Day 3 Connections got off to a slow start. Surprisingly, after about ten minutes of complete silence, the group broke out of the silence, and the detached looks disappeared. Many encouraging comments were presented: expressions of gratitude for the sharing of educational resource information, hopes of continuing the first day's excitement, remarks about the stimulating learning atmosphere present at this institute, and gratitude for the alleviation of past apprehensions about the Internet. Roseanne told us an amusing story of how she taught her relatives how to use their e-mail, which they have possessed for a while but never knew how to operate. Through her one day of learning at the Institute, she was able to teach two others how to use their Internet resources. Her story was proof-positive of how the information gained by the participants not only aids participants themselves, but multiplies within the realm of every person with whom these participants come in contact.
After Connections, we plunged right into the action. First, the participants touched base with their computers by checking their e-mail, responding to messages, and re-learning a few of the more complicated procedures. The next area of discovery was the file transfer software. We started off by learning how to use Fetch: how to open the connection to different FTP sites, view files, and download software from the Forum archives.
As always, the participants were given plenty of time to explore the many resources at their leisure. Some of the interesting FTP sites toward which the group was directed were BBN, Ednet, Internet Resources Directory, Gutenberg Project, Apple General Support, Math ARchive site, and NASA Spacelink. In addition to their individual exploration, the group was also shown how to save sites as bookmarks and how to add sites to the shortcuts menu. We understood Fetch to be a quick, easy file transfer software when one knows the specific address of the file one wants to retrieve.
After Fetch, we were introduced to TurboGopher and TurboGopher's search mechanism, Veronica. We learned the difference between searching Gopherspace and searching directories, how to open Gopher sites, and how to make bookmarks. TurboGopher is the perfect software when one wants to find information on a certain topic, but does not exactly know where to look for it.
After this morning session of Macintosh software, I will never forget Steve's repeated phrase, "Whenever you're using Macintosh software, what do you always check first?" Of course, we now all dutifully reply (and almost in a drone), "Set the preferences."
In the afternoon we experimented with the Stella Octangula kit. I will post a separate article that tells the story of our informative and thought-provoking afternoon. After the Stella Octangula session, we briefly explored the Geometer's Sketchpad software. The group's mission was to solve one of Annie's Problems of the Week using Sketchpad. Many of the participants solved the problem quickly and efficiently, and more than once I heard someone exclaim, "Gosh, this is so EASY with Sketchpad. I can see it so much better this way."
The evening came to a close with the showing of a few movies. A couple of math videos were shown ("Not Knot" was one), and then David went out to Blockbuster to find Stephen Hawking's movie in order to break the stream of math information overload.
Despite the persistent heat, the omnipresent humidity, and the inconvenience of Swarthmore's decapitated computing center, the institute ran beautifully for the second straight day. The food continued to be excellent. Lunch was again make-your-own sandwiches, salads, and pasta salads, but today we were delighted with the introduction of scrumptious fruit salads. Dinner was an amazing display of Greek cuisine prepared by a gracious Swarthmore graduate. Well, I will be posting the happenings of the Stella Octangula session shortly, and besides that, I will post again tomorrow following our visit to Philadelphia.
--Heather Mateyak :)