[IAEP] 90% fluency Re: Granny Cloud

[Yamandu Ploskonka]

When I was in Bolivia recently I happened to be present at a rather 
high-level meeting where the matter of the literacy rate of Ecuador was 
being discussed, and criticism of those critisizing it got criticized - 
apparently UNICEF or one other such agency had disputed a 1% gain 
claimed by the government, who then had to retract its figures.

The main point had to do with "the breach".  Apparently or so we were 
told, you can and should be able to count success in literacy even in 
cases that all you have been able to achieve with that 70-year-old 
peasant was to get him to recognize his name, or write it when prompted, 
and people who don't count that as a gain in absolute literacy figures 
for the country are plain evil imperialist capitalistic goons or their 
equivalent.

In this context it surprises me less that many projects simply are not 
interested in cause-effect research, based in objective data, regarding 
OLPC or any of such. Qualitative research is in, as valid and 
acceptable, and so is perception-based data and interviews rather than 
actual event/fact observation, and technicalities are used to debunk 
data-based reports (this later actually might be fair, if they play by 
the rules).

Because we do not have suitably globally agreed-on scales and answers, 
answers that are consistent at the same time with evidence-based 
research, political correctness, and respect for the downtrodden, we are 
a bit stuck when it comes to say if we are - where? - somewhere...

As to myself, I will not dispute the claims by our President, Evo 
Morales, and his government, that we have, in Bolivia, achieved 100% 
literacy.  There are, so I've been told by some of the very people who 
have arrived to that number, solid reasons and evidence that shows such 
an excellent goal and need has been met.

Now, y'all at PARC, do you have some definitions that clarify what it is 
they meant by 90% fluency?
They are crucial, no doubt...  is that like 10% less than 100%?



As to drop making technology available for the top quartiles just 
because the low quartile is not getting any benefit, I have no words.

It is very nice to want to close the breach, to want to help the least, 
but if the only way to more equality is by setting up a lower ceiling 
for those who actually could benefit at the least cost, then we are 
totally messed up, it certainly is NOT unimportant.

A colleague in the Sur list was mentioning "residual cognitive benefits" 
in the form of new brain circuits.  When I think on how much more 
expensive it is to get a good education to a kid with low socioeconomics 
than it is to a better-off one, besides the whole issue of context I 
worry on how we do not realize the consequences, importance and 
additional cost to go that extra mile - and in doing so, refrain from 
discriminating against those who do not need all of that effort, those 
whose 2-parent households get hit by taxes and their own expenses as 
they do some of the push.  I know it gets silly very fast, but in real 
world terms, let us not pretend we are surprised by the higher XO 
breakage rates among urban poor kids in Uruguay, or the low breakage 
amongst the even poorer in Nepal, when we know that one of those 
pretends that equality happens by saying so, and the other carefully 
builds and together with the interested parties prepares for difficult 
scenarios.

Alas,

Yama



On 11/02/2010 10:51 AM, Alan Kay wrote:
> To me, this is the main point.
>
> Years ago (at PARC) we decided that in any meaningful world, we needed 
> to help 90% of the learners achieve real fluency (or judge our methods 
> to be not good enough). Both the "90%" and "real fluency" are crucial 
> (the latter is often abandoned when the former is held to be important).
>
> Cheers,
>
> Alan
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* K. K. Subramaniam <kksubbu.ml at gmail.com>
> *To:* iaep at lists.sugarlabs.org
> *Sent:* Tue, November 2, 2010 7:45:47 AM
> *Subject:* Re: [IAEP] Granny Cloud
>
> On Tuesday 02 Nov 2010 8:17:34 am Caryl Bigenho wrote:
> > Hi All...
> > Here is a concise article that summarizes Sugata Mitra's work with the
> > "Granny Cloud."  Note he says a 1 to 1 model doesn't work. He uses 4 
> to 1.
> > http://dnc.digitalunite.com/2010/07/29/granny-cloud-to-teach-children-via-
> > the-internet/
> I would be wary of reaching any specific conclusion from such 
> experiments. This
> is not to discourage new experiments but to highlight the fact the 
> need of the
> hours are interventions that ensures that the number of students who 
> are *not
> learning* should provably *decrease* during a three year window.
>
> When we throw technology X or method Y at the education problem and 
> make the
> top two quartiles learn better but leave the bottom quartile out cold, 
> then
> such a tech/method is a nice but unimportant development for tacking 
> education
> issues we face today.
>
> Subbu
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