more visualization: green eggs and ham

Here is a Wordle I created from the text of Dr. Seuss' Green Eggs and Ham. The size of the word is relative to the frequency of the word in the text. Interesting way to see patterns....

google wave

Well, I've officially decided that I "don't get" the scroll bars in google wave. Thoroughly frustrating trying to navigate a wave. Arg!!!

False Robotics Update

False Robotics had an awesome day at the FLL Vancouver Island Regional Tournament, placing 2nd in the Robotics Performance portion of the competition. They also did an amazing job in the teamwork challenge, considering there were 12 participants ranging in age from 8 to 12. Great job guys!

FLL Robotics Tournament

Well, the weekend is here. Team False Robotics will be heading off to the regional tournament this weekend. Today we're running a mock tourney at the school, followed by a t-shirt making extravaganza. Then off on the 4pm ferry tomorrow for an awesome road trip! 12 kids and 7 adults. Going to be mayhem!

SIGCSE poster accepted!

Found out the the poster I proposed for SIGCSE '10 was accepted. Guess I'm going to Milwaukee in March. Beer and polkas and CS Ed. Woo Hoo.

Awesome visualization

This is a great Ted talk which includes one of the best visualizations I've seen in a ppt presentation:

SIGCSE video entry

I've created a video (as you may know already), and have entered it in the Video competition for SIGCSE 2010. Here it is: Relational Graphs: What are they?. Check it out.

It was designed originally as a motivator for some graph theory lessons I will be doing in a couple of Grade Six Math classes soon. Hopefully it will get accepted at SIGCSE too!

URL doesn't rhyme with girl

My good friend, who will remain unnamed, has reminded me how silly it sounds when people pronounce URL so that it rhymes with girl.

URL, stands for Uniform Resource Locator. It is an acronym, and is pronounced: YOU ARE ELL. ;)

Carl Sagan is brilliant

I found this wicked quote:

We have a society which is built on science and technology and which uses science in every one of the interstices of national life, and in which the public, the executive, the legislative and the judiciary have very little understanding of what science is about.

--Carl Sagan

As intricate and subtle as we...

Very cool video:

Beautiful Science

Help Desk

This just seems appropriate, as I've been thinking a lot about how to design interfaces so that they are intuitive to use...

Help Desk

LOL

Video take 2

I'm working on this video as in introductory "movie" for graph theory lesson for grade sixes. Here is my latest version:

Creative Commons

Today I rediscovered Creative Commons. Freely available music, videos, photos etc. Talk about making collaboration possible. Way to go! Just goes to show that not everyone is stupid.

Turing

Just heard the news that Gordan Brown apologized to Turing. Long time coming.

Graph Theory

This is still a work in progress, but thought I'd put it out there for comments. What is it for, you ask?

Well, it is supposed to be a "motivational video" for my lessons on Graph Theory. Fun!

False Robotics

Last week was the first meeting of the False Robotics club at False Bay School. We're part of the First Lego League, hosted this year by BCIT. Our regional tournament is in Duncan this year, and we're all looking forward to another road trip. Last year's robotics club was a huge success. The team competed at the regional tournament in Victoria, and we exceeded all our own expectations. Plus we had an awesome road trip, culminating in a night at a hotel with pizza and chocolate.

This year there are at least 12 kids who want to participate. Regulations state that only 10 kids are allowed per team, so we're going to have to be creative in determining who is officially on the team. I'm just so proud, that on an island with a total population of 350 people, there are 12 kids who want to join the robotics club! Pretty astonishing, I must admit.

This time round we're going to make team shirts, but one of the things that the club members from last year insisted upon, was that we not have t-shirts that "all look the same". True non-conformists. So, we've recruited a local artist to help us with stencils, and all the kids are going to bring their own shirts to paint. Should be extra creative. I think mine will just say:

FALSE

On the back.

Who doesn't love brussels sprouts

In one of my non-computerized adventures recently, I had the chance to explore the Cedar Farmer's Market (south of Nanaimo). Local farmers had various produce and products for sale, from brussels sprouts to handcrafted furniture. It was a blast.

No, I will not fix your computer

What is Computer Science?

I will be revisiting this fundamental question frequently. But for now I will start with stating some things that computer science is not all about:

• fixing computers
• installing programs on computers
• building computers

Come to think of it, why is that word "computer" even in there at all?

Some "computer scientists" prefer computing science. I am not opposed to this name. But somehow I still think of it as computer science. Weird.

CSCW

This term I'm taking Computer Supported Collaborative Work, taught by Dr. Storey, at UVic. This topic is of particular interest to me, as CSCW could improve education for people living in remote and rural areas. For people who live in the city, and have various options when it comes to educational choices, this may not immediately seem important. But imagine you live in a small community, and say, have a family to raise and support. Or if you are a child from a family who must relocate for you to finish high school. Shouldn't you have access to education, regardless of your location? Of course there are a number of distance education options out there for people in this position, but they usually involve a lot of individual study.

The question I pose is: is there a way that all these students could work together "virtually?" This could serve to improve the experience, and give distance students a sense of community. I am hoping that this course will help me evaluate existing "virtual classroom" platforms, and help make this idea a reality.

During the first two classes, Dr. Storey showed us a couple of videos which I thought were very compelling:

A Vision of Students Today

The Web is Watching Us

Check them out

Sister's

Sometimes I get to play outside. Here is a pic from the recent weekend.

A Beginning

People say that Computer Science is an inherently interdisciplinary area of study. What does this mean, really? Does it mean that we haven't really come up with an agreed upon definition of what CS is? Maybe.