After the second Niel lecture, we had a quite passionate discussion with Romain, our mentor. I cannot summarize it: the discussion was dense, and my english is too simple. I've been teaching for more than ten years. This means that I am no longer used to follow lectures. However, as a scientist I continually learn stuffs... in a very different way. On the one hand, Niel's lecture is full of informations, pointing out interesting stuff (tools, techniques, concepts). But all in all, it's really fast (who said superficial ?), and it would be worth to develop many points. Is not it the student's work to dig what looks important to him ? Is not it the teacher role to stress what is really important ? How to deal with a worldwide audience with various ages/backgrounds/motivations/cultures ?
And in the end, two mirroring questions: is this a lecture, a conference, a seminar ? what am I looking for here ? Is all this related to the french way of teaching (more "cartesian", more deductive, more "theoretical", less inductive, less "practical") ? I precisely decided with Vincent Dupuis to start a FabLab structure to renew the way we teach (2 years ago)... And I am surprised of the effect, when applied to myself ?!
During the discussion, we also talked about documentation. Is it worthwile to re-write (not copy-paste !) a tutorial that is well written, instead of linking it ? Does not too much information kill relevant information ?
Other point: a discussion about machines standardization, and the FabLab inventory. Many digital fabrication workshop in France claim to be FabLabs, while not have the right inventory. Why ? Is there a cultural explaination ?