Sources of Inspiration
For today, two quotations from Mindstorms: Children, Computers, and Powerful Ideas, by Seymour Papert:One of the mainstays of the LOGO environment is the cluster of concepts related to "bugs" and "debugging." One does not expect anything to work at the first try. One does not judge by standards like "right--you get a good grade" and "wrong--you get a bad grade." Rather one asks the question: "How can I fix it?" and to fix it one has first to understand what happened in its own terms. Only then can we make it happen on our terms.
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 and establishes an intimated contact with some of the deepest ideas from science, from mathematics, and from the art of intellectual model building.