Yesterday we got an email from one of the parents which helped remind me how different things have turned out than what we originally imagined, possibly for the better.
The initial vision was that the young people would come in and would be keen to learn technical skills, as has generally been my experience when working with small numbers at limited-time workshops in the past.
At The Lab we have found the students are often more interested in socialising - which is normal for most kids, but unusual for some of these, and it's having positive results.
Despite being slightly unexpected, it gets back to a couple of things we have witnessed in the past;
- These young people know when they are surrounded by like minds, and feel very comfortable.
- The technology acts as an 'object of affinity' - allowing the young people to communicate through devices they are familiar with.
In terms of inspiring the kids to learn, we haven't wanted to force anybody so we started a gamemaking competition, which is completely voluntary, although we offered a prize as an incentive(a logitech gaming keyboard attachment). After one week one young man was already making quite a bit of progress, and this has caught the eyes of others, who are now learning by themselves to use software we have had difficulty interrupting their Lab gaming session to teach them.
I think one lesson in this is that we cannot force the kids to do anything(which was never our intention) - but we can motivate them by providing opportunities, as we have done with the competition.
The second lesson is perhaps that we cannot motivate the young people with our words - it must come from within. This is perhaps more likely to be inspired by other young people. If we can do something amazing, they don't care, we are old and they can't relate, but if the guy like them sitting next to them can, it's a different case. This would suggest that we should look at offering more open opportunities for the group at large - more activities they can choose to be a part of and work together on.
This is not to say the mentors aren't important - they are vital, giving the young people something to aspire to, and also being able to get the young people over those inevitable technical walls they come up against.
All of this has got me thinking about my own youth and where I got this kind of support. My parents sent me to Scouts, in the hope I would become a more social and well rounded person.
I think that's what we are doing at The Lab. We are using technology to do it - but if we can take care of the self esteem and sense of social inclusion of the young people I think they will be motivated to generally teach themselves the technical skills, and come to us for help when required.
1. Socialising through gaming
2. An increasing sense of social inclusion
3. Desire to learn technical skills
4. Increased social capital
Now back to providing opportunities....
One thing the Scouts did for me was provide a whole bunch of opportunities. I don't want to copy their military stylings, or christian rituals, but they do have some good ideas.
One of these is the badges. They have several similarities to achievements used in online gaming.
Scouts progress through three levels(Pioneer/red, Explorer/blue, Adventurer/green) depending on how many achievements they have. There are achievements involving community engagement and group work.
They provided a good framework for a lot of social activities, and they also allowed for a lot of us to achieve at least something in an area of our interest. Many of the skills were pretty obscure, but at the time they seemed quite important.
With all of this in mind I got thinking about having some online assessments for The Lab for a range of topics the kids would be interested in learning. Instead of badges, we could have online 'achievements' like many online games. These would be visible by peers, which is what would make them important.
It is also possible that this could be tied into existing courses either online, at high school or TAFE.
Achievements could include something like;
Beginner X
Advanced X
Master X
X=
Programmer(Basic, VB, C++ ??)
Web Programmer(html5, php)
Web Designer(html, css, graphic design, copywriting)
Graphic Designer(photoshop, illustrator, fireworks etc)
3d Designer(3ds max, blender, sketchup etc)
Filmmaker(vegas etc)
Music maker
Gamemaker(gamemaker, unity etc)
Arduino Programmer
System Administrator?
Teamwork(achieving something with another person)
Charity(helping others- eg http://www.spectrumvic.org.au/)
Master(teaching others)
Special interest???
Programming languages?
Specific Software?
Group activity badges?
Overall levels
Some vague ideas....
Beginner - Teamwork and 3X Beginner
Advanced - 3X Advanced and Charity or Master
Master - 3X Master and Charity or Master
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