Pre- and Post Workshop Reading Packet
Provocations
- Eight Big Ideas Behind Constructionism by Seymour Papert
- Obsolete Skill Set: The 3Rs by Seymour Papert
- A Very Personal Road to Reinventing Mathematics Education by Gary Stager
- Minds in Motion, Media in Transition – Growing up in the digital age: Areas of change by Edith Ackermann
- Constructivism(s): Shared roots, crossed paths, multiple legacies by Edith Ackermann
- Piaget’s Constructivism, Papert’s Constructionism: What’s the difference? by Edith Ackermann
- How to Teach Computational Thinking by Stephen Wolfram
It’s Good to Be the King (Wired 2000) article about micronations
Useless Machine articles
Synthetic Biology (mealworm) documents
- Elementary Science Study Behavior of Mealworms Teachers Guide
- Paul Goldenberg & Hal Abelson’s MIT Logo Lab Teacher’s Guide for Computational Models of Animal Behavior
- Teacher materials for mealworm experiments
Throwback Media
- Descript – The indispensable tool for editing and publishing audio/video with AI tools from a word processing interface.
- Generic Radio Workshop Old Time Radio Script Library
- Old Time Radio Researchers Group library of radio scripts
- Old Time Radio Download script collection
- How To Start A Podcast, According To The Pros At NPR
- Radio: An Illustrated Guide (PDF) by Ira Glass of This American Life – a terrific 32-page graphic novel for $3
Messing About articles
- Messing About in Science by David Hawkins
- The Computer as Material: Messing About with Time by Seymour Papert and George Franz
- Overnight Problems by Mitchel Resnick
Multiple perspectives on process learning
Constructionism 2025 Conference Materials
- Turtle Art Microworld handout
- Turtle Art Resources
- Creating (aboriginal) Dreamtime Designs in Logo (a microworld within a microworld)
- Josh Burker’s Turtle Art Programming 3D Printing, Ceramic Tile Project Guide
- Creating a Microworld in Turtle Art
- Creating a Microworld in Snap!
- Creating a Finch Microworld
- Gary Stager’s Constructionism 2025 Paper
- Teacher-Made Microworlds Article by Dan Watt (classic)
- Lynx web-based Logo
- Trial version of Wolfram Notebook Assistant + LLM Kit
- Wolfram Notebook + LLM Kit Special Pricing for Educators & Computational Literacy Resources
The Eight Big Ideas Behind Constructionism by Seymour Papert (in multiple languages)
Relevant Books
Constructing Modern Knowledge
- The Menu of Nutritious Computational Environments for Learning
- Turtle Art software link and resources
- MakeCode
- Turtlestitch
- SNAP! software with Hummingbird or Finch blocks (use to program the Hummingbird Bit)
- micro:bit one-hour challenges and radio tutorial
- Seymour Papert’s Eight Big Ideas Behind Constructionist Learning
- Constructive, Creative, Playful Computing Options for Children & Families
- Logo history, resources, & digital books
- The history of 1:1 personal computing in schools
- Program your own Gameboy
- Our favorite software high-tech tools, books, and resources for creative educators
- Creating a Finch microworld (for young learners) and Finch-related AI resources
- Using the micro:bit, Octostudio, microBlocks, and a programmable backpack in a project
- Fantastic new book, The Invent To Learn Guide to the micro:bit
- Do you know the mother of educational technology?
- Wolfram Language and math resources, including videos
- Useful to the Point of Being Revolutionary: Introducing Wolfram Notebook Assistant by Stephen Wolfram (December 2024)
- Logo Overnight by Mitchel Resnick
A collection of Logo programming challenges taking advantage of computing power and time.
Resources for All
- Collaborate with Gary Stager – bring Gary to your conference, school, or district
- Learn more about Gary Stager, Ph.D.
- Gary Stager’s blog, Stager-to-Go
- Books by Creative Educators for Creative Educators
- Invent to Learn (book) web site
- Schools are My Happy Place by Gary Stager
- Wunderkammer, a unique take on inspiring project-based learning by Gary Stager
- The Constructing Modern Knowledge Podcast hosted by Gary Stager
- Summer Reading Recommendations for Educators (updated 2024)
- Our favorite software high-tech tools, books, and resources for creative educators
- Constructive, Creative, Playful Computing Options for Children & Families
Stunning Wolfram discussion of AI – It’s history, current state, and future implications.
Two Conversations with Stephen Wolfram about computation.
The Kawasaki podcast is particularly clarifying. The conversation with Howard Gardner is great too.
Computational AI Resources
- Gary’s ISTELive 24 paper, Generative AI as Mathland and Constructionist Frontier
- Lots! by Gary Stager – in this article, Gary makes a case for computing
- Coding in the Age of AI Workshop Recording & Resources, including the code & experiments related to the ISTE 24 paper
- AI in Education Reading List
- Download the free whitepaper, Game-Changing AI Tools for Education, written by Gary Stager
- Learn more about AI in Education, its history and potential here
- Read Five Ways Constructing Modern Knowledge has Roots in AI
- Tutorials for machine learning and AI projects using the Finch robot or Hummingbird Robotics Kit
- Machine learning with the BBC micro:bit activity and tools by Aarhus University
For Over-Achievers
Here are some things to read or watch to begin thinking about AI and computational fluency.
- Obsolete Skill Set: The 3 Rs — Literacy and Letteracy in the Media Ages by Seymour Papert
- What is Logo? And Who Needs It? by Seymour Papert
- Stephen Wolfram’s Introduction to the Wolfram Language (13-minute video)
- What is Wolfram Language – An interview with Stephen Wolfram (40-minute video)
- What is a Computational Essay? by Stephen Wolfram
- How to Teach Computational Thinking by Stephen Wolfram
- Game Over for Maths A-level by Conrad Wolfram
- Will AIs Take All Our Jobs and End Human History—or Not? Well, It’s Complicated… by Stephen Wolfram
- ChatGPT Gets Its “Wolfram Superpowers”! – by Stephen Wolfram
Free Trial Version of Wolfram Notebook Assistant
An AI chatbot frontend onto the Wolfram Language computational system.
