Interesting People mailing list archives
Re: Background to the film Slumdog Millionaire
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2009 09:50:01 -0500
Begin forwarded message: From: Charles Pinneo <pinneo () sbcglobal net> Date: February 25, 2009 7:42:09 AM ESTTo: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>, Brian Randell <Brian.Randell () ncl ac uk >
Subject: Re: [IP] Background to the film Slumdog Millionaire Brian, Fantastic story!The computer IS the perfect teaching machine. It only needs to be refined a little.
What this suggests is that the teacher may not be necessary. It also suggests that the best teaching may be for the teacher to get completely out of the way instead of spoiling the learning situation. As teachers, I wonder if Brian Randell and Dave Farber agree that teachers often get in the way and stifle learning.
Although one thing a teacher can do better is to interact at the point of frustration and then re-teach at that point to clarify. Computers cannot yet read a students facial expressions, see frustration, and then re-teach the part he didn't understand. Score one for the teacher.
Although my Sony camera can snap the shutter when it reads a smile. Score one for the computer.
Mac iPhoto has face recognition for finding, for example, all the pictures of your daughter in your iPhoto database and putting them in a folder. So it won't be long until frustration is detected. Score one for the computer.
But, remembering the perfect explanation from last year's lesson plan is another story, unless you saved your lesson plans from last year. Score one for the computer.
But, teachers have a tendency to assume that the student already knows as much as you do, so you leave out steps you already know. Score one for the computer.
Teachers are warm to the touch. Score one for the teacher. Teachers sometimes smell funny. ;-) Score one for the computer. Charles Pinneo pinneo () sbcglobal net ----------------------------- On Feb 24, 2009, at 12:43 PM, David Farber wrote:
Begin forwarded message: From: Brian Randell <Brian.Randell () ncl ac uk> Date: February 24, 2009 12:01:22 PM EST To: dave () farber net Subject: Background to the film Slumdog Millionaire Hi Dave: For IP if you think it is appropriate:A NEWCASTLE professor watched Oscar-winning Slumdog Millionaire - not realising he was the inspiration behind the movie.A decade ago Professor Sugata Mitra knocked a hole through the wall of his laboratory in New Delhi, India, so children in the adjoining slum could play on one of his computers.The experiment, to see whether unschooled children would teach themselves how to use the internet if left to their own devices, was intended as an educational tool.But it eventually inspired the film which swept the Oscars on Sunday night.As he celebrated the film's success, original author Vikas Swarup said he wrote Q&A, which was adapted for the screen by Simon Beaufoy, as a direct result of hearing about street children using Professor Mitra's computer.. . . Full story at: http://tinyurl.com/czcd32 See also: http://markkobayashihillary.computing.co.uk/2009/02/a-niit-at-the-movies.html cheers Brian --School of Computing Science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne,NE1 7RU, UK EMAIL = Brian.Randell () ncl ac uk PHONE = +44 191 222 7923 FAX = +44 191 222 8232 URL = http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/people/brian.randell ------------------------------------------- Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/ Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
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Current thread:
- Background to the film Slumdog Millionaire David Farber (Feb 24)
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- Re: Background to the film Slumdog Millionaire David Farber (Feb 25)