ICT PROJECTS FOR SCHOOL Bebras It is Informatics! Dr. Hans-Werner Hein, BWINF (Germany)
The Bebras International Contest on Informatics and Computer Fluency started 10 years ago in Lithuania - Bebras is the Lithuanian word for Beaver rapid growth in participating countries (now 30) website > bebras.org < each country has a website in its own language
The main aim is to promote interest in Information Technology and Informatics (Computing) as foundational science of this area to all school students National contests are organised at the same time in all the countries that joined Bebras - usually the second week of November - the Bebras Week.
Each country choses tasks from the Bebras task pool approved by the annually organised International Task Workshop. These tasks then are translated from English into the national languages.
November 2013 734 558 children participated worldwide
Bebras has side-projects and side-results, e.g. BebrasLodge (programming environment for tasks with constructive interactivity) Bebras Challenge System (mostly used online system to implement and run Bebras contests) Bebras statistics are topic of scientific research printed educational material, e.g. the German booklet and the Itʻs Informatics afterwords
Itʻs Informatics - Motivation give students an idea that what is behind the task, is useful and respectable give teachers an inspiration and a push to invent a lesson or a project based on the task be instructive for adults, especially the parents with 5-Minute-Lectures in General Knowledge on Informatics
Itʻs Informatics - Motivation stress on the similarities and oppositeness of Mathematics and Informatics impress politicians and scientists
Itʻs Informatics - Technology Text snippet with a meme inside A meme (/ˈmiːm/ meem) is "an idea, behaviour, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."
A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols, or practices that can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals, or other imitable phenomena with a mimicked theme. Supporters of the concept regard memes as cultural analogues to genes in that they self-replicate, mutate, and respond to selective pressures. Richard Dawkins: The Selfish Gene (1976)
Examples
Informatics thinks with Graphs 2013-DE-09
2013-DE-03 Pay with Attention Fanfan is crazy about pop star Justout and likes to make him a present. Fanfan recently heard that attention will be a currency of the upcoming information economy. So Fanfan plans to spend Justout some attention. What costs Fanfan the smallest amount of attention for Justout? A) Pushing the I-like-It button at Justout's profile webpage. B) Travelling to the next city and visiting a live concert of Justout. C) Singing aloud Justout's latest pop song once every day. D) Dressing up in the Justout style (ski goggles, kilt and yellow gumboots) and walk around in a large shopping mall for an hour.
It's informatics From the ancient media we knew "attention" as an economic factor for a long time. Newspapers, radio and television stations permanently measured media attention to calculate their fees for the included advertising. With the global Internet services the opportunities to draw attention is potentiated for organisations and even more for each single person. Everybody should be aware that in the Internet nothing is gratis. For each glance at a screen you pay with your precious limited lifetime. Informatics develops tools to comprise information to its essence and thus spare attention. But it also develops entertainment software to spoil it.
Attention is Lifetime (and time is money) 2013-DE-03
Informatics is Expert in Optimising 2012-DE-02
There are many risks with data 2012-DE-01
To know the basics of Informatics and to be educated in its structured thinking is useful in everyday life, as are reading and calculating.
It is possible to present Informatics to people of any age, for the younger in challenging 3-minute tasks, for the elder in not forgettable 5-minute lectures.
The Bebras International Contest on Informatics and Computer Fluency with the It's Informatics afterwords is a globally successful example.