Linux, Learning, and Sugar Kids

Although much of what we discuss here at HASTAC tends to revolve around our own research interests and work at the university-level, in this post I'm going to discuss computing for kids. Since I have a young child myself, who will soon turn four, I have been investigating educational software lately and have found a wealth of resources. There are several different Linux distributions designed with school children in mind. For those of you not familiar with Linux and its very large (and ever-growing) ecosystem of different flavors, allow me a brief explanation.

Linux is an open source operating system that has been around and in development for decades now. The description at Linux.org states, "Linux is a free Unix-type operating system originally created by Linus Torvalds with the assistance of developers around the world. Developed under the GNU General Public License, the source code for Linux is freely available to everyone." Because it is open source, anybody with the time and skills can help develop it. As a result, Linux quickly became an enormous collaboration of coders and has matured into a stable, highly customizable, and (mostly) easy-to-use operating system. I have been using it as my only operating system for several years now and am currently writing this blog post on a laptop running Kubuntu 9.04 in OpenOffice (an open source office suite). I won't go into the details of the different types of Linux out there, but suffice it to say there are many different ones and they're called distributions, some of which are designed specifically for children, as I mentioned.

Of these Linux distros for kids, the best I have found, after trying ones like Edubuntu, Qimo, and some others, goes by the playful name Sugar on a Stick, an OS that can run entirely from a USB stick. It provides an easy, icon-driven interface, includes many different educational activities and tools (including a word processor and web browser), and most interestingly makes collaboration between its users absolutely painless and, indeed, assumed. For a quick introduction to this distro, check out this rather trippy cartoon that tells the story of a day in the life of a young student using Sugar on a Stick.

The interface they've designed is incredibly slick and intuitive. Here's a short video of it in action. Even though it's aimed at school-age children, it's simple even for pre-schoolers to master. My son, after only a little explanation from me, can already navigate the menus and activities easily. After creating the USB stick, which is also quite simple to do, I spent some time customizing his Sugar with activities I know are suitable for his age, such as a paint program called TuxPaint  and a suite of educational games and toys (including chess, which I'm excited to see) called GCompris. Sugar comes with many activities already installed, but I knew from trying out some other systems that he likes these applications, too. As you might expect, they were, like just about everything else in Sugar, easy to install and use.

Beyond the simple existence of this fantastic OS, I want to draw attention to the ways Sugar implements many of the core pedagogical values many here at HASTAC share. Sugar is the OS designed for the One Laptop Per Child initiative, whose mission statement reads:

To create educational opportunities for the world's poorest children by providing each child with a rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop with content and software designed for collaborative, joyful, self-empowered learning. When children have access to this type of tool they get engaged in their own education. They learn, share, create, and collaborate. They become connected to each other, to the world and to a brighter future.

Like many of the conversations we have here at HASTAC, this project focuses on learning through collaboration, experimentation, and pleasure. For example, rather than applications or tools, each program is called an activity and runs at full-screen, two design choices that derive from this pedagogical orientation. Collaboration is also assumed by the OS; you can invite friends to just about any activity (like writing, painting, web browsing), and everyone who joins will see the same thing. While I could go on and detail all the other pedagogical ideas Sugar implements, in the spirit of user-driven learning, I suggest you simply explore the OLPC website and read about it.

What will the university experience be like for students who were raised on Sugar (or similar platforms)? The current generation of students already approaches college with expectations that often differ from too many professors. What would a class of Sugar-users, raised on collaboration and pleasurable learning, expect from their courses and instructors?