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Something was happening at the St. Paul Logo Summer Institute that I did not understand. I was learning to use Logo, which is what I had come for, and it was exciting, but I couldn't put my finger on my feelings or just what was happening in my mind. I was a little peculiar among the participants as I am a college biology teacher who wanted to explore the use of Logo for a class in artificial life ( and maybe even get my hands on the new StarLogo). Being a newcomer without prior experience in Logo, I started out spending most of my time on MicroWorlds. I found that it could be used as an introductory tool with adults for exploring self-organizing systems. But each day I had the nagging feeling that something else was going on. I walked to and from the Institute each day and so had between thirty
and forty-five minutes - depending on my energy level and route
- going and coming, to free-fall ideas. On the next to the last
day of the Institute I began compiling in my mind a list of mental
skills I had been using during the week. A partial list follows:
I'm sure a longer list could be developed, but it was at about this point that it struck me what was going on. None of these mental skills were particularly new to me. I had learned all of them at several times during my life, but especially while engaged in research, whether for myself or for my various degrees. But in doing biological research, the stages and steps are spread out over a long period of time. So many things interfere with the immediate analysis of your data. Even to collect the data requires the obtaining and nurturing of some biological system. This is not always an easy task. (Biologists like to say, "Under the most controlled conditions of light, temperature, and humidity the organism does damn well as it pleases." Since the Logo Institute I think it might apply to computers as well.) I finished my degrees in the days before personal computers and computer graphics. The time needed to prepare tables was exorbitant. Then with classes and teaching woven into the time fabric, analysis and understanding came extremely slowly. What was happening at the Institute, and I can see could happen in a classroom, is the compression of the entire research process. Research skills - higher level skills from Bloom's Taxonomy - are used over and over again within the space of minutes. The time between problem identification, clarification, identification of sequential steps, breaking the problem up into manageable, and perhaps repeatable, units, test runs, experiments, trouble shooting errors, collecting data (does it do what I want?), analysis (why not?) can all be completed within minutes, not months. The experience of discovery is an exciting and addictive feeling. To suddenly experience it repeatedly in a day, perhaps an hour, was both exhilarating and disconcerting. Having read much on Logo prior to the Institute it is probably silly that it took me a week to realize what was happening. The language was designed to do this very thing. I am sure many people will find this insight mundane, having discovered it themselves long ago. On the other hand, I don't see a lot written about the use of Logo with older students - and I'm about as old as one could be and still dare claim student status - or as a useful tool in the scientific education enterprise. Students who were well versed in Logo activities as children must surely be successful in scientific research if given the chance. Unfortunately our secondary education system seldom offers such a chance. So much research seems directed at the effect Logo has on curriculum mastery, memorizing facts. Perhaps someone ought to be looking at the effect on career choice, research activities, science fair participation, or other measures of success in these areas, rather than test performance. During the Institute week I felt very much out of my element. I am not an amateur hacker and started pretty much from scratch. I know from this experience, and others, how hard it is to have confidence as you enter a new field. I admire those teachers who strive to bring technology into their classrooms in a meaningful way when they themselves probably have not been involved with it in their own education. Perhaps my experience will give some of you confidence as you work with Logo that you are indeed doing something important and right in your classrooms. I am convinced, after the St. Paul Summer Institute, that you are.
Gary McCallister is Professor of Biology at Mesa State College in Grand Junction, Colorado. He participated in the 1995 Logo St. Paul Summer Institute. He has been a facilitator at Logo Summer Institutes at Mesa State College in Grand Junction, Colorado. He may be contacted at: mccallis@mesastate.edu
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