[WARNING: Cross posted]
hi sanjay, D@S team and others,
Sanjay Chigurupati wrote on Sun, Dec 08, 2002 at 12:49:50AM -0800:
,----[ on the issue of writing books ]
| what topics are you looking at? what is the audience you are looking
| at, with respect to their familiarity of the topic?
`----
The audience is school students (also college students if we grow a
bit further). Practically, the students that we met seem to know a lot
more than what we (or atleast me) expected. Though on the topics of
fundamentals of computing, fundamentals of programming, they are a bit
weak. Most still think the 'start' button is due to some chip inside
their computer. :) Yet they seem to know most of the 'practical' stuff
like browsing the WWW, using yahoo, etc., :)
We have the following plans:
a. Review / Rework / Modify Jonathan Bartlett's book - "Programming
Ground Up". This book is more of an introduction to programming for a
mature user (using assembly as its main form of teaching techniques in
programming). We haven't started the review yet, but i find it very
good. This could be something we can take to colleges. [*]
b. Our primary aim is to tell the schools that Free Software education
is viable and that we can support them frame their syllabus, books,
etc.,. The bruises that our friends from the FSUGs got from their
effort in the kerala government's IT@SCHOOLS project is a lesson for
us and we will have to make sure we have all the books in hand before
we go for a proposal to, say, an individual school or the government
of Tamil Nadu. Hence we write new books / modify existing books to
make sure we give them enough infrastructure.
c. Currently these are our plans:
1. Arun (Kochi) will write a book on 'Introduction to the GNU/Linux
system'. Target audience: 6th standard [**]
2. Manikandan is thinking of writing a book on 'Fundamentals of
Networking'. We would use MKS's existing work for this
purpose. Target Audience: 10th - 12th. [+]
3. I just started out on writing a book on 'Fundamentals of
Computers'. Target audience: 4th standard. [*]
4. Jonathan Bartlett's 'Programming Ground up' - yet to decide how we
can use this. I guess only college students can take this, not
schoolers.
5. stuff from gnupress.org, etc., need to be trimmed and made
dilute. save work as much as possible.
Take a look at these from:
http://gpasokan.com/demo-schools/cvs/books/
(
Legend:
[*] - compiled form of the book isn't available yet (maybe we will put
them up on the downloads section on savannah, not in the repository).
[**] - pre development stage!
[+] - planning stage - yet to commence writing
)
It would be very helpful if people here can come forward to write
simple books (maybe 90 page stuff - typically like what the govt of TN
writes). Topics could be anything that you think kids need to learn
about computing and Free Software. Like with the FSUG-Kochi guys, we
are trying to make sure that we dont teach just one particular product
(like, not just GNOME when it comes to a desktop, but genrally talk
about what an 'icon' is and what minimising a window is with
references to GNOME, KDE, WMAKER, etc.,). Your work must be released
under the terms of the GNU FDL (http://gnu.org/licenses/fdl.txt).
Join the demo@schools mailing list and pour your suggestions. tell us
how you can help us.
http://gpasokan.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/demo-schools
Note: You can borrow the existing computer books proposed by the Tamil
Nadu State Board for classes 11th, 12th from me (ph: 2233483) (also
available at most book stores)
-Suraj
--
+-------------------------------------------------<suraj@xxxxxxxxxxx>--+
| Her serene beauty fills my eyes in grace; ample charm of |
| her smooth shoulders, enhance her modesty in simplicity |
| (signaling symptoms of love - 2), Thirukkural |
+--<http://symonds.net/~suraj/>----------------------------------------+
