I also met with Robbin Chapman

I really enjoyed meeting and talking with Robbin. She's excellent. From this meeting, lots of good ideas and a vague plan.

Things that she wishes could've been implemented with pearls of wisdom
*string of pearls. the ability to visualize a user's pearl activities. i feel like this is a little along the idea of glorianna's path based stuff. but where you can see the path someone took through the pearls instead of creating a path intentionally.
*history of edits. so you can see how people change their work over time. seeing how they learn to explain themselves via this tool

We talked about her pearls of wisdom a lot, and how the questions they asked came out of cognitive science. They're questions that are simple but that lead to rich answers. She suggested having an icebreaker before working with the kids. And also stressed the importance of talking with the people who work with the kids and working with them before working with the kids. Which is something I try for, already.

Vague plan:
1) get something working by end of month. i'm working on this. if all else fails with ruby, there's the wiki.
2) narrow down a population (i'd say 12-16 year olds? narrower?)
3) ask people in MITERS if they'd like to help populate the information space/site. Also get ML'ers and the teachers of the kids feedback before the kids.
4) spend 2-3 weeks in july working with kids and getting feedback.
5) in the meantime, write all i can on my thesis.
6) finalize and turn in.

Anyway. That's the gist of things.