What is your garden of action?
I think
in circles.
NCWIT Aspirations in Computing AiC Mentor Expectations
Efficiency …
Asked my 5 year old granddaughter what that means after telling her the story of why I was stopping to buying gas on the way home from picking her up. We broke the word into parts so she could say it. She said Oh, it is “fish in the ocean.”
I explained it is doing things to save time safety. I said sometimes when we rush we make mistakes, and that ends up taking more time. Ever type the wrong password. After more discussion, I think she understood the need to research and plan. Gee … that is what I have been teaching in my computer science, math and CTE classes since 1985 – the systems model, inputs -outputs – quality control.
Efficiency signifies a peak level of performance that uses the least amount of inputs to achieve the highest amount of output. Efficiency requires reducing the number of unnecessary resources used to produce a given output including personal time and energy.
Boston Dynamics: Inside the workshop where robots of the future are being built – After years of trying, 60 Minutes cameras finally get a peek inside the workshop at Boston Dynamics, where robots move in ways once only thought possible in movies – Anderson Cooper reports.
The next generation of robots – Boston Dynamics said when ask why – it is just fun.
The move of computer science to CTE is like Brexit. CTE coordinators are making decisions impacting the successful classroom economy that teachers have built over decades. In this age of AI and Cyber Security needs it is no time to kill the spirit of teachers. Vicky one of our AiC Teachers of the Year and sponsor of a National AiC winner said this: “I quit, I quit … I am retiring.” One of the students in the Girls Who Code Digital Tech Conference asked, “How can we help our teachers keep the course they want to teach? Seems the CTE coordinators have eliminated CSIII as a choice. To leave no child behind, you first have to leave no teacher behind!
In preparing for a Great Decision discussion on Brexit, I found this:
The questions asked for the discussion are the most important part of driving conversation. The Girls Who Code organizers of the conference zoomed with me to go over my role. They surveyed the conference participants and shared those questions. I was able to prepare my answer ahead of time and posted my answers on the post below to save time.
The only thing I know about Brexit is what is on the news, and what my son who lives in London shares. I just don’t know enough to give my opinion, and so am in total listening mode. I am relying on the expertise of the Foreign Policy Association who has been doing this for decades: www.fpa.org/great_decisions/
In exploring answers that fit my core values of Curiosity, Kindness and Beauty, I listen to TED Talks. One that popped up was “How to Be a Better Human
Being.” This ties to Brexit in that it was about a 50:50 vote, just like the presidency. What are your core values? Seems like that is the solution for polarization presented by this speaker.
What is empowering is when you get your first editorial published. When you get your first law passed. But what is even more empowering is when you see the youth doing the same thing. And by youth I mean anyone without gray hair.
Being a WHChamps keeps me connected to my values. I am still part of a tribe who are living up to the challenge to help win the future by out-educating, out-innovating, and out-building our competitors in the 21st century. It keeps me blogging, as it is my websites started in the 1990s that resulted in being honored as a White House Champion of Change. The 1000’s of WHChamps are still connected on a closed Facebook page. And I can search on their interactive map for those who live in my area or who are working on similar challenges. My challenge is to do the same thing for you girls through mentorships and internships connected to your passions: knorth.edublogs.org/learn/ncwit-aspirations-award/2021-2/problem-areas-2021-aic-applicants
Social groups like this who can team to solve problems. Have you been a political activist? Advocate to make CS an academic area.
Teach through the Arts. Do you know about Seymour Papert, Artemis Papert, Turtle Art, coding Digital to Physical, Logo Foundation? Have a Dance Party.
I enjoyed designing and sewing when I was your age. I liked creating things and became interested in AI as I was interested in how the brain worked. Majored in math, but in 1968 added a minor in 1968 in computer science. Dropped this as I became frustrated standing in lines to run my keypunch cards. Had cognitive science been a major, that is what I would study now. My brother learned to program in “C” to write software for his construction business. Since there was no computer store in town, he opened an Apple store. I bought an AppleIIE, which I still have, for my children in the 1970s. That is when my interest really started, programming in Logo and Basic. Do you know who Leo Cherne is? I felt the power that rooted my interest: The computer is incredibly fast, accurate, and stupid … The marriage of the two is a force beyond calculation.
Research what lights your fire. See where the pathways on the answers take you. If you keep coming back to one area, find out what languages they use to solve. Have you ever programmed in “R” or Processing? Have you taken a data science course? How have you used CS to solve a local problem to help nature? To help those in your community?
Knowledge is Answers to Questions, the more questions the more knowledge.
Working for Dr. Mavis Kelsey was typing his family genealogy. He wrote everything on index cards, sorted, then added to the index. I suggested he buy an AppleIIE and use the next database software. I was one of the first to use the Microsoft Access Database and worked with the company to improve their software. Every semicolon and period had to be right. When finally finished, I ran the data, but alas not enough memory. Contacted Computer Craft on 59 and Bissonnet where we purchased, as they promised it would work. They said I could run the data on their computer with more memory. I remember loading the code which had to run overnight. I taped a sign on the monitor, “do not turn off!”. The most exciting moment was coming in the next morning and seeing the words, index complete. And finally seeing the book published that I was part of in 1979. A book I am part of now is “No Fear Coding, Computational Thinking Across the K-5 Curriculum. I wrote the chapters on the Bee-Bot which are I posted online. And presented at a workshop for the City of Houston. They are looking for ambassadors if interested in doing presentation like this with a friend who lives in Houston.
Thank you leaders for inviting me to present at your Girls Who Code workshop which gave me a deadline to getting some of my history posted. Nice thing about coding in HTML and bl
ogging is that all my errors can easily be fixed. And new ideas can be added at anytime in the future. And being able to do what I love, talk to students. Which is so much more fun than adults, who often make me feel uncomfortable.
My questions:
“Oh, the Thinks you can Think” … This cancel culture has got to stop. March 2nd Dr. Seuss Read Across America celebration omitted. This is so, so stupid. We need to work on building not tearing down cultures.
Capital Siege Hearings – didn’t have the right data getting to the decision makers. EPCOT Energy failure – decision makers not prepared.
Does this mindset start in schools when decision makers are not preparing students to make decisions? When classrooms are controlled by laws. When students are not given time to reflect on their lesson. Child Friendly Cities need Dr. Seuss Creators.
CHAMPIONS CHALLENGE:
ARE YOU READY:
“We are mostly farmers … “ Thomas Friedman Chapter 9 11:20:50 – Everyone must read “Thank You for Being Late…” He has solutions if only we will listen: Chicken Coups, Gardens and the Web. What if the US built a wall of self-reliant green houses along the border? Immigrants migrate to survive. Let’s give them to tools to do that in Mexico so they can solve their own problems. The Arctic freeze of electricity and water gave all Texans a feel for what it is like to live without. But that was just one week. In other countries it is years. Let’s build with kindness!
LOCAL SOLUTIONS:
What ideas can you add to this? Does the vision inspire you to create?
Building garden pathways in my neighborhood …
London with my family … Italy with Bobbie …
Canada with AAUW Garden Divas – COVID meet-up on “The Gardener”.
Gardens should fit the landscape … focal points channel your view … Sensual element — smell, sound … Patience — wait for development … Surprises … Gardens should fit the landscape … Sensual element — smell, sound … Patience — wait for development …
The pathways on “The Gardener” took me to the next documentary, “Call of the Forest: The Forgotten Wisdom of Trees” and to the Boreal Forest. 
To create talent teachers must ask their students the right questions. My grandchildren are conscientious workers in school. But not engaged in what GaGa is working on because their teachers have not asked perked their curiosity. What else is going on? What can go on in schools to create pathways of learning learners did not know they would like? “Never allow yourself to be too certain.” Steward Brand Futurist … willing to challenge himself and other people.
Where are you on the empathy … apathy spectrum?
It is contagious … act with empathy or with apathy has the power to infect everyone around them. Is the empathy-apathy disposition spectrum at the very core, responsible for creating organizational and communal culture? Can you be that one person to plant the seed? Are you unaware or don’t care?