Etoys Blog Archive

You've found our blog, which will contain news and views regarding Etoys and its community. If you'd like to contribute to our blog on a semi-regular basis, please contact us. We'd love the help....

Greetings! Many of you have started, or will shortly be starting, a new academic year at your school or University. We wish you a successful and fun-filled new school year! We have just launched our new Etoys web site to coincide with the new academic year. It is still found at "www.squeakland.org", but its design and content are all new. It features a brand-new version of Etoys for download, which we will announce in a separate message. We hope you'll find the new site simpler to navigate, more straightforward in sharing our message, and loaded with helpful content. New materials...

Here's an interesting piece of news. As of last weekend, XOs have been deployed,or soon will be, in 31 countries around the world. They are: Afghanistan, Brazil, Cambodia, Colombia,Ethiopia, Ghana, Haiti, India, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Mali, Mexico, Mongolia, Mozambique, Nepal, Nigeria, Niue, Pakistan, Palestine, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Russia, Rwanda, Senegal, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Thailand, United States and Uruguay....

Our friends at Waveplace have organized the first Waveplace Awards program where children from the U.S. (Florida), St. John, Haiti and Nicaragua have created Etoy storybooks they will share live via the Waveplace website. www.waveplace.com/awards Judges from several continents will participate in a live webcast today starting at 1 PM Pacific Time, 4 PM Eastern Time. Watch live or check the site later to see all of the projects!...

Here is a link out of Uruguay showing how to use Etoys to create "books": http://ceibalflorida.blogspot.com/search/label/etoys They are still using XO SW release 656 in Uruguay and I'm not sure which version of Etoys they have (maybe you can tell from the screen shots?). Its great that they have learned how to create books, include images from the XO camera and post that to the Web. That's not trivial with XO 656! There are also some posts on using eToys to teach geometry. Lastly, I saw a thread on using EToys to create concept maps on our Spanish language list....

Wonderful blog post about Etoys by FlyingSinger....

(by Mike Lee, from newsletter The OLPC Learning Club of Washington DC, a diverse grassroots group of XO laptop users with a passion for education, held its first content jam session as part of our January meeting at the Arlington Career Center (ACC) in Virginia. Though OLPC-style jams are typically intensive work sessions focused on producing content for the laptop, this time we chose to ease into the world of Squeak and Etoys by conducting a qualitative review of a series of Etoys-based activities created several years ago for the NASA Connect series. Our project took on the name "Etoys...

(by Rita Freudenberg, from newsletter) When I first got word about the creation of a new organisation with the mission of taking the gift of Etoys and helping it evolve, I was very interested. I thought about it a week and then spoke up, "I definitely wanted to be a part of this." That was last November and since then I have spoken with so many interesting people about Etoys and and the Squeakland Foundation. I'm very enthusiastic about our plans. One of my chief goals will be the development of the online Etoys community for every Etoys user out...

(by Timothy Falconer, from newsletter) Our current community hardly needs convincing. We've seen the transformations. We've seen average students become exceptional students. We've seen teachers and children having fun while tackling otherwise difficult subjects like math and science. We've seen the vision of Papert and Kay manifest as one learning oasis after another. We've seen it work. Much more is possible. Having spent the last year promoting Etoys on behalf of Waveplace, I'm quite certain that Etoys is ready to take off. With interest in low-cost laptops at an all time high, with frustration over "teach to the test" reaching...

(by Kim Rose, from newsletter) Happy New Year to all! Alan Kay and I are both excited to announce the formation of Squeakland Foundation, a non-profit organization that will take over from Viewpoints Research as the guardians of Etoys. A critical piece of the mission of Viewpoints Research is to deliver free and open source exemplars and prototypes to the world and then spin them out to new organizations so that they may advance, grow, and evolve. Etoys is now ready to leave the Viewpoints nest and begin its next phase of life. Led by Tim Falconer and Rita Freudenberg,...

Our new board of directors held its first meeting last Thursday, where we approved the name, elected our officers, and made plans for this year's Squeakfest events. The new board includes: Tim Falconer Kim Rose Walter Bender Rita Freudenberg Kathleen Harness Marta Voelcker Scott Wallace Yoshiki Ohshima Milan Zimmerman These nine people are just the start, of course. Please help us in our mission to "build community and encourage deep learning worldwide by promoting, supporting, and improving Squeak Etoys and related educational media."...

January 20th is a memorable day for Squeakland for another reason, since an honorary doctorate from Kyoto University has been awarded to our great mentor and father of Etoys, Dr. Alan Kay. The honorary doctorate recognizes his great contribution to the advancement of education and research at Kyoto University as well as his outstanding contribution to science and culture. Read more about the ceremony here and here....

Are you a painter, a writer, a poet, a wit Are you a thinker, a reader, a writer, a clown Are you a seeker, a dreamer, a searcher, a seer? Open a world; Come in!...

This year we hope to hold two Squeakfest conferences, one in Brasil and another in the United States. While US details are still pending, we're very pleased to announce Squeakfest Brasil! WHEN: July 24th and 25th, 2009 WHERE: Porto Alegre, Brasil WHO: Hosted by UFRGS and Pensamento Digital WHAT: a teacher-oriented, hands-on conference, showcasing Squeak Etoys use throughout Brasil and the rest of South & Central America LANGUAGES: Portuguese and Spanish, with English translators We've timed our conference so you may also attend the 9th World Conference on Computers in Education (WCCE): WHEN: July 27th to July 31st, 2009 WHERE:...

Right after attending C5 conference, the VPRI Etoys group visited a workshop with Etoys at the Toshiba Science Museum. There are workshops at the museum and Showa Elementary School every month, organised by Toshio Miyasaka from Digital Hollywood Graduate School. At the moment they have a project called "Minnade Tanoshiku Squeak", which means "Let's all enjoy Squeak" in English. The website http://mts-j.hiho.jp/ is in japanese, but one can use Google translation. The objective of the project is to develop teaching materials and test them through conducting workshops for children. Toshio Miyasaka says " I am impressed every time I conduct...

Greetings, We are happy to announce that University of North Carolina Wilmington will be the host for this year's Squeakfest! We invite you all to a face to face gathering, sharing of experiences and materials relative to the usage of Etoys. We will have two great keynote speakers this year: Walter Bender from Sugar Labs and Julian Lombardi from Duke University. Squeakfest USA July 26, 27 and 28th Wilmington, NC University of Wilmington We'll have more info on the Squeakfest website shortly, but until then, please save the date! Please forward this email and share with friends and colleagues. This...

On Freemor's Weblog are some nice Etoys tutorials. Go and check out here: http://freemor.wordpress.com/...

Hi everyone, Our spring newsletter is out! If you aren't subscribed, you can read it here: http://squeakland.org/news/newsletter/web.jsp?id=10 If you'd like to subscribe, click here: http://squeakland.org/subscribe/...

Registration is now open for both Squeakfest USA 2009 (Los Angeles: August 10,11,12) and Squeakfest Brasil 2009 (Porto Alegre: July 23, 24, 25). Squeakfest USA registration costs $100, or $125 if payment is received after August 1st. Squeakfest Brasil registration is free. Please register as early as possible so that we may better plan the events. To register for Squeakfest USA, click here. To register for Squeakfest Brasil, click here. To find out more about Squeakfest, visit squeakfest.org. We hope to see you!...

Have a look at this really impressive video showing an Etoys interface to a microchip (PIC16F877A MCU) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Qsh9vFIls4...

We're very pleased to announce that Squeak Etoys has been named Editor's Choice by Children's Technology Review in their June 2009 issue!...

Greetings from Porto Alegre, Brasil! As I write this from breakfast, the sun is coming up over the city. I'll soon be joined by the ten of us who have traveled here to represent Squeakland Foundation and our respective Etoys organizations. Most of us flew in yesterday, then met last night for a wonderful dinner hosted by Intel, one of the conference sponsors. It was very nice seeing everyone last night. While we speak frequently together through Skype and Qwaq, there's nothing quite like meeting in person. At dinner we had time to discuss ours lives outside Etoys, getting to...

As I write this, I'm flying home from Squeakfest USA. Sitting here, staring at my laptop, I'm completely unable to find appropriate words to describe the magic and friendship of the last few weeks. So many passionate talks, so many stirring examples, so many last minute details and surprises. I'm tired. That much is clear. Blame it on three conferences in four weeks and roughly fifteen thousand miles of travel in between. Were it not for my many Squeaker traveling companions, I'd have curled up to hibernate long ago. Truly the best part of the last month has been the...

After nine months of work by our software team, and several weeks of sprinting by Bert Freudenberg, Yoshiki Ohshima, Scott Wallace, and myself, we're very happy to announce the Squeak Etoys 4 release candidate! What's a release candidate, you ask? Well, it's hopefully the final version, but we want more testing first. It's better than a beta, but not quite ready for real use. We'll be releasing the Etoys 4 final on October 21st. Please help us test the new Etoys! We want to make sure that it's rock solid before getting used in schools and homes throughout the world....

With the launch of the beta Squeakland Showcase, we'd love for any and all to upload their favorite Etoys projects! Think of it as a Squeakland housewarming party, which for those that don't know the term, it's when friends come to your new house with gifts to make the house nicer for everyone. There's two ways you can upload projects: 1) If you're using the Etoys 4 release candidate, you can upload directly from Etoys. 2) If you're already got some PR files, the go to the showcase upload page: http://squeakland.org/showcase/upload'> http://squeakland.org/showcase/upload Either way, you'll need to create a free...

I've finished my work on the new Squeakland showcase. It should be considered beta (feature complete), with only bug fixes till next month. You can watch the new Showcase Preview video. Please take the time to watch this before making suggestions on how to improve it. To create an account so you can upload projects to the showcase, click here. We *really* need you to upload good projects. We'll be doing a great deal of publicity for Etoys 4 and the showcase in late October. Till then, please upload projects, ask others to upload projects, and comment on projects. Consider...

We've just posted the second Etoys 4 release candidate: http://squeakland.org/download/ (scroll to bottom of page) This one has more translations and some bug fixes. We're one step closer to our final release on October 21st. Please help us by testing RC2 with your existing projects, and some new ones. And while you're there, upload a few to the showcase! Feel free to add tickets to our tracker. Here's a list of RC2 changes. Here's a list of current known issues....

If you're reading this message, and you like Etoys, please take a minute and let us know you're listening: http://squeakland.org/squeakers We're trying to get a better idea of the size of the Etoys community. Also, please forward the link to other Squeakers that you know....

It was a *lot* of work, but squeakland.org is now available in multiple languages. Currently we support English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French. There's much content that needs further translating, particularly for French, but you can see for yourself by changing the language drop-down in the upper-right corner. As a bonus, I've enabled automatic Google translation for project comments and the Squeakers page: http://squeakland.org/squeakers Anyway, we've made a start. If you'd like to add your language to the list, read these two issues and then click "contact" on the website to volunteer: http://tracker.squeakland.org/browse/SQ-481 http://tracker.squeakland.org/browse/SQ-480'> http://tracker.squeakland.org/browse/SQ-480 There are still some spots...

Squeakland is proud to announce the release of Etoys 4, which you can now download from our website. Special thanks to the Squeakland software team, particularly Bert Freudenberg, Yoshiki Ohshima, and Scott Wallace for their tremendous efforts in the last month. Your hard work really shows! http://squeakland.org/download/'> http://squeakland.org/download/ In our Fall newsletter, you'll find some thoughts by Scott Wallace, along with the Etoys 4 release notes which detail the changes you'll find. Of special interest is the new Squeakland Showcase. Everyone can now share their projects directly from Etoys to our website, where the Etoys community can then benefit from...

We had a real backlog of projects waiting to go live on the site. This weekend I tweaked several things and fixed a few bugs, and as a result, a slew of new ballots went out. Now every public project has at least one vote, which means they're all visible. We're up to 102 projects! Quite a selection. Lots of great stuff. http://squeakland.org/showcase/ On a more technical note, I changed the "re-ballot" priority to make things more fair. As ballots expire, projects are picked to get new ballots. Before tonight I favored projects that were the oldest. I've switched...

We've gone through the list of 190+ tickets in JIRA and reduced that to an even 100 for the next version of Etoys, expected June 2010. http://tracker.squeakland.org If you'd like to champion particular issues, try voting in JIRA, which is now much more obvious because of the Popular Issues tab in JIRA. Simply click on the issue you want, the look to the left and click "Vote for it". This will raise the issue in our awareness :) And if you have any new ideas, simple create the issue. You need a JIRA account to vote or create issues. (It's...

Squeakland will have it's first Book Sprint to create a Reference Manual for Etoys! Please join us online during the week of December, 7 to December12, 2009. The book will serve as - the manual you can look up every part of Etoys, - the documentation of what we commit to support in Etoys and - the starting point for other, more elaborate materials. For writing we intend to use FLOSS Manuals. The manual will be available online (html and pdf format), and as a real book per print-on-demand. It will be licensed under MIT, so that we can...

Try adding this to your favorite webpage: <iframe style="border: none" src="http://squeakland.org/squeakers/squeakerButton.jsp" width="270" height="143"></iframe> It'll look and work like this: We'll be promoting this, along with it's static cousin at: http://squeakland.org/linking/ Want to make sure the flash button (the first one) works on many browsers & websites before going public with it. And yes, I know Flash doesn't work in various places. I'm asking to test this button in the places where Flash works (aka, anywhere you can see a YouTube video)....

We just had our kick-off audio chat for the book sprint. It is wonderful to have so many great people working together on the Etoys manual! For now, we start writing at FLOSS Manuals Etoys . if you have any questions or want to discuss, try the IRC and start your question with @help ... In case everyone has finally gone to sleep, check out the book sprint page on our wiki or send an email to rita@squeakland.org We will have our next audio chat tomorrow, December 8 at 3 pm EST, 12 PST....

We're in day two of our Etoys book sprint! Please spend time with us in the Etoys chat channel to help motivate everyone. Usually book sprints are done in person, so we're using our chat channel as a way to spend time together. It's a great way to meet other Etoys enthusiasts and help the writers at the same time. There are two ways to visit our chat channel . . . 1) visit http://chat.squeakland.org and put your nickname in place of "squeaker###". Simply type messages at the bottom of the screen and click Enter. 2) download and install an...

Our first book sprint was a great kick-off for our effort to write the Etoys Reference Manual. Here you can read how it went and how we plan to go on: We started the sprint on Monday, December 7th, with a first discussion about the structure, target audience and FLOSS Manuals. We started writing the first parts then and met again for an audio call on Tuesday. We had a longer discussion and agreed on the structure now available on the wiki page: http://wiki.squeakland.org/display/sq/Book+Sprint On the other days I had audio chats with Cherry, Randy and Stephen Thomas, mostly about...

We are happy to announce another opportunity for a face to face gathering and sharing of experiences and materials relative to the usage of Etoys. Squeakfest USA August 10, 11 and 12th Los Angeles, CA at the Faculty Center, UCLA Campus We'll have more info on the Squeakland website shortly, but until then, please save the date! Please forward this email and share with friends and colleagues. This will be a gathering of users and practitioners of Etoys -- teachers, researchers, and developers to share and learn. Newcomers to Etoys are most welcome too! We hope to see you in...

Hello everyone, I'm back from Haiti, both literally and figuratively. Since the earthquake, nearly all of my time has been spent on the seven Etoys pilots that have started or will soon start in four different regions of Haiti. To follow our progress, read the Waveplace blog and see the two videos at http://waveplace.org/news/. We'll be adding a great many photos in the next few days. Connectivity was very bad, so we are only uploading photos now. While it may appear that Haiti has benefitted at the expense of Squeakland so far this year, I think quite the opposite is...

Dear Squeakers, I'm happy to tell you that we have a new Squeakland Board in place! On our last board meeting at April, 27 we came up with a list of candidates, and everyone accepted. We now have Rita Freudenberg, Cathleen Galas, Walter Bender, Scott Wallace, Ted Kaehler, Randall Caton, Elliot Miranda, Cherry Withers, Kathleen Harness, Marta Voelker, Milan Zimmerman, Carlos Rabassa, and Korakurider on the board. http://www.squeakland.org/about/people/ I want to thank everyone on the previous board for all the work you did during the last year, especially the leaving board members Kim Rose, Yoshiki Oshima, and Tim Falconer. On...

Thanks to the diligent work of Cathie and others, we were able to send the application of Squakland Foundation to become part of the Software Freedom Conservancy today! We know that the process will take some time, since the SFC has a backlog for acceptance of projects of up to three to six months. But this process has now started!...

The official Squeakfest website is now live and ready for you to propose a presentation, workshop, or panel. http://squeakfest.org The dates for Squeakfest USA in Wilmington NC are July 26, 27, 28. The theme for this year's conference will be "Etoys in the STEM classroom." As we are in the place where the NSF project Using Squeak to Infuse Technology (USeIT) is reaching it's 3rd year, we will see and learn a lot about their experiences. If you've got experience teaching with Etoys, we'd love to hear about it, as would the attendees of the conference. We're also very interested...

Squeak Etoys has been demonstrated on Classmate, XO, and iPad at LinuxTag Berlin 2010...

Here you can find Steve's new video and blog about the things you can do with Etoys! http://mrstevesscience.blogspot.com...