps as a
>future enhancement, you could let the user customize the font?
>
>Anyway, a useful service.  I could see teachers like me wanting to use this
>with our classes.
>
>Thank you for giving me this opportunity.
>
>Kirby
>
>
>--
>No virus found in this outgoing message.
>Checked by AVG Free Edition.
>Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.11/191 - Release Date: 12/2/2005
>
>



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Sat Dec  3 21:03:06 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Sat, 03 Dec 2005 12:03:06 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F25F7069F233F3C1C2A44E2BE4F0@phx.gbl>
References: <BAY0-MC2-F12KudyJNg006e64ed@bay0-mc2-f12.bay0.hotmail.com>
	<BAY115-F25F7069F233F3C1C2A44E2BE4F0@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <dmstle$pk9$1@sea.gmane.org>

damon bryant wrote:
> As you got more items correct 
> you got harder questions. In contrast, if you initially got questions 
> incorrect, you would have received easier questions....
In the 70s there was research on such systems (keeping people at 80%
correct is great rule-of-thumb goal).  See Stuff done at Stanford's
Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences.  At IMSSS
we did lots of this kind of stuff.  We generally broke the skills into
strands (separate concepts), and kept track of the student's performance
in each strand separately (try it; it helps).  BIP (Basic Instructional
Program) was an ONR (Office of Naval Research) sponsored system, that
tried to teach "programming in Basic."  The BIP model (and often the
"standard" IMSSS model) was to score every task in each strand, and find
the "best" for the student based on his current position.
For arithmetic, we actually generated problems based on the different
desired strand properties; nobody was clever enough to generate software
problems; we simply consulted our DB.  We taught how to do proofs in
Logic and Set Theory using some of these techniques.
Names to look for on papers in the 70s-80s include Patrick Suppes (head
of one side of IMSSS), Richard Atkinson (head of the other side),
Barbara Searle, Avron Barr, and Marian Beard.  These are not the only
people who worked there, but a number I recall that should help you to
find the research publications (try Google Scholar).


A follow-on for some of this work is:
     http://www-epgy.stanford.edu/

I worked there "back in the day" and was quite proud to be a part of
some of that work.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From damonbryant at msn.com  Sun Dec  4 19:52:56 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Sun, 04 Dec 2005 12:52:56 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <dmstle$pk9$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F155B9C0B2D59B66D88BD87BE4E0@phx.gbl>


Scott:

I will attempt to incorporate your suggestion of keeping track of 
performance; I'll need to create some attributes on the examinee objects 
that will hold past test scores created within the system.

I am, however, approaching the scoring differently. Although I do report 
percentage correct, I'm using Item Response Theory to (1) score each 
question, (2) estimate ability using a Bayesian algorithm based on maximum 
likelihood, (3) estimate the error in the estimate of ability, and (4) 
select the most appropriate question to administer next. This is very 
similar to what is done at the Educational Testing Service in Princeton with 
the computer adaptive versions of the SAT and the GRE. I don't know the 
language used to develop their platform, but this one for the demo is 
developed in Python using numarray and multithreading modules to widen the 
bottlenecks and speed the delivery of test questions served in html format 
to the client's page.

Thanks for your comments!

By the way, I am looking for teachers, preferably middle and high school, 
who would be willing to trial the system. I have another site where they 
will have the ability to enroll students, monitor testing status, and view 
scores for all students. Do you know of any?




>From: Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org>
>To: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Sat, 03 Dec 2005 12:03:06 -0800
>
>damon bryant wrote:
> > As you got more items correct
> > you got harder questions. In contrast, if you initially got questions
> > incorrect, you would have received easier questions....
>In the 70s there was research on such systems (keeping people at 80%
>correct is great rule-of-thumb goal).  See Stuff done at Stanford's
>Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences.  At IMSSS
>we did lots of this kind of stuff.  We generally broke the skills into
>strands (separate concepts), and kept track of the student's performance
>in each strand separately (try it; it helps).  BIP (Basic Instructional
>Program) was an ONR (Office of Naval Research) sponsored system, that
>tried to teach "programming in Basic."  The BIP model (and often the
>"standard" IMSSS model) was to score every task in each strand, and find
>the "best" for the student based on his current position.
>For arithmetic, we actually generated problems based on the different
>desired strand properties; nobody was clever enough to generate software
>problems; we simply consulted our DB.  We taught how to do proofs in
>Logic and Set Theory using some of these techniques.
>Names to look for on papers in the 70s-80s include Patrick Suppes (head
>of one side of IMSSS), Richard Atkinson (head of the other side),
>Barbara Searle, Avron Barr, and Marian Beard.  These are not the only
>people who worked there, but a number I recall that should help you to
>find the research publications (try Google Scholar).
>
>
>A follow-on for some of this work is:
>      http://www-epgy.stanford.edu/
>
>I worked there "back in the day" and was quite proud to be a part of
>some of that work.
>
>--Scott David Daniels
>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Sun Dec  4 20:32:27 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:32:27 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F155B9C0B2D59B66D88BD87BE4E0@phx.gbl>
References: <dmstle$pk9$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<BAY115-F155B9C0B2D59B66D88BD87BE4E0@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <dmvg7v$gkk$1@sea.gmane.org>

I wrote:
 >> ... keeping people at 80% correct is great rule-of-thumb goal ...

To elaborate on the statement above a bit, we did drill-and practice
teaching (and had students loving it).  The value of the 80% is for
maximal learning.  Something like 50% is the best for measurement theory
(but discourages the student drastically).  In graduate school I had
one instructor who tried to target his tests to get 50% as the average
mark.  It was incredibly discouraging for most of the students (I
eventually came to be OK with it, but it took half the course).

The hardest part to create is the courseware (including questions), the
second-hardest effort is scoring the questions (rating the difficulty in
all applicable strands).  The software to deliver the questions was, in
many senses, a less labor-intensive task (especially when amortized over
a number of courses).  I think we came up with at least a ten-to-one
ratio (may have been higher, but definitely not lower) in effort
compared to the new prep for a course by an instructor.

I am (and was) a programming, rather than an education, guy.  I do not
know the education theory behind our research well, but I know how a
lot of the code worked (and know where some of our papers went).  We
kept an exponentially decaying model of the student's ability in each
"strand" and used that to help the estimate of his score in the coming
question "cloud."  A simplified version of the same approach would be
to have strand-specific questions, randomly pick a strand, and pick the
"best" question for that student in that strand.  Or, you could bias the
choices between strands to give more balanced progress (increasing the
probability of work where the student is weakest).


--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From urnerk at qwest.net  Sun Dec  4 23:53:42 2005
From: urnerk at qwest.net (Kirby Urner)
Date: Sun, 4 Dec 2005 14:53:42 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Lowering the barriers to programming
In-Reply-To: <20051202202440.3EFE61E4017@bag.python.org>
Message-ID: <20051204225347.BBCA71E400B@bag.python.org>

> Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] I've just started reading this paper
> 
> > If anyone else wants to grab a copy and chat about it after reading,
> > let me know.
> >
> > --Scott David Daniels
> > Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
> 
> Downloading now...  I anticipate having some comments.
> 
> Kirby

So I've been through it once.

I derived some value and pleasure from this paper, I should say that up
front, since I'm in a mood to just make a lot of criticisms below.  Chalk it
up to my generally dark disposition.

Seems to me in this age of hypermedia and streaming video that a print
article like this is somewhat of an anachronism.  Show me clips of the
described systems, not just still pix and little write-ups; have the
taxonomies yield memberships more dynamically, in some GUI.  Provide written
summaries as gloss.  Add talking heads.  Make it a whole web site.

Why should the expectation be that all this wealth of non-linear info should
distill to some linear printed journal article instead of hypermedia?  Not
what I'd want my NSF tax dollars to underwrite (DARPA, NASA...) -- just
speaking as a private citizen.

Anyway, a fun trip down memory lane, remembering all those dead languages.
PL/1, Algol, heh.

Other ways to categorize were implied but not explicit:  the targeted age
group for example.  Some were explicitly for 4-7 year olds, or for 5th
graders.  Others seemed more college oriented.  This axis wasn't supplied
which just goes to show how there're always more axes when it comes to
multi-dimensional sorting schemes.  

Another axis:  how were each of these funded, e.g. which were expected to
earn a return in the market place?  Rocky's Boots was a for-sale product as
I recall (and worth buying).

A central purpose of all these systems was never addressed:  they give
computer scientists interesting work, dreaming up playful gizmos for guinea
pigs.  To pretend all these toyz are *just* about making programming
accessible to beginners is inauthentic -- it's also about doing something
challenging and fun (and fundable) with one's CS education.  Let's be up
front about that shall we?  Nothing to be ashamed of.

There seems to be a premise that providing a relevant context (answering the
question:  why program?) needs to be motivated from within the interface or
product itself.  I'd say that's more a job for the wider culture:  to show
role model peers using programming skills on TV, in movies.  Maybe there's
nothing lab coated technicians might do, in isolation, to make CS seem less
geeky.  Nor is it a given that "attracting people to programming" is the
same thing as "attracting people to CS".  There's overlap, sure.

An interesting sub-theme here is that some of these experiments in pedagogy
percolate back into the professional environment.  SmallTalk was for kids
(in this telling anyway), but was vastly influential on general purpose
production languages.  Same with Pascal.  Something intended to make X
easier to learn ends up eclipsing X.

The text didn't make any reference to whether type declarations are needed
or not.  Java is often mentioned as a target (what we're trying to learn),
but I didn't see how notions of types, of casting, got introduced.  Even
when the language is dynamically typed, you still have types.  It's not all
about loops and conditionals.

Nor did I see anything about the importance of an interactive interpreter.
My idea of beginning programming is you enter expressions for immediate
evaluation, get a session going, populate a workspace with names, before
saving anything in a text editor.  I've done two hours of Python and we've
yet to save any .py files (that'll happen this week).

An interactive interpreter doesn't prevent syntax errors, but it gives
immediate feedback.  You learn the syntax for a dictionary by trying to
build a dictionary.  You don't have to get a lot of other, unrelated syntax
right (void public main blah blah) before you debug the dictionary, i.e. you
just need expressions, not saved/compiled programs.  Very important.

Scheme/DrScheme not mentioned.  Definitely aimed at learners, with levels,
i.e. more features of the language get activated as one increases in
mastery.  Also interactive.

I think a useful learning environment might include a large library of
programs like this, so that students could play with a lot of them, get a
feel for the taxonomies, just as these author(s) did.  Don't start with 6
weeks of X, start with a couple hours devoted to X, Y, Z, maybe with a demo
to kick it off each time.  Exposure to this kind of variety helps answer the
question:  what might programmers do?  Script theater!  There's a reason
it's called a Programme at Stratford-upon-Avon.

So anyway, why not something more like:

learning_environments = [ToonTalk, SmallTalk, RockysBoots...]

for session in learning_environments:
   session.demo()
   session.play()

myproject = favorite(learning_environments)

for rest_of_term:
   myproject.workon()

myproject.addtoportfolio()
mygrade = professor.grades(myproject)

Or just give us that NSF-funded web site, where all these toyz are sampled,
demoed, made available for download (if they even still run on the newer
hardware).

What I'd like to give Tara for Xmas:  a furry cat pet that's programmable
somehow (like the Mindstorms Brick).  She wants a cyber cat (she feeds an
electronic fish everyday as it is -- has me transfer it to the laptop when
we go on trips), and as a parent I'd be more inclined to buy it if she could
program it herself.  A palette of sounds and motions, reflex arcs.

What I think more kids would like:  an easier way to program web sites that
function more like mazes, i.e. as browsers get more deeply into them, they
become more likely to be the people you'd like to interact with.  Casual
browsers drift off, frustrated by all the puzzles.

Kirby


-- 
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.11/191 - Release Date: 12/2/2005
 


From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Mon Dec  5 01:54:41 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Sun, 04 Dec 2005 19:54:41 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] Lowering the barriers to programming
In-Reply-To: <20051204225347.BBCA71E400B@bag.python.org>
References: <20051204225347.BBCA71E400B@bag.python.org>
Message-ID: <43938FD1.8060309@optonline.com>

Kirby Urner wrote:

>>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] I've just started reading this paper
>>
>>    
>>
>>>If anyone else wants to grab a copy and chat about it after reading,
>>>let me know.
>>>
>>>--Scott David Daniels
>>>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
>>>      
>>>
>>Downloading now...  I anticipate having some comments.
>>
>>Kirby
>>    
>>
>
>So I've been through it once.
>  
>
I've been through it more briefly.  More Pausch.  Not my favorite.

>Another axis:  how were each of these funded, e.g. which were expected to
>earn a return in the market place?  Rocky's Boots was a for-sale product as
>I recall (and worth buying).
>  
>
I thought we weren't supposed to acknowledge a consciousness of these 
kinds of issues ;)

>A central purpose of all these systems was never addressed:  they give
>computer scientists interesting work, dreaming up playful gizmos for guinea
>pigs.  To pretend all these toyz are *just* about making programming
>accessible to beginners is inauthentic -- it's also about doing something
>challenging and fun (and fundable) with one's CS education.  Let's be up
>front about that shall we?  Nothing to be ashamed of.
>  
>
Yes.

But it is indeed something to be ashamed of exactly to the extent there 
is inauthenticity. And I have the same sense as you, apparently,  as to 
many of these projects.

As much as I dissed Alice, I acknowledged that it as educational *for 
the students involved in helping to build it*.

And as much hope as I have for PyGeo, all I say about it for sure is 
that building it has been an education for  the developer  - me.

But in truth I suspect PyGeo to me a little more authentic - if less 
polished - than many other efforts cited here, perhaps precisely because 
there is no CS education that needed to be  justified by it, and no 
funders that need to be satisfied by it, and it was built to precise 
specifications (in some sense) to serve an actual need - my own  Much 
less speculative, in that sense.

>There seems to be a premise that providing a relevant context (answering the
>question:  why program?) needs to be motivated from within the interface or
>product itself.  I'd say that's more a job for the wider culture:  to show
>role model peers using programming skills on TV, in movies.  Maybe there's
>nothing lab coated technicians might do, in isolation, to make CS seem less
>geeky.  Nor is it a given that "attracting people to programming" is the
>same thing as "attracting people to CS".  There's overlap, sure.
>  
>
I think the answer "why program" has to be be embedded in the effort to 
teach programming.  You are a student -  and it is submitted that 
learning to program can help you pursue learning goals. Mathematics, 
geometry, etc.. Just as - if you were in business, learning to program 
might help you pursue business goals. 

Programming is a practical art, and we will be practical with it  
out-of-the-box. And stick with the obvious. Mathematics, geometry, etc.  .

Feel free to pursue 3d world building. Sounds like fun.  I encourage you 
to do so, in fact.  But not in school - as 3d world building is not a 
subject here.

Math is.

We are not trying to make programming inaccessible and boring.  We are 
trying to demonstrate that programming is a practical art.  We are in in 
school.  We will do with it the kinds of things that one does in 
school.  And it is in fact hard.  There will be homework, there will be 
tests, you might not do well at it, you might not even like it. But I 
do, which is why I am teaching it.  And it is my job to help you 
understand why I like it.  I will do my best.

>What I think more kids would like:  an easier way to program web sites that
>function more like mazes, i.e. as browsers get more deeply into them, they
>become more likely to be the people you'd like to interact with.  Casual
>browsers drift off, frustrated by all the puzzles.
>  
>
If we truly think programming is important, we will concern ourselves 
less with what "more kids would like". 

We will direct them in a way that is in their interests, and we will let 
them fail - if they insist.

Art



From lac at strakt.com  Mon Dec  5 07:50:22 2005
From: lac at strakt.com (Laura Creighton)
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 07:50:22 +0100
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: Message from Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels@Acm.Org> 
	of "Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:32:27 PST." <dmvg7v$gkk$1@sea.gmane.org> 
References: <dmstle$pk9$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<BAY115-F155B9C0B2D59B66D88BD87BE4E0@phx.gbl>
	<dmvg7v$gkk$1@sea.gmane.org> 
Message-ID: <200512050650.jB56oMU8002365@theraft.strakt.com>

In a message of Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:32:27 PST, Scott David Daniels writes:
>I wrote:
> >> ... keeping people at 80% correct is great rule-of-thumb goal ...
>
>To elaborate on the statement above a bit, we did drill-and practice
>teaching (and had students loving it).  The value of the 80% is for
>maximal learning.  Something like 50% is the best for measurement theory
>(but discourages the student drastically).  In graduate school I had
>one instructor who tried to target his tests to get 50% as the average
>mark.  It was incredibly discouraging for most of the students (I
>eventually came to be OK with it, but it took half the course).

<snip>

'Discouraging' misses the mark.  The University of Toronto has professors
who like to test to 50% as well.  And it causes suicides among undergraduates
who are first exposed to this, unless there is adequate preparation.  This
is incredibly _dangerous_ stuff.

Laura 

>--Scott David Daniels
>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig

From chuck at freshsources.com  Mon Dec  5 08:52:50 2005
From: chuck at freshsources.com (Chuck Allison)
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 00:52:50 -0700
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <200512050650.jB56oMU8002365@theraft.strakt.com>
References: <dmstle$pk9$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<BAY115-F155B9C0B2D59B66D88BD87BE4E0@phx.gbl>
	<dmvg7v$gkk$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<200512050650.jB56oMU8002365@theraft.strakt.com>
Message-ID: <1622567894.20051205005250@freshsources.com>

Hello Laura,

That's better than the Abstract Algebra class I took as an
undergraduate. The highest score on Test 1 was 19%. I got 6%! I retook
the class from another teacher and topped the class. Liked the subject
so much I took the second semester just for fun. Testing and teaching
strategies make a tremendous difference.

Sunday, December 4, 2005, 11:50:22 PM, you wrote:

LC> In a message of Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:32:27 PST, Scott David Daniels writes:
>>I wrote:
>> >> ... keeping people at 80% correct is great rule-of-thumb goal ...
>>
>>To elaborate on the statement above a bit, we did drill-and practice
>>teaching (and had students loving it).  The value of the 80% is for
>>maximal learning.  Something like 50% is the best for measurement theory
>>(but discourages the student drastically).  In graduate school I had
>>one instructor who tried to target his tests to get 50% as the average
>>mark.  It was incredibly discouraging for most of the students (I
>>eventually came to be OK with it, but it took half the course).

LC> <snip>

LC> 'Discouraging' misses the mark.  The University of Toronto has professors
LC> who like to test to 50% as well.  And it causes suicides among undergraduates
LC> who are first exposed to this, unless there is adequate preparation.  This
LC> is incredibly _dangerous_ stuff.

LC> Laura 

>>--Scott David Daniels
>>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>Edu-sig mailing list
>>Edu-sig at python.org
>>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
LC> _______________________________________________
LC> Edu-sig mailing list
LC> Edu-sig at python.org
LC> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig




-- 
Best regards,
 Chuck



From damonbryant at msn.com  Mon Dec  5 10:50:05 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 03:50:05 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <1622567894.20051205005250@freshsources.com>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F35159DA066A9B80289E28DBE410@phx.gbl>

One of the main reasons I decided to use an Item Response Theory (IRT) 
framework was that the testing platform, once fully operational, will not 
give students questions that are either too easy or too difficult for them, 
thus reducing anxiety and boredom for low and high ability students, 
respectively. In other words, high ability students will be challenged with 
more difficult questions and low ability students will receive questions 
that are challenging but matched to their ability. Each score is on the same 
scale, although some students will not receive the same questions. This is 
the beautiful thing! That is the concept of adaptive or tailored testing 
being implemented in the Python Programming: Procedural Online Test 
(http://www.adaptiveassessmentservices.com).

After reading the comment on 50% percent being optimal for measurement 
theory, I have to say about 90 years ago that was the best practice in order 
to maximize item/test variance, which maximized the distribution of scores. 
This is primarily a World War I and II convention in developing selection 
tests, i.e., Alpha and Beta, used to place conscripts in appropriate combat 
roles. Those two tests are the predecessors of the SAT administered by the 
Educational Testing Service, which is the organization where most of the war 
psychologists who developed Alpha and Beta went after the WW II. Because of 
their influence in selecting recruits who then received money after the war 
to go to college in the form of the GI Bill, these measurement specialists 
(psychometricians) did the same thing for ETS with the SAT in screening the 
same cohort for placement in colleges and universities around America. These 
psychologists had a strong influence of what constituted good practice in 
standardized testing. Accordingly, the practice of using 50% became well 
entrenched.

Later, IRT came on the scene in the early 1950s as an alternative to 
classical test theory and has some great theoretical and practical 
advantages over the previous approach of selecting items that have a 
variance of .50. The computing technology was not available then to 
implement the theory. However, it wasn't until the advent of the PC in the 
late 70s and early 80s that got psychometricians like me motivated to begin 
the implementation of IRT; once again at the forefront in the development 
was the armed services in the late 70s. It will take another decade or so to 
break the hold that Classical Test Theory has on measurement, and expect 
students' test anxiety to remain high in the interim. But as more and more 
begin to realize the benefits of IRT, especially computer adaptive testing, 
over CTT, it will no longer be an issue of was guidance should be used to 
administer and score tests.



>From: Chuck Allison <chuck at freshsources.com>
>Reply-To: Chuck Allison <chuck at freshsources.com>
>To: Laura Creighton <lac at strakt.com>
>CC: edu-sig at python.org, Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org>
>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 00:52:50 -0700
>
>Hello Laura,
>
>That's better than the Abstract Algebra class I took as an
>undergraduate. The highest score on Test 1 was 19%. I got 6%! I retook
>the class from another teacher and topped the class. Liked the subject
>so much I took the second semester just for fun. Testing and teaching
>strategies make a tremendous difference.
>
>Sunday, December 4, 2005, 11:50:22 PM, you wrote:
>
>LC> In a message of Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:32:27 PST, Scott David Daniels 
>writes:
> >>I wrote:
> >> >> ... keeping people at 80% correct is great rule-of-thumb goal ...
> >>
> >>To elaborate on the statement above a bit, we did drill-and practice
> >>teaching (and had students loving it).  The value of the 80% is for
> >>maximal learning.  Something like 50% is the best for measurement theory
> >>(but discourages the student drastically).  In graduate school I had
> >>one instructor who tried to target his tests to get 50% as the average
> >>mark.  It was incredibly discouraging for most of the students (I
> >>eventually came to be OK with it, but it took half the course).
>
>LC> <snip>
>
>LC> 'Discouraging' misses the mark.  The University of Toronto has 
>professors
>LC> who like to test to 50% as well.  And it causes suicides among 
>undergraduates
>LC> who are first exposed to this, unless there is adequate preparation.  
>This
>LC> is incredibly _dangerous_ stuff.
>
>LC> Laura
>
> >>--Scott David Daniels
> >>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
> >>
> >>_______________________________________________
> >>Edu-sig mailing list
> >>Edu-sig at python.org
> >>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
>LC> _______________________________________________
>LC> Edu-sig mailing list
>LC> Edu-sig at python.org
>LC> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
>
>
>
>
>--
>Best regards,
>  Chuck
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig



From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Mon Dec  5 14:59:10 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 08:59:10 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] rest2web created PyGeo docs
Message-ID: <439447AE.5070007@optonline.com>

My comments have gotten even more  particularly PyGeo centric, as I have 
been on a bit of a PyGeo binge. After some intensive refactoring and 
testing, I have declared the code "good enough", and am moving on to 
working on decent docs, and then a decently managed release. Its been 
some time.

Among the problems I feel I have recently solved is turning the 
individual reStructured text document pages into a coherent set of 
accessible documentation.  The solution came by way of the Fuzzyman's 
(Michael Foord)


  rest2web - The Site Builder

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/python/rest2web/

a tool others might interested in knowing about.

The results of my rest2web efforts on a portion of the PyGeo docs are up 
at :

http://pygeo.sourceforge.net/docs_html/index.html

feedback/comments welcome.

Art




From jmax at sfu.ca  Mon Dec  5 18:47:38 2005
From: jmax at sfu.ca (John Maxwell)
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 09:47:38 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] I've just started reading this paper
In-Reply-To: <mailman.7.1133607602.13144.edu-sig@python.org>
References: <mailman.7.1133607602.13144.edu-sig@python.org>
Message-ID: <92A8808F-9265-4B31-AD3D-AEFBA0AB4751@sfu.ca>

That is, Re: Kelleher and Pausch's Lowering the Barriers to  
Programming, ACM Computing Surveys  37(2)

Here's a comment off the top, and apart from the more obvious issue  
for the edu-sig group (namely, Python's near-complete absence): the  
"taxonomy" is completely ahistorical; they seem to have set up 60+  
programming environments next to one another and considered them all  
at face value, with no particular consideration for the time and  
context from which each emerged (we're talking a 45-year span here).  
The two exceptions to this are the repeated reference to a god-given,  
eternal "logo turtle", and a chart which tracks the "influences" of  
various systems on one another, but only by simple bibliometrics.

I'm working on a comprehensive history of the Smalltalk/Squeak  
'tradition' so this facet pops out at me immediately, as there are a  
half-dozen or more Smalltalk-derived systems listed here, though  
you'd never know it from the article.

My 2 cents. What do you folk think of this?

  - John Maxwell
    jmax at sfu.ca


From rsenra at acm.org  Mon Dec  5 22:53:00 2005
From: rsenra at acm.org (Rodrigo Senra)
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 19:53:00 -0200
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F35159DA066A9B80289E28DBE410@phx.gbl>
References: <BAY115-F35159DA066A9B80289E28DBE410@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>


On 5Dec 2005, at 7:50 AM, damon bryant wrote:

> One of the main reasons I decided to use an Item Response Theory (IRT)
> framework was that the testing platform, once fully operational,  
> will not
> give students questions that are either too easy or too difficult  
> for them,
> thus reducing anxiety and boredom for low and high ability students,
> respectively. In other words, high ability students will be  
> challenged with
> more difficult questions and low ability students will receive  
> questions
> that are challenging but matched to their ability.

So far so good...

> Each score is on the same scale, although some students will not
> receive the same questions. This is the beautiful thing!

I'd like to respectfully disagree. I'm afraid that would cause more  
harm than good.
One side of student evaluation is to give feedback *for* the  
students. That is a
relative measure, his/her performance against his/her peers.

If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some  
and an "easy"-A
for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it ?  
That sounds like
sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to  
prepare them to
tackle failure as well as success.

I do not mean such efforts are not worthy, quite the reverse. But I  
strongly disagree
with an adaptive scale. There should be a single scale fro the whole  
spectre of tests.
If some students excel their results must show this, as well as if  
some students perform
poorly that should not be hidden from them. Give them a goal and the  
means to pursue
their goal.

If I got your proposal all wrong, I apologize ;o)

best regards,
Senra


Rodrigo Senra
______________
rsenra @ acm.org
http://rodrigo.senra.nom.br





From damonbryant at msn.com  Tue Dec  6 03:19:20 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 20:19:20 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F2371546DF9EBF181373A74BE400@phx.gbl>


Hi Rodrigo!

>If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
>and an "easy"-A
>for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it?

No, students are not receiving a hard A or an easy A. I make no 
classifications such as those you propose. My point is that questions are 
placed on the same scale as the ability being measured (called a theta 
scale). Grades may be mapped to the scale though, but a hard A or easy A 
will not be assigned under aforementioned conditions described.

Because all questions in the item bank have been linked, two students can 
take the same computer adaptive test but have no items in common between the 
two administrations. However, scores are on the same scale. Research has 
shown that even low ability students, despite their performance, prefer 
computer adaptive tests over static fixed-length tests. It has also been 
shown to lower test anxiety while serving the same purpose as fixed-length 
linear tests in that educators are able to extract the same level of 
information about student achievement or aptitude without banging a 
student's head up against questions that he/she may have a very low 
probability of getting correct. The high ability students, instead of being 
bored, are receiving questions on the higher end of the theta scale that are 
appropriately matched to their ability to challenge them.

>That sounds like
>sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
>prepare them to
>tackle failure as well as success.

In fact computer adaptive tests are designed to administer items to a person 
of a SPECIFIC ability that will yield a 50/50 chance of correctly 
responding. For example, there are two examinees: Examinee A has a true 
theta of -1.5, and Examinee B has a true theta of 1.5. The theta scale has a 
typical range of -3 to 3. There is a question that has been mapped to the 
theta scale and it has a difficulty value of 1.5, how we estimate this is 
beyond our discussion but is relatively easy to do with Python. The item is 
appropriately match for Examinee B because s/he has approximately a 50% 
chance of getting this one right - not a very high chance or a very low 
chance of getting it correct but a equi-probable opportunity of either a 
success or a failure.

According to sampling theory, with multiple administrations of this item to 
a population of persons with a theta of 1.5, there will be an approximately 
equal number of successes and failures on this item, because the odds of 
getting it correct vs. incorrect are equal. However, with multiple 
administrations of this same item to a population of examinees with a theta 
of -1.5, which is substantially lower than 1.5, there will be exceedingly 
more failures than successes. Adaptive test algorithms seek to maximize 
information about examinees by estimating their ability and searching for 
questions in the item bank that match their ability levels, thus providing a 
50/50 chance of getting it right.

This is very different than administering a test where the professor seeks 
to have an average score is 50% because low ability students will get the 
vast majority of questions wrong, which could potentially increase anxiety, 
decrease self-efficacy, and lower the chance of acquiring information in 
subsequent teaching sessions (Bandura, self regulation). Adaptive testing is 
able to mitigate the psychological influences of testing on examinees by 
seeking to provide equal opportunities for both high and low ability 
students to experience success and failure to the same degree by getting 
items that are appropriately matched to their skill level. This is the 
aspect of adaptive testing that is attractive to me. It may not solve the 
problem, but it is a way of using technology to move in the right direction. 
I hope this is a better explanation than what I provided earlier.



>From: Rodrigo Senra <rsenra at acm.org>
>To: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 19:53:00 -0200
>
>
>On 5Dec 2005, at 7:50 AM, damon bryant wrote:
>
> > One of the main reasons I decided to use an Item Response Theory (IRT)
> > framework was that the testing platform, once fully operational,
> > will not
> > give students questions that are either too easy or too difficult
> > for them,
> > thus reducing anxiety and boredom for low and high ability students,
> > respectively. In other words, high ability students will be
> > challenged with
> > more difficult questions and low ability students will receive
> > questions
> > that are challenging but matched to their ability.
>
>So far so good...
>
> > Each score is on the same scale, although some students will not
> > receive the same questions. This is the beautiful thing!
>
>I'd like to respectfully disagree. I'm afraid that would cause more
>harm than good.
>One side of student evaluation is to give feedback *for* the
>students. That is a
>relative measure, his/her performance against his/her peers.
>
>If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
>and an "easy"-A
>for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it ?
>That sounds like
>sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
>prepare them to
>tackle failure as well as success.
>
>I do not mean such efforts are not worthy, quite the reverse. But I
>strongly disagree
>with an adaptive scale. There should be a single scale fro the whole
>spectre of tests.
>If some students excel their results must show this, as well as if
>some students perform
>poorly that should not be hidden from them. Give them a goal and the
>means to pursue
>their goal.
>
>If I got your proposal all wrong, I apologize ;o)
>
>best regards,
>Senra
>
>
>Rodrigo Senra
>______________
>rsenra @ acm.org
>http://rodrigo.senra.nom.br
>
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig



From sdurkin at psdschools.org  Tue Dec  6 03:04:16 2005
From: sdurkin at psdschools.org (Scott Durkin)
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 19:04:16 -0700 (MST)
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>
References: <BAY115-F35159DA066A9B80289E28DBE410@phx.gbl>
	<82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>
Message-ID: <8348.67.172.146.226.1133834656.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>

Could it be argued that the goal be for all students to score 100% on the
desired content?


Rodrigo Senra said:
>
> On 5Dec 2005, at 7:50 AM, damon bryant wrote:
>
>> One of the main reasons I decided to use an Item Response Theory (IRT)
>> framework was that the testing platform, once fully operational,
>> will not
>> give students questions that are either too easy or too difficult
>> for them,
>> thus reducing anxiety and boredom for low and high ability students,
>> respectively. In other words, high ability students will be
>> challenged with
>> more difficult questions and low ability students will receive
>> questions
>> that are challenging but matched to their ability.
>
> So far so good...
>
>> Each score is on the same scale, although some students will not
>> receive the same questions. This is the beautiful thing!
>
> I'd like to respectfully disagree. I'm afraid that would cause more
> harm than good.
> One side of student evaluation is to give feedback *for* the
> students. That is a
> relative measure, his/her performance against his/her peers.
>
> If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
> and an "easy"-A
> for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it ?
> That sounds like
> sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
> prepare them to
> tackle failure as well as success.
>
> I do not mean such efforts are not worthy, quite the reverse. But I
> strongly disagree
> with an adaptive scale. There should be a single scale fro the whole
> spectre of tests.
> If some students excel their results must show this, as well as if
> some students perform
> poorly that should not be hidden from them. Give them a goal and the
> means to pursue
> their goal.
>
> If I got your proposal all wrong, I apologize ;o)
>
> best regards,
> Senra
>
>
> Rodrigo Senra
> ______________
> rsenra @ acm.org
> http://rodrigo.senra.nom.br
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Edu-sig mailing list
> Edu-sig at python.org
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
>


--------------------------------------------------------------------
               S  c  o  t  t     J.    D  u  r  k  i  n
--------------------------------------------------------------------

             Computer Science  ||||  Preston Junior High

sdurkin at psdschools.org  ||||  http://staffweb.psdschools.org/sdurkin
____________________________________________________________________
    ___   _      ___   _      ___   _      ___   _      ___   _
   [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|
    '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|
   /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /
         |____________|____________|____________|____________|
                             |            |            |
                         ___  \_      ___  \_      ___  \_
   Computer   Room      [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|
     Lab      N205       '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|
                        /mmm/        /mmm/        /mmm/
____________________________________________________________________

                   970.419.7358  ||||  2005-2006


scott.james.durkin



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Tue Dec  6 04:04:45 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 19:04:45 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F2371546DF9EBF181373A74BE400@phx.gbl>
References: <82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>
	<BAY115-F2371546DF9EBF181373A74BE400@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <dn2v41$8ah$1@sea.gmane.org>

damon bryant wrote:
> Hi Rodrigo!
> 
>> If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
>> and an "easy"-A
>> for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it?
> 
> No, students are not receiving a hard A or an easy A. I make no 
> classifications such as those you propose. My point is that questions are 
> placed on the same scale as the ability being measured (called a theta 
> scale). Grades may be mapped to the scale though, but a hard A or easy A 
> will not be assigned under aforementioned conditions described.
> 
> Because all questions in the item bank have been linked, two students can 
> take the same computer adaptive test but have no items in common between the 
> two administrations. However, scores are on the same scale. Research has 
> shown that even low ability students, despite their performance, prefer 
> computer adaptive tests over static fixed-length tests. It has also been 
> shown to lower test anxiety while serving the same purpose as fixed-length 
> linear tests in that educators are able to extract the same level of 
> information about student achievement or aptitude without banging a 
> student's head up against questions that he/she may have a very low 
> probability of getting correct. The high ability students, instead of being 
> bored, are receiving questions on the higher end of the theta scale that are 
> appropriately matched to their ability to challenge them.
> 
>> That sounds like
>> sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
>> prepare them to
>> tackle failure as well as success.
> 
> .... The item is appropriately match for Examinee B because s/he has approximately
 > a 50% chance of getting this one right - not a very high chance or a 
very low
> chance of getting it correct but a equi-probable opportunity of either a 
> success or a failure....

Two comments:
   (1) You may find target a higher probability of correct gives a better
       subjective experience without significantly increasing the length
       of the test required to be confident of the score.

   (2) You should track each question's history vs. the final score for
       the test-taker.  This practice can help validate your scoring,
       as well as help you in weeding out mis-scored questions.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From wescpy at gmail.com  Tue Dec  6 08:46:32 2005
From: wescpy at gmail.com (w chun)
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 23:46:32 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <20051203154440.460881E4009@bag.python.org>
References: <BAY115-F2777C7DBAD63EC9F97D9F5BE4F0@phx.gbl>
	<20051203154440.460881E4009@bag.python.org>
Message-ID: <78b3a9580512052346k5a648addr65f0c9f2ba2f2de7@mail.gmail.com>

> The problems seemed to get much easier in the last 5 or so (very basic
> syntax questions).  The one about "James"=="james" returning -1 is no longer
> true on some Pythons (as now we have boolean True).


the tests were well done... i enjoyed taking them.  like kirby, i also
found the Boolean issue.  in the procedural test, i found a syntax
error... i think the question with the [None] * 5... (well, [None,
None, None, None, None] actually), where you're setting "x[b[i] =
True:" ... that colon shouldn't be there.  there was/were also
question(s) which used sum as a variable name.  that is a built-in
function that is hidden if used.  interestingly enough, your syntax
checked actually highlighted it too.  :-)

cheers,
-- wesley
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"Core Python Programming", Prentice Hall, (c)2006,2001
    http://corepython.com

wesley.j.chun :: wescpy-at-gmail.com
cyberweb.consulting : silicon valley, ca
http://cyberwebconsulting.com

From lac at strakt.com  Tue Dec  6 10:48:04 2005
From: lac at strakt.com (Laura Creighton)
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 10:48:04 +0100
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: Message from "damon bryant" <damonbryant@msn.com> of "Mon,
	05 Dec 2005 20:19:20 CST."
	<BAY115-F2371546DF9EBF181373A74BE400@phx.gbl> 
References: <BAY115-F2371546DF9EBF181373A74BE400@phx.gbl> 
Message-ID: <200512060948.jB69m4EP006425@theraft.strakt.com>


Interesting.  When the law society of Upper Canada was working
on CAI for teaching tax law to law students, they found that
the percentage correct they set has a definite, measurable effect
on the amount of time that the students were willing to drill.

At above 85%, the students believed they knew everything, and
did not drill much.  Some of these students were correct in their
estimations.  But if you went below 75% correct, the students
believed that the computer system was at fault, and that doing
the drill was a waste of time.

This perfectly matched with the student's own assessment of their
own abilities:  We asked them ahead of time, how well they thought
that they ought to be doing, and they all thought between 70% and
90% was about how well that 'good students should do on tests'.
And LSUC does not _have_ any poor students.

When they were given things to 'learn things for the first time'
they were able to tolerate significantly worse performance by themselves,
before they concluded that the effort was a waste of time.  Thus
one of the things that we tried to measure was the effect of 'what
percentage correct' had on actual amount of tax law learned.

And the result was unequivocal.  It is better to give each student a
percent correct that was slightly, but not substantially higher than
they estimated their own abilities, and always better than 70% in
any case.  The poorer students will drill for 16 or 18 hours, and
the best ones would only take 4, but by the end of the exercise,
everybody was scoring pretty well on tax questions.

Laura


In a message of Mon, 05 Dec 2005 20:19:20 CST, "damon bryant" writes:
>
>Hi Rodrigo!
>
>>If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
>>and an "easy"-A
>>for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it?
>
>No, students are not receiving a hard A or an easy A. I make no 
>classifications such as those you propose. My point is that questions are
> 
>placed on the same scale as the ability being measured (called a theta 
>scale). Grades may be mapped to the scale though, but a hard A or easy A 
>will not be assigned under aforementioned conditions described.
>
>Because all questions in the item bank have been linked, two students can
> 
>take the same computer adaptive test but have no items in common between 
>the 
>two administrations. However, scores are on the same scale. Research has 
>shown that even low ability students, despite their performance, prefer 
>computer adaptive tests over static fixed-length tests. It has also been 
>shown to lower test anxiety while serving the same purpose as fixed-lengt
>h 
>linear tests in that educators are able to extract the same level of 
>information about student achievement or aptitude without banging a 
>student's head up against questions that he/she may have a very low 
>probability of getting correct. The high ability students, instead of bei
>ng 
>bored, are receiving questions on the higher end of the theta scale that 
>are 
>appropriately matched to their ability to challenge them.
>
>>That sounds like
>>sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
>>prepare them to
>>tackle failure as well as success.
>
>In fact computer adaptive tests are designed to administer items to a per
>son 
>of a SPECIFIC ability that will yield a 50/50 chance of correctly 
>responding. For example, there are two examinees: Examinee A has a true 
>theta of -1.5, and Examinee B has a true theta of 1.5. The theta scale ha
>s a 
>typical range of -3 to 3. There is a question that has been mapped to the
> 
>theta scale and it has a difficulty value of 1.5, how we estimate this is
> 
>beyond our discussion but is relatively easy to do with Python. The item 
>is 
>appropriately match for Examinee B because s/he has approximately a 50% 
>chance of getting this one right - not a very high chance or a very low 
>chance of getting it correct but a equi-probable opportunity of either a 
>success or a failure.
>
>According to sampling theory, with multiple administrations of this item 
>to 
>a population of persons with a theta of 1.5, there will be an approximate
>ly 
>equal number of successes and failures on this item, because the odds of 
>getting it correct vs. incorrect are equal. However, with multiple 
>administrations of this same item to a population of examinees with a the
>ta 
>of -1.5, which is substantially lower than 1.5, there will be exceedingly
> 
>more failures than successes. Adaptive test algorithms seek to maximize 
>information about examinees by estimating their ability and searching for
> 
>questions in the item bank that match their ability levels, thus providin
>g a 
>50/50 chance of getting it right.
>
>This is very different than administering a test where the professor seek
>s 
>to have an average score is 50% because low ability students will get the
> 
>vast majority of questions wrong, which could potentially increase anxiet
>y, 
>decrease self-efficacy, and lower the chance of acquiring information in 
>subsequent teaching sessions (Bandura, self regulation). Adaptive testing
> is 
>able to mitigate the psychological influences of testing on examinees by 
>seeking to provide equal opportunities for both high and low ability 
>students to experience success and failure to the same degree by getting 
>items that are appropriately matched to their skill level. This is the 
>aspect of adaptive testing that is attractive to me. It may not solve the
> 
>problem, but it is a way of using technology to move in the right directi
>on. 
>I hope this is a better explanation than what I provided earlier.
>
>
>
>>From: Rodrigo Senra <rsenra at acm.org>
>>To: edu-sig at python.org
>>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>>Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 19:53:00 -0200
>>
>>
>>On 5Dec 2005, at 7:50 AM, damon bryant wrote:
>>
>> > One of the main reasons I decided to use an Item Response Theory (IRT
>)
>> > framework was that the testing platform, once fully operational,
>> > will not
>> > give students questions that are either too easy or too difficult
>> > for them,
>> > thus reducing anxiety and boredom for low and high ability students,
>> > respectively. In other words, high ability students will be
>> > challenged with
>> > more difficult questions and low ability students will receive
>> > questions
>> > that are challenging but matched to their ability.
>>
>>So far so good...
>>
>> > Each score is on the same scale, although some students will not
>> > receive the same questions. This is the beautiful thing!
>>
>>I'd like to respectfully disagree. I'm afraid that would cause more
>>harm than good.
>>One side of student evaluation is to give feedback *for* the
>>students. That is a
>>relative measure, his/her performance against his/her peers.
>>
>>If I understood correctly the proposal is to give a "hard"-A for some
>>and an "easy"-A
>>for others, so everybody have A's (A=='good score'). Is that it ?
>>That sounds like
>>sweeping the dirt under the carpet. Students will know. We have to
>>prepare them to
>>tackle failure as well as success.
>>
>>I do not mean such efforts are not worthy, quite the reverse. But I
>>strongly disagree
>>with an adaptive scale. There should be a single scale fro the whole
>>spectre of tests.
>>If some students excel their results must show this, as well as if
>>some students perform
>>poorly that should not be hidden from them. Give them a goal and the
>>means to pursue
>>their goal.
>>
>>If I got your proposal all wrong, I apologize ;o)
>>
>>best regards,
>>Senra
>>
>>
>>Rodrigo Senra
>>______________
>>rsenra @ acm.org
>>http://rodrigo.senra.nom.br
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>_______________________________________________
>>Edu-sig mailing list
>>Edu-sig at python.org
>>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig

From damonbryant at msn.com  Tue Dec  6 12:40:25 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 05:40:25 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <78b3a9580512052346k5a648addr65f0c9f2ba2f2de7@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F36CDDDC294F854B1CD6E87BE400@phx.gbl>

Thanks, Wesley!

If the item bank were larger, you would not have received easier questions 
at the end. You would have gotten more difficult questions. The bank for the 
demo is quite small, so you exhausted all of the difficult ones first 
because your ability initially mapped on to the difficult portion of the 
scale. The algorithm is quite efficient in determining where you are on the 
scale after about 3 - 5 questions.  In a test with a larger bank, you would 
have received more difficult questions as long as you kept getting them 
right. The test would finally terminate after 20 questions being 
administered. The alpha of the test, a psychometric term for reliability, is 
estimated to be .92 or higher with this number of items in a well designed 
computer adaptive test.

I have corrected the issue with the use of 'sum' (now ‘sum1’) and the syntax 
error with 'True:' (now ‘True’); that was a good catch! On a different note, 
I thought by designing this trial version of the system in Python, there 
would be an increase in the time in serving the questions to the client. I 
guess that using numarray and multithreading to do the heavy lifting on the 
back end has made it ‘fast enough’ for operational use. What do you think?



>From: w chun <wescpy at gmail.com>
>To: damon bryant <damonbryant at msn.com>
>CC: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 23:46:32 -0800
>
> > The problems seemed to get much easier in the last 5 or so (very basic
> > syntax questions).  The one about "James"=="james" returning -1 is no 
>longer
> > true on some Pythons (as now we have boolean True).
>
>
>the tests were well done... i enjoyed taking them.  like kirby, i also
>found the Boolean issue.  in the procedural test, i found a syntax
>error... i think the question with the [None] * 5... (well, [None,
>None, None, None, None] actually), where you're setting "x[b[i] =
>True:" ... that colon shouldn't be there.  there was/were also
>question(s) which used sum as a variable name.  that is a built-in
>function that is hidden if used.  interestingly enough, your syntax
>checked actually highlighted it too.  :-)
>
>cheers,
>-- wesley
>- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>"Core Python Programming", Prentice Hall, (c)2006,2001
>     http://corepython.com
>
>wesley.j.chun :: wescpy-at-gmail.com
>cyberweb.consulting : silicon valley, ca
>http://cyberwebconsulting.com



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Tue Dec  6 22:23:52 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 13:23:52 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F36CDDDC294F854B1CD6E87BE400@phx.gbl>
References: <78b3a9580512052346k5a648addr65f0c9f2ba2f2de7@mail.gmail.com>
	<BAY115-F36CDDDC294F854B1CD6E87BE400@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <dn4vgr$nrb$1@sea.gmane.org>

damon bryant wrote:
...
> I have corrected the issue with the use of 'sum' (now ?sum1?) and the 
I'd suggest "total" would be a better replacement than sum1.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From damonbryant at msn.com  Wed Dec  7 01:15:14 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 18:15:14 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <dn4vgr$nrb$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F377BF072C6F0BFD23A2D57BE430@phx.gbl>

Total does make more sense. I've made the change to "total". Thanks, Scott!


>From: Scott David Daniels <Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org>
>To: edu-sig at python.org
>Subject: Re: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
>Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 13:23:52 -0800
>
>damon bryant wrote:
>...
> > I have corrected the issue with the use of 'sum' (now ‘sum1’) and the
>I'd suggest "total" would be a better replacement than sum1.
>
>--Scott David Daniels
>Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org
>
>_______________________________________________
>Edu-sig mailing list
>Edu-sig at python.org
>http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig



From rsenra at acm.org  Wed Dec  7 02:08:39 2005
From: rsenra at acm.org (Rodrigo Senra)
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 2005 23:08:39 -0200
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <8348.67.172.146.226.1133834656.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>
References: <BAY115-F35159DA066A9B80289E28DBE410@phx.gbl>
	<82464DE7-0A04-47A4-A141-D411972638E5@acm.org>
	<8348.67.172.146.226.1133834656.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>
Message-ID: <6D6292E5-E207-4B9D-9EF0-B1DF35B6DBF4@acm.org>


[ Scott Durkin ]:

> Could it be argued that the goal be for all students to score 100%  
> on the
> desired content?

That is precisely my goal when I  elaborate exams. No success so far ;o)


[ Damon Bryant ]:

> No, students are not receiving a hard A or an easy A. I make no  
> classifications such as those you propose. My point is that  
> questions are placed on the same scale as the ability being  
> measured (called a theta scale). Grades may be mapped to the scale  
> though, but a hard A or easy A will not be assigned under  
> aforementioned conditions described.
>
> Because all questions in the item bank have been linked, two  
> students can take the same computer adaptive test but have no items  
> in common between the two administrations. However, scores are on  
> the same scale.

Thank you for taking the trouble to explain it further.

Abra??o,
Senra


Rodrigo Senra
______________
rsenra @ acm.org
http://rodrigo.senra.nom.br





From damonbryant at msn.com  Wed Dec  7 02:50:07 2005
From: damonbryant at msn.com (damon bryant)
Date: Tue, 06 Dec 2005 19:50:07 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <8348.67.172.146.226.1133834656.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>
Message-ID: <BAY115-F144897672FFE2491A0E047BE430@phx.gbl>

>Could it be argued that the goal be for all students to score 100% on the
>desired content?
>

I would argue that it should be one of the goals in designing and 
implementing a training program. The test could have a different purpose. 
What we all have experienced in teaching students is that ability is 
distributed; more than likely that distribution is normal for whatever 
reason, and the variation of scores within the distribution can be tight 
(e.g., SAT quantitative scores at Rice) or loose (e.g., SAT quantitative 
scores at a junior college, assuming that the SAT is a requirement).

Psychological tests and measures can give us an indication of where students 
stand in a distribution (norm-referenced testing) or where each student's 
achievement level is relative to some absolute performance criterion 
(criterion-referenced testing) before, during, or after training. In other 
words, it depends on the purpose of testing, which is determined before it 
is designed and is a major evaluation point of its validity or accuracy in 
doing what it purports to do.

Damon



From sdurkin at psdschools.org  Wed Dec  7 04:18:41 2005
From: sdurkin at psdschools.org (Scott Durkin)
Date: Tue, 6 Dec 2005 20:18:41 -0700 (MST)
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python Programming: Procedural Online Test
In-Reply-To: <BAY115-F144897672FFE2491A0E047BE430@phx.gbl>
References: <8348.67.172.146.226.1133834656.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>
	<BAY115-F144897672FFE2491A0E047BE430@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <11633.67.172.146.226.1133925521.squirrel@webmail.psdschools.org>

Damon,

Thank you for your thoughtful response.  In terms of the Python tests, I
as well would hope that all my students (13- to 15-years-old) could answer
questions based on the content shared - kind of in the spirit of the
Computing for All/Core Knowledge (NoChildLeftBehind-ish? - not playing
"gotcha", but here is the information we expect you to know, do you know
it? can you apply it?) approach (along with opportunities for students to
display and be recoginized for comprehension and ability above and beyond
what was expressly expected within the realm of the standard curriculum) -
as you indicated in the phrase "training program" in the first paragraph
of your response.  As far as the assessment of the distributed
ability-related issues (primarily expressed in your second paragraph), I
will definitely leave that to the education psychologists and what is
attempting to be measured - perhaps that of which is beyond the
curriculum.

Thanks again,

Scott

damon bryant said:
>>Could it be argued that the goal be for all students to score 100% on the
>>desired content?
>>
>
> I would argue that it should be one of the goals in designing and
> implementing a training program. The test could have a different purpose.
> What we all have experienced in teaching students is that ability is
> distributed; more than likely that distribution is normal for whatever
> reason, and the variation of scores within the distribution can be tight
> (e.g., SAT quantitative scores at Rice) or loose (e.g., SAT quantitative
> scores at a junior college, assuming that the SAT is a requirement).
>
> Psychological tests and measures can give us an indication of where
> students
> stand in a distribution (norm-referenced testing) or where each student's
> achievement level is relative to some absolute performance criterion
> (criterion-referenced testing) before, during, or after training. In other
> words, it depends on the purpose of testing, which is determined before it
> is designed and is a major evaluation point of its validity or accuracy in
> doing what it purports to do.
>
> Damon
>
>
>


--------------------------------------------------------------------
               S  c  o  t  t     J.    D  u  r  k  i  n
--------------------------------------------------------------------

             Computer Science  ||||  Preston Junior High

sdurkin at psdschools.org  ||||  http://staffweb.psdschools.org/sdurkin
____________________________________________________________________
    ___   _      ___   _      ___   _      ___   _      ___   _
   [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|
    '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|
   /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /     /mmm/  /
         |____________|____________|____________|____________|
                             |            |            |
                         ___  \_      ___  \_      ___  \_
   Computer   Room      [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|    [(_)] |=|
     Lab      N205       '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|     '-`  |_|
                        /mmm/        /mmm/        /mmm/
____________________________________________________________________

                   970.419.7358  ||||  2005-2006


scott.james.durkin



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Tue Dec 13 19:35:02 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Tue, 13 Dec 2005 10:35:02 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Lowering the Barriers to  Programming
In-Reply-To: <dmo3s3$2rl$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <dmo3s3$2rl$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <dnn48a$sj2$1@sea.gmane.org>

Kelleher and Pausch's ACM Computing Surveys 37(2) paper.

Well, I took my time getting through the paper, and like the rest of you
here was left dissatisfied.  The first problem I have with the paper is
is that, while there is a large body of work that it covers, I am
unable to discern a desiderata for whether any particular work will be
included.  I certainly see Python as one (very successful) attempt to
address the "Lowering the Barriers."  Not seeing any criteria for
inclusion or exclusion leaves me feeling that this paper is about "a
bunch of stuff I read."

Clearly there has been a lot of effort here in analyzing the subject
systems; simply thoroughly reading the system descriptions would be
exhausting.  The paper though, leaves me with the impression, "I read
a bunch of stuff, and this is kinda-sorta how I see the stuff I read
can be classified."

A survey like this should either start with a taxonomy and show how
efforts fall into this taxonomy.  Such a paper is about the taxonomy,
and should concentrate on how well the taxonomy works.  On the other
hand, the paper could describe a way of accumulating research, and
then produce a taxonomy from observation on the accumulation.  Neither
seems to be the case here.

A kvetch: the SP/k claims PL/1 evaluates 25 + 1/3 as 5.33333.  How could
this be true?  When stating a possibly surprising fact, proofreading is
indicated.

Why is COBOL in there? If it is, FORTRAN and ALGOL certainly belong, and
wherever those three belong is where Python belongs.  I suspect that
Turing is in this group, and I don't know that Turing was a "stripped
down for teaching" language.  Claiming that BASIC's "LET" statement
is somehow simplifying the language for the student does not convince
me; I think LET simplifies the interpreter, not the student's task,


As to the chosen hierarchy, the top-level distinction confuses me:
       Systems to teach programming for its own sake
   vs. Systems to teach programming in pursuit of another goal
To which class do systems to teach programming in order to teach
Computer Science belong?  Determining the "primary aspect of
programming that the system attempts to simplify" seems equally
troublesome, requiring a crystal ball -- I have no confidence in
reading this paper that another person would cut the boundaries
the same way.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Wed Dec 14 15:47:46 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 09:47:46 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of
	algorithms"
Message-ID: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com>

A bit of a windy road:

starting, as usual, with the personal frame of reference....

PyGeo's current implementation supports the exploration of the geometry 
of complex numbers, and therefore speaks Mobius transformations.

http://pygeo.sourceforge.net

now has a  pretty picture of a simple recursive transformation of 4 
circles on the unit sphere (...thanks to __iter__   the ability to 
recursively transform any arbitrary set of geometric objects is now 
built-in to PyGeo).

My current exploration (current as in today) is finding the mechanism to 
build a Mobius transformation that would be based (in part) on it's 
(pickable and movable) fixed points  - of which a Mobius transformation 
has 2, which may coincide, or be located inconveniently - e.g. at  infinity.

Which has me stepping into the math of the fixed points of a function - 
it being trivial to find the fixed points, given the Mobius 
transformation matrix, but less trivial (from where I am sitting at the 
moment) to build the transformation from fixed point information. So  I 
am struggling and researching some.

In the course of which I come across this  definition of "Fixed Point" 
in a programming glossary, @

http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~hgreenbe/glossary/second.php?page=F.html

Of a function, f:X-->X, f(x)=x. Of a point-to-set map, F:X-->2^X, x is 
in F(x). The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of 
algorithms 
<http://carbon.cudenver.edu/%7Ehgreenbe/glossary/second.php?page=A.html#Algorithm>.

Having discussed here my growing interest in some study of algorithmics, 
but not getting there yet, but  pursuing something that as far as I am 
aware is unconnected to such study, and then finding this statement 
indicating there is more of a connection - perhaps - than I had 
understood, is to me interesting.

I have thought of "fixed point"  (in programming) as connected 
to/opposed to "floating point", not as something directly connected to 
the concept of "f(x)=x"

The statement above seems to be telling me otherwise.

Guess I am fishing for some exposition on the statement that the

"The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of algorithms"

Art



From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Dec 14 16:45:46 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 07:45:46 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
	of algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com>
Message-ID: <dnpemt$1ib$1@sea.gmane.org>

Arthur wrote:
  > I have thought of "fixed point"  (in programming) as connected
> to/opposed to "floating point", not as something directly connected to 
> the concept of "f(x)=x"
> 
> The statement above seems to be telling me otherwise.
> Guess I am fishing for some exposition on the statement that the
> "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of algorithms"

Well, in fact both meanings of "fixed point" are used, seldom by the
same person.  I expect Knuth is in that small group that uses both
meanings regularly (since his basic training was all mathematics).
Look to the "functional programming" people for examination of the
whole idea of fixed points of functions (Bird & Wadler is a standard
F.P. text).


--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Wed Dec 14 17:37:44 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 08:37:44 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Recap of today's Python class (Urner @ Winterhaven)
Message-ID: <f604188c0512140837x61b155efvdd9c3122b1e9703d@mail.gmail.com>

Today was my 4th session in a sequence of nine.

I think the way it's developing for me is I hand out worksheets, which pose
questions around Python, and students have the option to just fill them in,
knowing Python "in their heads" well enough to not consult the actual
interpreter.  Others run the questions through Python.  Others do a little
of both.  Worked pretty well today.  The kids seemed very engaged.  I walked
around helping and explaining.  We were in learning mode, not "prove to me
you already know it" mode.

We started out with an xmlrpclib demo.  My setup was lame:  Ethernet from my
laptop to a neighboring PC, with an air gap to the actual PPS intranet.  So
of course it didn't work.  Even after fixing the link, I was having
problems.  But some of the kids got their examples to work.  In a way that
was good:  teacher in a group with floundering students, other students
having it work.  Very democratic.

At the very end of the class, I retold the story about the young Gauss, this
time suggesting he did the whole thing in his head.  Like, the teacher said
add 1 to 100 and he said hmmmm, that's range(1,101) and range(100, 0, -1) on
top of each other, and a sum of 101, 101, 101... 100 times = 100(101).  But
that's twice the sum you need, so voila, 5050, in like 8 seconds.  Stunned
teacher.

I explained why such consecutive sums-from-1 are considered "triangular" and
threw out this challenge:  class is about to end, but if anyone thinks they
can do this:

def tri(n):
   # something goes here
   return answer

then let me know now.  Type type type.  A hand goes up.  I quickly memorize
the student's solution and transfer it to the screen up front (laptop ->
projector -> screen):

def tri(n):
   num = n * (n + 1)
   num = num / 2
   return num

(actually the student said 'print num' and I said that'd be OK too).

And yes, tri(100) returns 5050, so big win.  The kids felt one of their own
had risen to the challenge, not in a competitive way, but as their
representative.  A peer had passed a tough test on their behalf.

Note:  using "__past__ style" division is OK in this context, as n, n+1 must
form an even/odd pair, meaning their product is even, meaning 2 divides with
no remainder (i.e. integer division OK).

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051214/595fafa3/attachment.htm

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Wed Dec 14 17:36:54 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 08:36:54 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Urner @ Qwest: posts to edu-sig blocked
Message-ID: <f604188c0512140836p3dd6d5ecx6682e210e6bf09ea@mail.gmail.com>

Maybe a tightening spam filter is to blame.

In any case, I'm resubscribing from my Gmail account.

As a Qwest user, I'm used to being discriminated against, thanks to the
activities of my fellow Qwestians.

My next post will be back to business.

Kirby

====

Hi. This is the qmail-send program at mpls-qmqp-01.inet.qwest.net.
I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses.
This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out.

<edu-sig at python.org>:
194.109.207.14 does not like recipient.
Remote host said: 554 Service unavailable; Client host [63.231.195.112]
blocked using t1.dnsbl.net.au; see http://dnsbl.net.au/rmst/ and
http://dnsbl.net.au/lookup/?63.231.195.112
Giving up on 194.109.207.14.

--- Below this line is a copy of the message.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051214/5f2758d6/attachment.html

From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Wed Dec 14 18:04:39 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 12:04:39 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
 of algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <dnpemt$1ib$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com> <dnpemt$1ib$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <43A050A7.7040300@optonline.com>

Scott David Daniels wrote:

>Well, in fact both meanings of "fixed point" are used, seldom by the
>same person.  I expect Knuth is in that small group that uses both
>meanings regularly (since his basic training was all mathematics).
>Look to the "functional programming" people for examination of the
>whole idea of fixed points of functions (Bird & Wadler is a standard
>F.P. text).
>  
>
thanks for the clarification as to terminology.

re:  "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of algorithms"

I guess what I am asking further is whether the statement is simply 
referencing the development of  algorithms for solving the mathematical 
question of the fixed points of a function, in the context of 
mathematical programming where that particular mathematical problem 
might happen to present itself- or is there some implication that the 
problem of  f(x) = x is one that  has more general implications  in 
algorithmics as  a distinct area of study.

.. or am I asking a question that is itself too round-about to have an 
answer of the kind of am looking for? ;)

Art


From Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org  Wed Dec 14 18:27:39 2005
From: Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org (Scott David Daniels)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 09:27:39 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
	of algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <43A050A7.7040300@optonline.com>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com> <dnpemt$1ib$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<43A050A7.7040300@optonline.com>
Message-ID: <dnpklu$p1g$1@sea.gmane.org>

Arthur wrote:
> re:  "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of algorithms"
> 
> I guess what I am asking further is whether the statement is simply 
> referencing the development of  algorithms for solving the mathematical 
> question of the fixed points of a function, in the context of 
> mathematical programming where that particular mathematical problem 
> might happen to present itself- or is there some implication that the 
> problem of  f(x) = x is one that  has more general implications  in 
> algorithmics as  a distinct area of study.
I think the answer is yes (there are such implications), and that those
implications show up in the functional programming world (where they
like to think of everything as constants and pure functions).  The
places it shows up (if I understand correctly) have a lot to do with
compilation and binding functions into environments where the functions
themselves are a part of that environment.  But this is simply a
suspicion, I can't say that I've delved too deeply into this area.
I suspect the other way into this is Category Theory, an area I am
afraid I under-appreciate (though some say it is just because I don't
"get it").

> .. or am I asking a question that is itself too round-about to have an 
> answer of the kind of am looking for? ;)

The above is as much as I can give you.  You may get more from abstract
algebra people.

--Scott David Daniels
Scott.Daniels at Acm.Org


From dooms at info.ucl.ac.be  Wed Dec 14 18:53:58 2005
From: dooms at info.ucl.ac.be (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Gr=E9goire_Dooms?=)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 18:53:58 +0100
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
 of	algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com>
Message-ID: <43A05C36.6000504@info.ucl.ac.be>

Arthur wrote:

>Guess I am fishing for some exposition on the statement that the
>
>"The study of fixed points has been at the foundation of algorithms"
>  
>
Very deep in the foundations of algorithms are the foundations of 
computer science semantics:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denotational_semantics

An other area where I've been exposed ot fixed points is concurrent 
constraint programming where constraint propagators are applied to a 
computation space until a fixed point is reached (see for instance 
http://www.gecode.org/ for a Open source implementation).

HTH,
--
Gr?goire Dooms

PS: Where is the connection with education with/about Python ?


From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Wed Dec 14 20:16:33 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 2005 14:16:33 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
 of	algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <43A05C36.6000504@info.ucl.ac.be>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com> <43A05C36.6000504@info.ucl.ac.be>
Message-ID: <43A06F91.6000509@optonline.com>

Gr?goire Dooms wrote:

> Very deep in the foundations of algorithms are the foundations of 
> computer science semantics:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denotational_semantics
>
> An other area where I've been exposed ot fixed points is concurrent 
> constraint programming where constraint propagators are applied to a 
> computation space until a fixed point is reached (see for instance 
> http://www.gecode.org/ for a Open source implementation).

I see your familiarity with the gecode project and its concepts are more 
than casual ;):

http://cpgraph.info.ucl.ac.be/

> HTH,

Helps - in the sense of giving me some impression of the meaning of the 
behind the assertion, realizing that an "impression" is all I have the 
prerequisites to achieve.

> -- 
> Gr?goire Dooms
>
> PS: Where is the connection with education with/about Python ?

Maybe little. Though I have certainly been *more* irrelevant than this. 
As I suspect you are aware.

Obviously there will be more relevance once you do the Python bindings 
to CP(Graph) ;).

I do flirt with the idea of having nothing to say here - which will 
certainly avoid any possibility of my raising irrelevancies.

Is PyGeo relevant to education with/about Python? 

I am not quite ready yet, but after the next release I will be willing 
to argue that it is more than relevant - that it is significant. Knowing 
that I might have lost objectivity, but also knowing what I know.

Art


Art




From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Thu Dec 15 16:59:01 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Thu, 15 Dec 2005 10:59:01 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] "The study of fixed points has been at the foundation
 of algorithms"
In-Reply-To: <dnpklu$p1g$1@sea.gmane.org>
References: <43A03092.80904@optonline.com> <dnpemt$1ib$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<43A050A7.7040300@optonline.com> <dnpklu$p1g$1@sea.gmane.org>
Message-ID: <43A192C5.1080806@optonline.com>

Scott David Daniels wrote:

>I suspect the other way into this is Category Theory, an area I am
>afraid I under-appreciate (though some say it is just because I don't
>"get it").
>
Read through this explanation of Category Theory.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/category-theory/

While not being in a position to approach the concepts described in any 
serious way, I can - I think - at least appreciate that the ghost of 
Felix Klein hovers about.

The discussion I am having with myself here has to do with modernism and 
education. My concept of educational reform has much to do with the 
ghost of Felix Klein, as well...in  perceiving a need to have even 
elementary levels of instruction better informed by the kinds of 
modernist abstractions with which categories like Category Theory grapple.

Whereas I don't think that, in general, technology has any (necessarily) 
important role to play in such reform - I do think that specific tools - 
Python certainly among them (with or without my efforts to contribute) 
can, and probably will.

Art.


From ajsiegel at optonline.net  Fri Dec 16 16:13:06 2005
From: ajsiegel at optonline.net (Arthur)
Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 10:13:06 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] The Bridges Conference: Mathematical Connections, in Art,
 Music, and Science
Message-ID: <43A2D982.1020505@optonline.com>

http://www.lkl.ac.uk/bridges/call.html




From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Sun Dec 18 00:14:29 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Sat, 17 Dec 2005 15:14:29 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets (scrolling,
	embedded animations & testing -- credit-accruing)
Message-ID: <f604188c0512171514q66d778celbda95191ac0d2cee@mail.gmail.com>

So I'm thinking the way to do worksheets is to think of a scrolling web
page, with embedded applets, and with reader challenges built in, with some
kind of automatic scoring (useful feedback).

The style of the worksheet would of course reflect the artistic
sensibilities (or lack thereof) of the author.  I've been influenced by the
O'Reilly 'head first' series: http://headfirst.oreilly.com/

Somewhere in a sidebar, or maybe even front and center, Python learners
should see:

mytuple = ( element, )
listcopy = [ comma, separated, elements ][:]
{dictionary}[lookup] = newelement

and variations on that theme.  The point is to reinforce a lot of related
concepts using nifty mnemonics.  For example, it's not just that tuples are
parenthesis-defined, but that a single element requires a comma.  With
lists, we address the need for a slice, if we want to avoid a double-naming
the same referent in memory.  With the last line, we illustrate adding to a
dictionary using the assignment operator.

This is but one example.  Another would be:

noun.verb(args)
noun.state

where noun = object; verb is for method (args = eatables); state could be an
adjective (green), or even a property, with getter / setter verbs behind the
scenes.

For more on properties:
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/2005-August/005059.html (ff.
thread)

An inheritance path might be

Class0 (object) -> Class1 (Class 0) -> Class2 (Class1)  -> Class3 (Class2)

where these nouns are class objects, superclasses going left, subclasses
going right.

These little alphanumeric mnemonics need to be abetted with multiple
pictures.  For example, a complex number sequence, generated from some
arbitrary point on the complex plane, per Mandelbrot or Julia, should loop
through Python stepwise, while doing something graphical directly adjacent
(a pixel attains some color value, vectors swing around -- many options).

I'm influenced here by J Language pedagogy, which goes to great lengths to
tie up with "parts of speech", thereby making "grammar" the right word to
apply when studying J's structure and syntax.
http://www.4dsolutions.net/ocn/Jlang.html  (Kenneth Iverson himself helped
me squish some typos before he died -- I think there're still one or two).

These "Prosperos Books" (some from O'Reilly?), could be used in a community
college setting, sometimes in testing situations i.e. under controlled
conditions that measure student performance in some pre-agreed-upon way.

Related reading:
http://mybizmo.blogspot.com/2005/12/another-interesting-day.html (click in
MER in "After dark, I wrote an essay on
MER<http://mathforum.org/kb/thread.jspa?threadID=1310716&tstart=0>for
our
KBE <http://worldgame.blogspot.com/2005/10/saturday-academy.html>,...")

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051217/0025b13a/attachment.html

From radenski at chapman.edu  Mon Dec 19 20:26:11 2005
From: radenski at chapman.edu (Radenski, Atanas)
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 2005 11:26:11 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python as a CS1 language: Reference(s)?
Message-ID: <A50A29B70741ED42BE44230B1DF611840F1B0A4C@ADAM.chapman.edu>

Hello all,

 

I am writing a paper on my experience with Python as a CS language at
Chapman University, California. I know Python has been used as CS1
language in some colleges/universities, such as:

 

1.	Wartburg College (IA, USA)
2.	Georgia Tech (GA, USA)
3.	University of California Irvine (CA, USA)
4.	Simon Fraser University (BC, Canada)
5.	Center College (KY, USA)
6.	Chapman University (CA, USA)

 

Is there a comprehensive list of institutions that use Python? 

 

Can you provide information of other institutions, not in the above
list? 

 

Any references to related resources will be appreciated.

 

Bets regards,

 

Atanas

 

Atanas Radenski


mailto:radenski at chapman.edu      http://www.chapman.edu/~radenski/

 

In this world, time and space are the same -- Richard Wagner
("Parsifal", 1882)

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051219/abea93c2/attachment.htm

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Mon Dec 19 23:50:50 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 2005 14:50:50 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets (scrolling,
	embedded animations & testing -- credit-accruing)
In-Reply-To: <f604188c0512171514q66d778celbda95191ac0d2cee@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f604188c0512171514q66d778celbda95191ac0d2cee@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <f604188c0512191450i3cd893dbgbebc2dd3288047ed@mail.gmail.com>

On 12/17/05, kirby urner <kirby.urner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> These "Prosperos Books" (some from O'Reilly?), could be used in a
> community college setting, sometimes in testing situations i.e. under
> controlled conditions that measure student performance in some
> pre-agreed-upon way.


For example, under the heading of "useless Python" we have:

>>> N=100
>>> sum([i+j for i,j in zip(range(1,N+1), range(N,0,-1))])/2
5050

OK, lots of fun syntax, but deployed in a surreal fashion i.e. no one would
want to really write a function that way right?

Surreal is a key word here.  I think we've learned from the Head First
experiments, among others, that humans crave bandwidth.  One reason kids
tune out, get bored, and therefore perform poorly, appear stupid, fall
behind, is they're busy day dreaming.  Anything to compensate for the tedium
of low bandwidth classroom pedagogy.  There's a reason we call it "pedantic"
(the pace of foot soldiers -- trudge trudge trudge).

What I'd like to provide is high bandwidth, over-the-wire learning
experiences, preferably on big plasma, with sensurround sound, that fully
leverage our capacity for imagination.  Purists will whine about all the
"irrelevant noise" stuffed into our pipelines, but perhaps they're just not
attuned to all the cultural allusions, sidebar tributes, cameo appearances.

Like, the above Python fragment ain't so useless in a dynamic worksheet
context, wherein we have an embedded movie re-enactment of Baby Gauss,
chewing on 1+2+3... 100 i.e. the 100th triangular number, and deriving 101 +
101 + ... 101 (100 times), with thought balloons showing "as if" he were
thinking in Python (two ranges, one reversed, zipped to pairs, then
pairwise, then globally summed -- then divide by two to elimate the
doubling).

And for the Nth triangular number:

>>> def tri(n):
    return sum([i+j for i,j in zip(range(1,n+1), range(n,0,-1))])/2

>>> tri(9000)
40504500

Which is of course completely ridiculous as we've already shown we don't
need the memory-intensive range bit:

>>> (9001*9000)//2
40504500

>>> def tri(n):  return n*(n+1)//2

Triangular number:  the number of one-on-one handshakes or dialogs betwixt N
participants, this time using N(N-1)//2 i.e. every "me" (N of us) times
"everyone who ain't me" (N-1 others) divided by 2 (because one handshake
works both ways as a greeting).  Dynamic workbook:  phones ringing,
fragments of dialog.

Consecutive triangles pile as tetrahedra, leading to more animations and
more fill-in-the-blanks (using tri, already defined, define the Python
function tetra).

You could have real human teachers, even in real time, doing some of the
teleprompting.  A dynamic book doesn't presuppose everything's canned.
There's room for dynamism even of a noncomputable sort, given the human
element.

I think that early Python Love Story out of Yorktown HS is prototypical:
real human actors engaged in role playing, interspliced with dryer fare.

With millions of kids growing up on Hogwarts etc., the demand for something
a bit more engaging than Everyday Math ("Jimmy buys six eggs at .39 apiece,
if he breaks two coming home...").  We're doing our kids a disservice if we
plan around these dry-as-bones text books as our only mode of delivery.

I'm not against text books per se.  I *am* against text books as the only
option.

I think the publishers with compassion will pioneer the newer options.  From
what I've learned at OSCONs, we have every reason to expect more from XUL
etc.

There's this instinct to force junior to buckle down and learn hard stuff
the hard way, i.e. it can't be serious if it's not dry-as-bones, anything
glitzy is pandering/spoiling.  I question that instinct, distrust it.  It
smacks too much of "we never had that much fun as kids, why should you?"

We're not just teaching "mathematics" or "Python" or "programming" in a
narrow sense.  We're showing off what multimedia might do for us,
encouraging students to emulate and then improve upon the workbooks
themselves.   We're teaching art, not just science, and maybe in that order
for a welcome change.

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051219/ad3820c3/attachment.html

From bmiller at luther.edu  Tue Dec 20 00:15:34 2005
From: bmiller at luther.edu (Brad Miller)
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 2005 17:15:34 -0600
Subject: [Edu-sig] Python as a CS1 language: Reference(s)?
In-Reply-To: <A50A29B70741ED42BE44230B1DF611840F1B0A4C@ADAM.chapman.edu>
References: <A50A29B70741ED42BE44230B1DF611840F1B0A4C@ADAM.chapman.edu>
Message-ID: <35510D8F-CCF7-46CF-B5CF-5407FB1185C2@luther.edu>

Hi,

We use Python in CS1 and CS2 at Luther College (IA, USA)  We are in  
our second year with Python and are very pleased.

As long as we are on the topic I will take this opportunity to  
announce that there will be a special session at SIGCSE '06 in  
Houston on teaching introductory CS with Python.  I hope that many of  
you on this list will be able to make it.  We hope to have a chance  
to compare notes and talk about what works what doesn't and what the  
future may bring.

Brad

Brad Miller, PhD
Assistant Professor
Luther College
http://www.cs.luther.edu/~bmiller
jabber:  bnmnetp at jabber.org


On Dec 19, 2005, at 1:26 PM, Radenski, Atanas wrote:

> Hello all,
>
>
>
> I am writing a paper on my experience with Python as a CS language  
> at Chapman University, California. I know Python has been used as  
> CS1 language in some colleges/universities, such as:
>
>
>
> Wartburg College (IA, USA)
> Georgia Tech (GA, USA)
> University of California Irvine (CA, USA)
> Simon Fraser University (BC, Canada)
> Center College (KY, USA)
> Chapman University (CA, USA)
>
>
> Is there a comprehensive list of institutions that use Python?
>
>
>
> Can you provide information of other institutions, not in the above  
> list?
>
>
>
> Any references to related resources will be appreciated.
>
>
>
> Bets regards,
>
>
>
> Atanas
>
>
>
> Atanas Radenski
>
>
> mailto:radenski at chapman.edu      http://www.chapman.edu/~radenski/
>
>
>
> In this world, time and space are the same -- Richard Wagner  
> ("Parsifal", 1882)
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Edu-sig mailing list
> Edu-sig at python.org
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051219/10919b88/attachment.html
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: PGP.sig
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 186 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
Url : http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051219/10919b88/PGP-0001.pgp

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Tue Dec 20 22:46:52 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Tue, 20 Dec 2005 13:46:52 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets (scrolling,
	embedded animations & testing -- credit-accruing)
In-Reply-To: <f604188c0512191450i3cd893dbgbebc2dd3288047ed@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f604188c0512171514q66d778celbda95191ac0d2cee@mail.gmail.com>
	<f604188c0512191450i3cd893dbgbebc2dd3288047ed@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <f604188c0512201346h28f77dd8p94867d0c33d38c32@mail.gmail.com>

>
> We're not just teaching "mathematics" or "Python" or "programming" in a
> narrow sense.  We're showing off what multimedia might do for us,
> encouraging students to emulate and then improve upon the workbooks
> themselves.   We're teaching art, not just science, and maybe in that order
> for a welcome change.
>
> Kirby
>
>
I summarized all this in a blog post this morning, with call-backs to here
and elsewhere:
http://mybizmo.blogspot.com/2005/12/prosperos-books.html

I think it's important to open source these ideas before someone claims they
were hidden in some nondisclosure agreement somewhere.  I did the same thing
with hypertoons.  Maybe I don't get super rich, but then neither do a lot of
undeserving lawyers -- a source of satisfaction for me.

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051220/a08e998c/attachment.html

From missive at hotmail.com  Thu Dec 22 00:16:54 2005
From: missive at hotmail.com (Lee Harr)
Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2005 03:46:54 +0430
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets
Message-ID: <BAY12-F2476E370ADA816D3EB34D8B1310@phx.gbl>

>What I'd like to provide is high bandwidth, over-the-wire learning
>experiences, preferably on big plasma, with sensurround sound, that fully
>leverage our capacity for imagination.


Maybe I am a purist, but how does high bandwidth multimedia bring
on the imagination? Seems to me that the kid who turns a rock in to
a spaceship is using more imagination than the kid who sits back and
lets the 3-d virtual reality space complex blast him in to orbit around
the planet Boredium.

It is a very fine line to walk. We want to keep their attention, of course,
but we also want them to create things that we could never have
imagined ourselves.

If education is entertainment, where is the incentive to create?

Maybe the boredom is an integral part of the educational experience.
"These old fogies are so boring. There must be a better way to do this!"

_________________________________________________________________
Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today - it's FREE! 
http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/


From winstonw at stratolab.com  Thu Dec 22 01:03:21 2005
From: winstonw at stratolab.com (Winston Wolff)
Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 19:03:21 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets
In-Reply-To: <BAY12-F2476E370ADA816D3EB34D8B1310@phx.gbl>
References: <BAY12-F2476E370ADA816D3EB34D8B1310@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <FF163673-4475-4843-BE39-D264510F112B@stratolab.com>

Right, it seems to me the bandwidth should come from the student's  
own imagination not from the worksheet.  We just have to define a  
worksheet and a classroom setting that can accommodate students that  
take a lesson in 20 different directions.

-ww

On Dec 21, 2005, at 6:16 PM, Lee Harr wrote:

> Maybe I am a purist, but how does high bandwidth multimedia bring
> on the imagination? Seems to me that the kid who turns a rock in to
> a spaceship is using more imagination than the kid who sits back and
> lets the 3-d virtual reality space complex blast him in to orbit  
> around
> the planet Boredium.
>
> It is a very fine line to walk. We want to keep their attention, of  
> course,
> but we also want them to create things that we could never have
> imagined ourselves.
>
> If education is entertainment, where is the incentive to create?
>
> Maybe the boredom is an integral part of the educational experience.
> "These old fogies are so boring. There must be a better way to do  
> this!"




______________________________________________________
winston wolff - (646) 827-2242 - http://www.stratolab.com
learning by creating - video game courses for kids in new york


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051221/fc5e7cc7/attachment.html

From dajoy at openworldlearning.org  Thu Dec 22 14:16:17 2005
From: dajoy at openworldlearning.org (Daniel Ajoy)
Date: Thu, 22 Dec 2005 08:16:17 -0500
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets (Lee Harr)
In-Reply-To: <mailman.7.1135249202.30117.edu-sig@python.org>
Message-ID: <43AA60D1.28799.275FB025@localhost>

On 22 Dec 2005 at 12:00, edu-sig-request at python.org wrote:

> If education is entertainment, where is the incentive to create?
> 
> Maybe the boredom is an integral part of the educational experience.
> "These old fogies are so boring. There must be a better way to do this!"
> 

Edutainment, No thanks.
I Prefer Playful Learning.
http://llk.media.mit.edu/papers/archive/mres/edutainment.pdf


Daniel





*****************************
OpenWorld Learning
http://www.openworldlearning.org



From fmuga at ateneo.edu  Sat Dec 24 17:21:27 2005
From: fmuga at ateneo.edu (Felix P. Muga II)
Date: Sun, 25 Dec 2005 00:21:27 +0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] MS EXCEL Error
Message-ID: <1135441287.43ad758790e73@mail.ateneo.edu>


 IN MS EXCEL 1900 IS A LEAP YEAR

I was writing a Python program to find the exact date of Easter Sunday
for a given year after 1900 as an example for the course in Discrete
Mathematics which I am teaching to 2nd year undergraduate students in
my university.

A part of the program calls for computing the number of days from 1900
to the given year. Hence, I have to consider the number of leap years.
To derive the formula for finding the number of days, I used MS EXCEL
since it has an excellent resource about DATES. However, I found out
that MS EXCEL accepts the string '2/29/1900' as a legal date and even
considers '2/29/1900' as a WEDNESDAY. Also, MS EXCEL recognizes January
1, 1900 as a SUNDAY.

To verify these MS EXCEL results, I searched the WEB for the topic on
PERPETUAL CALENDAR which showed that JANUARY 1, 1900 is a MONDAY and
not a SUNDAY.

Furthermore, I found out that a LEAP YEAR is defined as a YEAR which
satisfies at least one of the two conditions:

1. The YEAR is a multiple of 4 and not a multiple of 100.
2. If the YEAR is a multiple of 100 then it must be a multiple of 400.

Hence, 1996 and 2004 are leap years since they satisfy the first
condition. Also, 1600 and 2000 are leap years since they satisfy the
second condition. However, 1900 is NOT a LEAP YEAR since it is a multiple
of 4 and a multiple of 100 but not a multiple of 400.

The error in MS EXCEL is only confined to the dates from January 1, 1900
to February 28, 1900 (an ASH Wednesday) and the illegal date of February
29, 1990.

Thus, a mistake occurs in the computation if these dates are involved.
An example is the problem of finding the number of days between January 1,
1900 and December 31, 2005. It assigns a serial number of 1 to January 1,
1900 and a serial number of 39,448 to January 1, 2008. However, the
correct serial number to January 1, 2008 should be 39,447. The error is
due to the existence of February 29, 1900 (serial number of 60) as a
valid date in MS EXCEL.

Fortunately, I discovered this problem and I was successful in writing a
Python program that returns the exact date of Easter Sunday for a given
year after 1900.

-- 
Felix P. Muga II, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Mathematics Department
Ateneo de Manila University

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Mon Dec 26 01:59:29 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Sun, 25 Dec 2005 16:59:29 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Dynamic Worksheets
In-Reply-To: <FF163673-4475-4843-BE39-D264510F112B@stratolab.com>
References: <BAY12-F2476E370ADA816D3EB34D8B1310@phx.gbl>
	<FF163673-4475-4843-BE39-D264510F112B@stratolab.com>
Message-ID: <f604188c0512251659r1dab273eka85773014939f4ba@mail.gmail.com>

On 12/21/05, Winston Wolff <winstonw at stratolab.com> wrote:
>
> Right, it seems to me the bandwidth should come from the student's own
> imagination not from the worksheet.  We just have to define a worksheet and
> a classroom setting that can accommodate students that take a lesson in 20
> different directions.
> -ww
>

I don't see it as either/or.  Like in Uru (computer game), you have to slow
down and read ordinary text quite a bit.  A high bandwidth worksheet might
send you to the library on assignment (whether that's a "virtual library" or
not depends on the context).

We're also giving students tools to create these dynamic workbooks for one
another.  Think of it as an art form, like movie making.

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051225/281c09b3/attachment.htm

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Sat Dec 31 20:57:40 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Sat, 31 Dec 2005 11:57:40 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Brainstorming a new worksheet for 2006
Message-ID: <f604188c0512311157y5403829aldaaf7bcd59e9d3e@mail.gmail.com>

I'll be back to school on Tuesday, teaching another Python class.  I'm about
to throw together a web based worksheet for use in class (each student will
pull it up in a browser).  I'll be recycling a lot of familiar material.
Just thought I'd brainstorm out loud about the contents, then whip it
together, then come back here and share the URL.

I want to review some of what we've done so far, include a lot of links,
preview some of the content ahead.

Topics:
Google Earth, Celestia and Stellarium for orientation (hello world)
Latitude / Longitude
XML
Python:
   shell mode
   primitive objects vs. collections
Collections:
   list
   dictionary
   string
   tuple
Expressions:
   list comprehensions
Functions:
   getting started with sequences:  triangular, tetrahedral numbers etc.
Generators:
   same ground, different capabilities
   generator expressions
...

That should be enough to get me going.  I'll be back soon with that URL.
It'll be a work in progress and I'll be open to feedback (positive,
negative, neutral, indifferent).

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051231/4f66e508/attachment.html

From kirby.urner at gmail.com  Sat Dec 31 22:30:08 2005
From: kirby.urner at gmail.com (kirby urner)
Date: Sat, 31 Dec 2005 13:30:08 -0800
Subject: [Edu-sig] Fwd: Brainstorming a new worksheet for 2006
In-Reply-To: <f604188c0512311157y5403829aldaaf7bcd59e9d3e@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f604188c0512311157y5403829aldaaf7bcd59e9d3e@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <f604188c0512311330m251757bbk6ca1cedce9262bb6@mail.gmail.com>

That should be enough to get me going.  I'll be back soon with that URL.
It'll be a work in progress and I'll be open to feedback (positive,
negative, neutral, indifferent).

Kirby

===

OK, in about 90 minutes, I got this far:

http://www.4dsolutions.net/ocn/winterhaven/

(of course this page will be changing as time goes on).

I have a few minutes to work on my functions page before I have to go
somewhere.  I'll get started on that now.

Kirby
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mail.python.org/pipermail/edu-sig/attachments/20051231/e6cb71a5/attachment.htm