I Hear Rumors That Our Education Institutions Are In Trouble
by
Tom Hill
Pundits tell me that unless we change things, our youth will not have a chance in the flat world.
I have a couple of youthful data points, two grandchildren. Given a grandfather's natural bias, Grace Ann and Luke are two remarkable windows into the future. Grace Ann, at the age of three, demonstrated disdain for my wife's super-sized mega-pixel monitor and powerful chip, that simply had a dial-up Internet connection. She understood that my small-screen notebook computer with a high-speed DSL connection offered greater real power. 'The power of connections.'
My five year-old grandson, Luke, and I completed assembling a LEGO® Excavator toy designed for eight-year-olds and older - proving that 5 and 65 do average to be a little greater than 8.
We completed the building project, and without taking a breath, he said, “Now that we've built it, let's put a motor on it and write a program to make it move.” I have to repeat, “... let's put a motor on it and write a program to make it move.”
I’ll give away the punch line now – “Today’s youth are demanding a superior education system.”
Let’s trace the few months that preceded Luke’s matter-of-fact declaration of robotics programming intent:
April, Week 1 - I attended a lecture where Tufts University professor Chris Rogers outlined an educational program called ROBOLAB he developed with LEGO to teach elementary school students to program robots and learn the linkage to engineering, science and math. Professor Rogers gave me the LEGO education connection.
April, Week 2 – One evening Grace Ann, Luke and Gramps (that’s me) surfed the Web for a picture of ROBOLAB and LEGO education lab kits that include the LabView programming language, LEGO small portable robotics computer, an assortment of LEGO parts with motors and sensors, and lab experiments used to teach robotics. Grace Ann said to me “I think you should order a robot kit for your birthday.” So I did.
April and May, Every Other Week - We get together while babysitting to read or listen to the prepared robotics lesson, build the experimental robotics device, add the motors and sensors, write a program, solve programming problems and watch the robot move.
Luke’s statement was not a stretch for a young man who has been building robots and writing programs for all of two months.
We have living proof in my 60 short years that the education construction toy has progressed from the 20th century Erector Set® to 21st century programmable LEGO Mindstorms™ robots.
We don’t have to worry about the future of education. Today’s youth will demand a superior local education system or they will go to any Internet institution that can satisfy their needs. All we have to do as the adults is make sure the local school systems and Internet institutions are capable of living up to our children's expanding expectations.
