The Daily Papert

Constructionism: A New Opportunity for Elementary Science Education

There are countless dissertations citing the 1986 NSF proposal, Constructionism: A New Opportunity for Elementary Science Education, by MIT Professor Seymour Papert. For years, I have been on the hunt for the actual document. I even contacted my Congressman to get a copy since the project was funded by the National Science Foundation. Despite those […]

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The Lessons of Logo

1990s, Computers, Learning, Logo, Project-based learning, Robotics, School Reform, Teaching / gary

The Lessons of Logo Teaching and Computers Magazine “The Magazine for Teachers of the 1990s” March/April 1990 – Volume 7, Number 5 Orlando, L. C. (1990). The Lessons of Logo. Teaching and Computing, 7(5), 20-25. Teaching and Computers Lessons of Logo 1990 searchable It was almost 25 years ago that Logo, the first programming language

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Powerful Idea Du Jour from Seymour Papert

uncategorized / gary

“Once I was alerted to the concept of “hard fun” I began listening for it and heard it over and over. It is expressed in many different ways, all of which all boil down to the conclusion that everyone likes hard challenging things to do. But they have to be the right things matched to

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Today’s Thought from Seymour Papert

1980s, Computers, Learning, Mathematics, School Reform, uncategorized / gary

“Two fundamental ideas run through this book. The first is that it is possible to design computers so that learning to communicate with them can be a natural process, more like learning French by living in France than like trying to learn it through the unnatural process of American foreign-language instruction in classrooms. Second, learning

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A Bit of Wisdom from Seymour Papert

1980s, Computers / gary

“All of us, professionals as well as laymen, must consciously break the habits we bring to thinking about the computer. Computation is in its infancy. It is hard to think about computers of the future without projecting onto them the properties and the limitations of those we think we know today. And nowhere is this

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Thought of the Day from Seymour Papert

1980s, Computers, Mathematics, Science, Teaching / gary

“Many children who grow up in our cities are surrounded by the artifacts of science but have good reason to see them as belonging to “the others”; in many case they are perceived as belonging to the social enemy. Still other obstacles are more abstract, though ultimately of the same nature. Most branches of the

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Today’s Word for Learning from Seymour Papert

1980s, Computers, Learning, School Reform, Teaching / gary

“Most writers emphasized using computers for games, entertainment, income tax, electronic mail, shopping, and banking. A few talked about the computer as a teaching machine. This book too poses the question of what will be done with personal computers, but in a very different way. I shall be talking about how computers may affect the

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A Daily Dose of Inspiration from Seymour Papert

1980s, Epistemology, Learning / gary

“My proud father suggested “being clever” as an explanation. But I was painfully aware that some people who could not understand the differential could easily do things I found much more difficult. Slowly I began to formulate what I still consider the fundamental fact about learning: Anything is easy if you can assimilate it to

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March 25, 2020

1980s, Computers, Constructionism, Epistemology, Learning / gary

“In many schools today, the phrase “computer-aided instruction” means making the computer teach the child. One might say the computer is being used to program the child. In my vision, the child programs the computer and, in doing so, both acquires a sense of mastery over a piece of the most modern and powerful technology

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March 24, 2020

2000s, Computers, Learning / gary

”We’re moving into a time when people need to know how to learn things they weren’t taught in school. Second, we now have the technology to let kids learn better. This will not just allow them to learn the same things better; it will teach kids to learn radical new things at all ages.” –

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