[okfn-discuss] Women comfortable at speaking at events...

Mon Nov 25 23:43:14 UTC 2013

We have recently started a club for kids in Edinburgh, inspired by the Young Rewired State Festival of Code; we call it Prewired: http://prewired.org

Sessions so far have involved Python, Minecraft, Scratch, web development and Java(!). This week we’ve got a session on using Arduino boards.

Although we haven’t specifically introduced open data as a topic, this is on our radar. If other people have got useful experience of creative ways of introducing young people to open data, we’d love to hear it. We’d also like to hear of ideas to encourage girls to get more involved in coding at an early stage.

Regards,

Ewan

On 25 Nov 2013, at 19:54, Marieke Guy <marieke.guy at okfn.org> wrote:

> I agree that getting children interested in technology early on is an important part of this jigsaw.
> 
> I don't know of any initiatives at the Open Knowledge Foundation looking at this in particular - please do shout if I've missed anything - but I came across some really exciting activity when attending MozFest (an event the Open Knowledge Foundation are heavily involved with) last month.
> 
> My favourites were:
> 	• Code Club- nationwide (UK) network of free volunteer-led after-school coding clubs for children aged 9-11.
> 	• Hive Learning Network - learning lab that engages youth around innovation, digital media and web-making - lots of projects and resources
> 	• Hackosaurus - using tools tools that make it easy for kids to remix, create and share on the web. 
> 	• Using Minecraft for teaching (quite a few independent activities around this)
> 	• Teaching computing offline (with logic puzzles and games)
> 	• Scratch - coding for beginners
> There was also a 'girls into technology' session. 
> As well as including children Mozilla has worked hard at getting a good gender balance at its events and it's really starting to pay off. There is a different feel to the event and it's a very positive buzz.
> I'd like to echo other people's comments - diversity is an important part of open knowledge. If this means that we need to be proactive for a while then let's do it!
> Marieke
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On 25/11/2013 19:20, William Waites wrote:
>> This is worthwhile. I suspect that the lack of women speaking at
>> technology related events is effect rather than cause though. By all
>> means find everyone that you can for speaking engagements, but the
>> cause might be addressed much earlier. Primary school, say, or at
>> least secondary school. Schools in general are pretty poor at teaching
>> about technology and maybe if that can be done better and not
>> introduce a subtle bias early on, maybe in a generation we'll start to
>> see substantial change.
>> 
>> Are there any initiatives within the OKF specifically for
>> schoolchildren? 
>> 
>> -w
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> 
> -- 
> Marieke Guy
> LinkedUp Project Community Coordinator | skype: mariekeguy | tel: 44 (0) 1285 885681 | @mariekeguy
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-------------
Ewan Klein
OKF Ambassador for Scotland
Skype:  ewan.h.klein |  @ewanhklein
The Open Knowledge Foundation
Empowering through Open Knowledge
http://scot.okfn.org/  |  @okfnscot