Volume 7 Number 3 - Summer 1999

A Logo Summer

The summer of 1999 was filled with Logo workshops and conferences. The Logo Foundation sponsored a full schedule of Logo Summer Institutes. Logo Immersion was hosted by the Spence School in New York City and by Mesa State College in Colorado. Participants designed and built animations, games, multimedia presentations, and explored turtle geometry and randomness. Logo Robotics was held at Convent of the Sacred Heart in New York City and at Mesa State. It was a particularly interesting time for this workshop: The release of LEGO Mindstorms™ has made the programmable brick widely available along with the older Control Lab™. We used Yellow Brick Logo, a MicroWorlds program that speaks to LEGO's RCX programmable brick, and Logo Blocks, an iconic version of Logo that also works with the RCX.

Leisure activities included rafting on the Colorado River, a tour of the Colorado National Monument, and a visit to the Dinosaur Museum in Colorado; and in New York, a Staten Island Ferry ride followed by dinner in Little Italy, a museum visit, and the "You've Got Mail" tour of the Manhattan locations where that film was shot. Mark your calendar for the 2000 Logo Summer Institutes: Logo Immersion New York City June 19 - 23 Grand Junction, Colorado July 17 - 21 Logo Robotics New York City June 19 - 23 Grand Junction, Colorado July 24 - 28 Registration materials will be available shortly.

The Stonington Retreat was held from June 27 - July 10. Participants worked with Logo and LEGO Logo while relaxing in a small fishing village on Deer Isle in Maine. Next summer's retreat will be held June 25 - 30 and July 9th - 14. Contact Laura Allen for more information.

Eurologo99, "a 20th Century Epilog and an entrance to year 2000" was held in Sofia, Bulgaria August 22 - 25, 1999. Seymour Papert, the "father of Logo," gave the opening Keynote speech, "Constructionism: Putting Logo in a Larger Perspective." Papert also received an honorary doctorate from the University of Sofia. In his acceptance speech, he called for heightened attention to learning environments akin to the increased awareness of, and care for the natural environment that has developed over the past several decades.

Celia Hoyles and Richard Noss spoke about the Playground Project, which aims to create new programming environments for children. In a related talk, Ivan Kalas of the development team that produced the widely used Comenius Logo, presented the next generation Open Logo, which will emphasize object-oriented programming and multi-tasking. Open Logo will be used, along with ToonTalk, in the Playground Project.

Bulgaria has had an active Logo community since the early 1980s, and the program included many presentations by Bulgarian researchers and teachers.

The proceedings of Eurologo99 will soon be posted on the Eurologo99 website. Paper copies are available for US$35 each. Look the Table of Contents and find out how to order your copy.

Eurologo01 will be held in Austria from August 20 to 24, 2001. Information will be posted on the Eurologo website.

The June 21 Logosium was sponsored by ISTE's Logo SIG and hosted by the Philadelphia Public Schools. The day featured tutorials, presentations, and panel discussions for both beginners and experienced Logo users. A highlight of the meeting was a discussion with Seymour Papert, who talked about new projects he is involved in: working with incarcerated youth and their teachers at the Maine Youth Center, and with teachers in one-teacher schools in Maine and in Costa Rica. For information about next year's Logosium in Atlanta contact Gary Stager.