The Children's Machine
Rethinking School In The Age Of The Computer
by Seymour Papert · first published 1985
60% recommend20% neutral20% critical
Why HN recommends it
Argues that computers should be used to rethink how children learn, with a humanist, empathetic view of education; recommended as a companion to Mindstorms for readers interested in learning and technology.
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Some books I've read recently that I enjoyed: Mindstorms and The Children's Machine by Seymour Papert Privacy on the Line by Whitfield Diffie and Susan Landau Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick Eminent Dogs, Dangerous Men by Donald McCaig How Children…
on “Ask HN: What should I read this summer?” ↗You might find it interesting to read some Seymour Papert, e.g., Mindstorms and The Children's Machine.
on “Programming is not math” ↗…inspiring and caring researcher, and he will inspire many generations to come. His work was truly groundbreaking, subtle and profound, and I encourage everyone to read some of his books, notably Mindstorm and Children's Machine https://www.amazon.com/Mindstorms-Children-Computers-Powerfu... https://www.amazon.com/Childrens-Machine-Rethinking-School-C...
on “Seymour Papert has died” ↗…"Thinking Forth" probably also count as timeless classics in the "thinking book" section. Lastly, see also Seymour Papert's books "Mindstorms: Children, Computers, and Powerful Ideas" (1980) and "The Children's Machine: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer" (1993). These are brilliant for anybody who's interested in thinking and learning, or the Logo programming language that Papert developed.
on “Ask HN: Are older programming books useful?” ↗…high school -- and it was an elective that I sort of fell into -- was a personal finance course, covering things like balancing a checkbook, filing income taxes, keeping a personal budget, etc. In The Children's Machine, Seymour Paper wrote: [O]n my reckoning, the fraction of human knowledge that is in the [school] curriculum is well under a millionth and diminishing fast. I simply cannot escape from the question: Why…
on “The examined life” ↗…about the civil rights movement in school. Certainly I have learned about it, but if I learned anything about it in school, I don't remember it. Seymour Papert asked a rhetorical question in his book The Children's Machine: On my reckoning, the fraction of human knowledge that is in the [school] curriculum is well under a millionth and diminishing fast. I simply cannot escape from the question: Why that millionth in particular?
on “Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism” ↗…guy; true visionary. Bit naive. And so he lived the rest of his life shaking his fist angrily at clouds, never realizing why he had failed so utterly in Changing the World. (So don’t bother reading The Children’s Machine, it’s bollocks.) If only Bill Atkinson, or Cook and Harris, had done Logo 2.0 instead of warmed-over Algols. That was a mistake. Though as Keith Braithwaite painfully observes: “It's a curious thing…
on “AppleScript (2006) [pdf]” ↗…man, so often quoted as the authority on what children cannot do because they are not at appropriate stages of development, published his first scientific article at age eleven!" -- Seymour Papert, The Children's Machine: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer (1993).
on “A 5 Minute Intelligence Test for Kids” ↗Seymour Papert, in The Children's Machine: [O]n my reckoning, the fraction of human knowledge that is in the curriculum is well under a millionth and diminishing fast. I simply cannot escape from the question: Why that millionth in particular?
on “The Master’s as the New Bachelor’s (2011)” ↗