13 Jun 2018
Antonio M. Battro
Academia Nacional de Educación Argentina
I met Seymour in the early 60’s when he was an active member of the Center of Genetic Epistemology directed by Jean Piaget in Geneva, where he started developing his cognitive theory on constructionism as a complement to Piaget’s theory of constructivism. In the words of Piaget, constructivism is the “formal obligation of constantly transcending the systems already constructed to assure non-contradiction”. On his side, Papert’s constructionism is more focused in the dynamics of developmental change than in the logical stability of mental structures. Both authors were clearly opposed to instructionism in education.
Seymour left Geneva for MIT, where he became with Marvin Minsky Director of the AI Lab (1967). He created LOGO, with Wally Feurzeig, and in the 80’s he introduced this computer language in schools. He became professor at the MIT Media Lab, founded by Nicholas Negroponte, but, unfortunately, his master Piaget died in 1980 and couldn’t see
his formidable breakthrough in education.
We followed his example very soon in Argentina with Horacio C. Reggini where we created la “Asociación Amigos de Logo” to enforce the practice of Logo in elementary schools and special schools. Papert’s seminal book, “Mindstorms” (1980) was followed by Reggini’s “Alas para la mente. Logo: un lenguaje de computadoras un estilo de pensar” (1982), a book that had a great impact in our latin-american region.
Logo can be used in many different settings, one of the most popular is to make designs on the computer screen using elementary geometric procedures that move a pointer, a small triangle that is called a “turtle”. This name has an interesting history in cybernetics and was inspired in the (analog) robot created by the neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977) in the 40’s.
Following this trend the first robot programmed by children in the 80’s was a Logo “turtle” that became a formidable tool in the hands of Seymour and his team. The turtle was a very simple and robust, robotic vehicle, equipped with two wheels, electric motors, a transparent shell, a ring as a touch sensor, connected to a computer. Children were taught to write modular and recursive Logo programs with few simple commands to control the turtle.
My first work with children and robots began with these charming Logo turtles in a variety of settings, working initially with disabled kids in a hospital and in some elementary schools. One unforgettable experience in the early 80’s was to watch our turtle being moved in Buenos Aires by Logo commands from Boston via modem and telephone lines, well before Internet. Seymour also was the first to communicate, from a Logo meeting in Brazil, via computers, with deaf children of Argentina who were using Logo under the guidance of Percival Denham.
Seymour helped to open this immense field of digital communication in education. He inspired the first implementation of computers in schools in Costa Rica, Colombia, Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina in the 80’s. His support was key in the international deployment of the program OLPC, One Laptop per Child, in the last decade, launched by Nicholas Negroponte and followed by Rodrigo Arboleda.
He will always live in our memories and will continue to inspire educators around the globe in their effort to expand knowledge and bring joy and creativity to all children.