Stu's BRAIN[tat]

...And it seems like there's hardly time to breathe.

The AlphaPad project was set up to train young people in digital skills. Around 60 young apprentices are slowly learning what it means to have a 'job' and for some, it seems to be a difficult thing to get to grips with. Myself and colleague, Andy Ray have had a brief chat about this and for us, we kind of knew what 'work' meant. We knew that there would be rules to abide by, we'd need to do the things that were asked of us and we that we needed to start taking on responsibilities and become adults, quickly. We were told these things by family members, friends and teachers.

So why are we initially finding it difficult to convey to these young people that they are now at work and unless they do their 'job' there's a good chance they won't be in such a privileged position? (there's quite a waiting list for this apprenticeship programme).

Obviously there are many reasons and each case brings it's own story but it did catch us out a little. Looking at where we have got to after two weeks though I think we're pretty confident on the direction of the programme. We're finding out more and more about these young people, where their interests lie, their hopes and fears for the future through informal chats, observation and their ongoing exploration of social media. This is the key to how we support them. Step by step and as much one to one time as possible.

The whole project is taking shape and we'll get into a pattern of updating the progress pretty soon. At the moment we're still having a look at all the little pieces of the puzzle and deciding what works well and what doesn't.

Today I had the pleasure of meeting a number of staff who work across the 3D Native / LearnPlay landscape. This was in conjunction with attending the induction day of around 30 new apprentices about to start 3D Native's Digital Media Apprenticeship project which is running at The Public, West Bromwich.

It's never easy wondering where to put yourself where things like induction processes go. A lot of paperwork, no familiar faces, wondering about what they're letting themselves into. The majority of the (overwhelmingly male) apprentices pretty much sat there and said very little while main man, Steve Hands gave them an overview of what's expected of them. Hopefully a lot of them will look back at this day with a wry grin. We have big plans for these young people but we're realistic. There's enough experience in the team to help make things happen, i'm certain of that.

I spoke with a couple of the apprentices, one of whom told me about his phobia of social networks. Yes, not what I expected but it led into an interesting chat about online bullying and the SOPA & PIPA acts. Can't wait until we start the sessions in a few weeks time.

For various reasons the break is over. Over the next 12 months or so I'll be working for 3D Native who do cool digital media stuff over at The Public in West Bromwich.

The project i'll be involved in is all about digital media apprenticeships in a development & mentoring role. I'm more than grateful to Sir Steve Hands (take a look at what else he gets up to) for this opportunity and i'll post more about it all pretty soon.

Now whether it's a sign of the times or more than likely, just my paranoia but I want to try and do something, it's not happening and it's getting me down. See, for the majority of my adult life, i've been tinkering with sound, be that playing in bands, composing, experimenting etc. I've been able to put more effort into it at some times more than others, depending on the obvious responsibilities that come and go in life. When i've had time to concentrate on it it's usually been pretty productive and successful and a real pleasure to do (music is 'the' obsession). I've got off on the solitary stuff as much as the collaborative efforts. Well, since my two children have pretty much taken over my life, familywise, we've had to do a bit of shuffling about and right now, some of the work stuff i've been doing has been put on hold. Now, I was channeling a lot of my creative outpourings through work (a challenge but it kinda worked) but now I need to dedicate a bit of time to the music. What I really want to do though, is get back into a band thing again, work with others, collaborate etc but this seems to be more tricky than I thought it would be. I've joined a few of those musician websites but they're all a load of bollocks and really don't work (Anyone want to create a useful / musician orientated social site for musicians?). Maybe it's an age thing... where do 40 year old blokes go to find like minded souls to start a band? Refining it a little, where are all the players from the late 80s onwards who were thrashing about to the likes of Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr? Those that got the techno bug and then found their tastes mutate into a genre mish mash(up). Surely there must be some folks out there with the itch who are not doing any music, but want to do some?????

So to put it out plainly, 40 year old into way too much music than is necessary (see my last.fm profile) loves creative sampling / loops, guitars, noise, pop, etc etc. Wants to start a new project, Birmingham way, looking at around 2 hours a week for getting together somewhere to jam and who knows what. So whether you're into post rock, techno, chill-wave... whatever, give us a spin if you like the idea of exploring some sonic tomfoolery.

You can hear a load of the stuff i've been doing over the past decade or so here in case you wondered what kind of crap i've been doing.

http://harribionic.com/pages/danulo-archive

If you're interested then please, please get in touch (reply on this post). Or if you know somebody who may be interested, again - pass on this message. I don't want to be stuck in a room on my own with a bunch of gagdets, guitars and wires for too much longer.

Just a quick post to let you know i'm taking a bit of an extended leave from the majority of social web stuff. It's time to play Dad + for a couple of years. If anyone is interested in taking forward any of the ideas we've been kicking around for the last 4 or so years then drop us a line.

Update on the progress so far with the coding concepts for toddlers idea. Things are starting to shape up. I have a working title for the project, Tiny Logics (tinylogics.co.uk) and an initial five programming concepts from which we will fashion some toddler activities.

The five concepts are by no means definitive but they are a starting point and I see the potential of this resource developing more anyhow, but for starters they should do the trick.

They are (so far in this order)

• variables
• conditionals
• loops
• arrays
• input/output

So starts the challenge to create a range of activities / games for parents to use with their children to begin to instil computer programming concepts. The reasons for doing this have been outlined by me and others elsewhere, but I will get round to detailing this a little better on some form of FAQ or 'about' page. Just want to point out though that all the stuff we do here is without tech. It's about that time before your kids are let loose on the ipad.

So far, two things have proved tricky. 1. attempting to separate the concepts from one another when working on example activities and 2, keeping it as simple as possible. The former is tricky because as we begin to look at conditional statements (if, then else etc) it's hard not to talk about loops. Obviously, it all fits together eventually but you need your wits. Keeping it simple... In the first instance i'm really trying to take each concept to it's core and focus there. In some ways i've found I need to forget it being about computer programming and see them as things in their own right, which they probably are and i'm working hard to keep the confusion to a minimum. Saying that, had a great session starting to shape it up and I can see where it's heading much better now. Must quickly say many thanks to Jon for the input and sticking with my moronic approaches at times.

Thanks to a number of high profile people questioning how we do IT in our schools (see links below), it looks like there are plenty of folks thinking along the same lines. Why doesn't programming feature in the curriculum? and how are we going to change that? All those in favour make a solid case for a change, but I think we need to look closely at how, when and why we introduce our children to digital literacy. As parents, we start our kids off on reading and counting etc before they start school. And likewise, I believe we should start them off with computing and programming. Many parents probably know this to some degree and allow their toddlers to play on their laptops or smart phones, recognising the learning potential. But also, like me, recognise that without understanding, we don't really know what lies ahead. What are we getting our kids into here?And it's difficult to get a grasp on the digital landscape as it is, the speed at which things change and how we handle it.

In an earlier post, I spoke about getting a resource together for parents that begins to address this stuff and i'll be putting some work in over the next months to start making it happen. I'm also very aware that it's up to the parents to engage with their kids in the first place, which is another story entirely. It's like any digital project or initiative, fine for those who can, with the kit, with the time and motivation. But as usual, many get left behind for any number of reasons. Taking these initiatives into the communities might be a way forward. I might look at doing that once I have something more structured to promote.

I hope I can keep up with the development of this as it gains momentum and will try and push both the toddlers and disadvantaged community agendas, as and where I can.

Guardian piece which sparked a load of interest

Emma Mulqueeny's blog post

Eric Schmidt on education in UK

You always need to give someone a reason to use digital stuff. There are plenty of fun and interesting ways to hook people in, you just need to be a bit creative sometimes. I've been thinking a bit about the whole hyperlocal thing of late and how you make local stuff 'interesting'. I think the more enagaged you can get with communities, the richer the content and maybe, the richer the connections. I don't really follow the hyperlocal 'scene' so I can't really say I know much about it. But as a local person interested in new media, I know what kinds of things would make me interested. Anyway, this is all still a load of loose bits of thought which I haven't really started to pull together yet but I wanted to quickly highlight a tweet I saw which fits into what i'm going on about:

These are things that i'm on about. Stories about family, events, incidents and the like. They are everywhere. This tweet from Steve could be asked everywhere... " So how did your mom and dad meet?". I know there is probably a lot of great stuff like this being shared online in the form of projects and the like. I wonder though, how much of it happens out of pure interest? I used to sit for hours listening to stories from my nan and other older family members. I found it fascinating.  A completely different world. I guess not everybody is fascinated by history and the stories people have but then again, I wonder how many people have taken the time to find out?

One project idea i've had for a while now but not the time to try it, is to collect a series of local stories with half a nod towards the inclusion agenda, but probably more to assess what we can learn as the generations shift and we lose those with the richest memories. Of course, anything I get round to trying out will be posted here.