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Future Software
After working in the BGSU Reading Lab with computers and children, I have
learned that the computer can be an outstanding tool for motivating kids to
read. A piece of software needs lots of interaction and text to accomplish
this. Some good games on the Macintoshes that we used were Cyan's "Manhole"
and Yukon Trail series. An innovation I would like to see in all childrens
programming would be for the software to involve the parent or teacher along
with the child.
Name: Keith L Anderson E-Mail: Legrande@rocketmail.com Subject: Family Software Hello I am an member of the LDS church. (Latter Day Saints) I would very much like Amiga software that has the same Strong ties to the family as this wonderfull religion. (Book of morman software in Specific). Name: Oscar J. Diaz E-Mail: blade29@msn.com Subject: First Time Programmers Hello, I'm just beginning the phases of being a programmer myself. As I go through these phases, I begin to grasp the power of what being a programmer could lead one to imagine all the possibilities it holds. As we enter a new millenium, we are on the thresholds of some major breakthroughs that are most, if not all, involve computers. Now let me get to my point. Wouldn't it be nice if there was some sort of elementary level programming courses that was set aside for young children to experiment with. Nothing that would make a child overwhelmed about the processes involved in programming. Just very basic (no pun attended ;) ) levels of the medium. Then as he/she gets more and more interested, then the courses would begin to get more and more thought provoking, thus leading to a mastering in any form of programming. Be it C/C++, FORTRAN, PASCAL, ASM and whatever future programming language that will exist in the not to distant future. Although in my opinion, JAVA is the language that will change all and all forms of communicating with the computer. Lets not forget, but we have to begin these instructions at an early age in a child's developement. Again, nothing complex but a slow and gradual interacting with some sort of language. Ok, before I depart. Let me just say that education on the Amiga is very important for the Amiga's existence. Besides, it was the first multimedia computer to take the very word 'multimedia' into the modern vocabulary. And it still has those capabilities to get education into a multimedia experience. Name: Doug DuBois E-Mail: ddebois@lausd.k12.ca.us Subject: Some Ideas I use Amigas in my classroom with 12 and 13 year olds. I mostly use digipaint on A1000s but I do also have a A4000-toaster flyer that we are learning to use. Kids like powerful features in the paint programs. I would like to see a paint program combined with a game in which they could create their own settings and possibly characters. I also use Mac Hyperstudio in our computer lab. Could something similar be made for kids using the amiga and HTML. We would be interested in beta-testing any software. Name: Robert Dupuy E-Mail: rdupuy@earthlink.net Subject: Kids' Programming Environment A fully animated programming environment exists on the pc. Its called Toontalk. You can check it out at www.toontalk.com While this program certainly could use some improvements, its a fantastic animated world where children can learn programming concepts and the results can be translated into java applets for the world to see! I would like if someone developed a programming environment for children on the Amiga. I actually think ToonTalk is a little too complex. I am amazed by its complexity, in fact. If someone could do a more incremental improvement on a learning language, such as logo, that included interactive animations, then I think they would do a great service to children who use Amigas! Name: Cindy Aguilar E-Mail: buzzybee@calweb.com Subject: A Few Ideas More educational software for children ages 3 - 6 years old. The children enjoy painting with fill in pictures. The more pictures the better. the pictures should be in three levals of learning. easy[ simple big fill in objests] medium[more objects in the pictures not too much detail] Harder[ pictures with realisitic details to fill in. ] the program should also have a free paint area. The area needs to contain stamps. shapes, pictures, and brushes. The more variety a program has the better entereated the childrem are. the product needs to be priced at an affordable price so teachers, daycares, and parents can afford the program. also, another product should be developed on the subject of teaching the Alphebet and numbers. counting objects under twenty. cute animation helps keep the children interested. Name: Ted Wallingford E-Mail: twalling@mich.com Subject: Educational Software Penetration The availability of all Amiga software has been infinitely questioned by Amiga dealers in North America. The reason for this is lack of consumer confidence and a subsequently poor distribution system for developers. I don't want to see this type of difficulty befall the educational software industry. Therefore, I think it's extremely important that Amiga Int'l and educational software makers like Mystique team up to provide unbeatable deals on educational computing solutions for home users and schools. $500 for a 1200, a 320 MB hard drive, and some edu-software isn't my idea of a good deal. PowerPC, multimedia software, and network support for less than $1800 USD is where the price contention is at. Without beating this price/performance ratio, the educational market will be impossible to penetrate. The cost of a 25 mHz-040 Amiga 4000 with no fast RAM has been stuck at $2000 for four years. Of course no educational instutions are buying them! Even if they were priced according to their capability ($600 or so), the performance still isn't there. So, in order to approach the educational market, which is invariably filled with buyers who are real sticklers for performance and anti-obsolecsence (sp?), the value of educational computing on the Amiga must be higher than it is on any other platform. One thing we can do, as developers, is make our programs better. This will increase the value of the platform as a choice for education. Then, Amiga must follow through by bringing prices down to a level that educational home users and institutions can call "valuable". Name: Travis Smith E-Mail: tsmith@mail.orion.org Subject: StarLogo StarLogo for the Mac is a major update to Logo using 1000s of turtles to simulate ecologies to traffic. I wish I could program well enough to port this one.
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