Sadie, Geek

Sadie blossomed in the course of days from not being able to use the mouse and being a keybanger to being able to use Windows Paint, to being able to use it with increasing discretion and being able to use Word’s drawing tools, to being able to use YouTube on her own to watch Sesame Street clips.  Which makes me think there needs to be a KidTube or YouKid or something, videos screened and safe for kids.  Left alone, she went from Sesame Street to an anime music video set to They’re Coming to Take Me Away to Chris Daughtry.

What really floored me was something she did late yesterday.

In her room, she has a Windows 98 computer.  Valerie’s is Windows 95.  Turns out they need separate desks so there’s room to mouse, especially with Valerie left handed, and Val has trouble with the full size chair.  We’re taking apart the crib (ugh) and moving it to our room, so Val will probably get her computer on a coffee table, easier for her for the time being.

That has the Windows 98 version of Paint, which is fine, and she’s been using it at length.  She’s gotten to the point where the only help she needs is getting a “fresh” screen, and that’s given us the opportunity to save some of her stuff.  One day was heavy on Sadie support because she kept accidentally flood filling the background and not knowing how to make it white again, but she learned that.  She also kept ending up with a bunch of instances of programs running and getting low memory errors.

In that version, the toolbar is docked.  She would accidentally undock it and then ask me to put it back, as it disturbed her to have it floating.

Sometimes she stands behind me and uses Paint on the Vista computer, which is also where she learned to use YouTube.  That has a different look and feel, mainly inherited from the OS, but also defaults to an undocked toolbar.

Yesterday she asked me to make the page bigger, taking the whole screen, so instead of 500-odd by 300-odd, it’s now 1000 by 700 and she’s thrilled.

Then as I watched she dragged the toolbar from floating toward the right to docked on the left side.  Extrapolated from watching me do it on her other computer a couple or so times.  It may not seem like much, but I’ve done too much tech support.  Way too many adults can’t extrapolate that way, or can’t control a mouse that well after that length of time, or can’t imagine being able to change how the program defaults.  I’ve had to walk people painfully through doing that sort of thing, or go to desks and do it for them, when they were lost.

What’s alarming is we weren’t expecting them to need access to a “real computer” so quickly.  A little while ago Valerie joined in and they were behind me fighting over the Vista machine.  Deb setup a user account on her XP machine for them and got them out there.

With her mousing coming along so well, and being on the verge of learning left and right in the process, and starting along the road to learning to read, Sadie will be ready for her first games she can actually control any time now.  I should have some around that are educational, or… ooh, she may be able to control Magic School Bus now.  Too bad they don’t work on her machine…

Posted by on 01/11 at 09:31 AM

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