As we finish another week in October I wanted to share an opportunity for families to discover the woman who helped imagine the future of computing. When I was homeschooling Charlie, there were so many people I didn’t know about. We learned a lot together, but there were still people, stories, and pieces of history that I had never been introduced to.
Ada Lovelace was one of those people. Do you know who she is? I came across Ada Lovelace Day while looking through different #holidays and observances, and I realized I didn’t know who she was or why there was a day celebrating her. That got me thinking. Just because Charlie has graduated doesn’t mean our learning has to stop.
I may get the opportunity to sit down with Charlie and David to learn about Ada together, or I may have to start learning on my own. Either way, I don’t want to miss the opportunity to discover someone new. And that’s why I thought you might enjoy having this information to share with your children, too.
Ada Lovelace was born Augusta Ada Byron on December 10, 1815, in England. She was a mathematician and writer who became known for her work connected to Charles Babbage’s plans for a remarkable calculating machine called the Analytical Engine. Something I hadn’t heard about. Had you?
Ada lived long before the computers we use today. There were no laptops, smartphones, or home computers. Yet she was thinking about what machines might be able to accomplish if people gave them the right instructions. In 1843, Ada published her English translation of a paper about Babbage’s proposed machine, along with extensive notes of her own. Those notes explained how the machine might carry out a sequence of operations to solve mathematical problems.
One section described a procedure for calculating Bernoulli numbers. It is widely recognized as an early example of a computer program written for a machine that was never completed during her lifetime. Here’s the part that really caught my attention. Ada didn’t look at the idea of a calculating machine and see only a way to add numbers. She considered whether a machine could manipulate symbols according to instructions, potentially extending its usefulness beyond arithmetic.
She even considered the possibility of using mathematical relationships to represent music. Think about that for a moment. Ada was exploring possibilities for a machine that had not yet been built, imagining uses that went beyond the calculations people might initially expect it to perform. Her ideas help us understand why she remains an important figure in the history of computing. You can learn more about her work through the Computer History Museum’s history of Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine and the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s article about Ada Lovelace.
Ada Lovelace Day was founded in 2009 by Suw Charman-Anderson. Its purpose is to raise the profile of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, commonly known as STEM. The day encourages people to recognize women’s achievements, share their stories, and introduce others to role models they may not have encountered before. You can learn more at the official Ada Lovelace Day website.
I think there’s something important in that mission. Sometimes children need to hear about people whose names aren’t always included in the stories they encounter at school. Learning about someone new can open the door to a subject they never considered exploring. And sometimes adults need those same opportunities, too!
One of the things I loved about homeschooling Charlie and Suzzane was having opportunities to learn alongside them. Homeschooling didn’t mean I knew everything there was to know. It meant we had opportunities to discover things together. Now that Charlie has graduated, I still believe learning should be part of our lives. That’s why I want to learn more about Ada Lovelace. I want to understand her story, what she accomplished, and why people continue to celebrate her today.
If you’re a parent or homeschool family, you can do the same thing with your children. You don’t need to be a mathematician or a computer expert to begin exploring her life.
Here are a few questions you can discuss together:
- Who was Ada Lovelace, and when did she live?
- What was Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine supposed to do?
- Why are Ada’s notes considered important in the history of computing?
- What did Ada imagine machines might be able to do beyond calculating numbers?
- What is something new you would like to learn as a family?
You can even ask your children to imagine what kind of machine they would invent if they could design one to help people. Their answers might surprise you! I’m sure Charlie’s answers would surprise me and even Suzzane’s if she was still here.
I may have discovered Ada Lovelace because of a holiday on the calendar, but I’m glad I took the time to find out who she was. There are so many people who have made a difference in our world, and we may not know their names until something encourages us to look a little closer. For me, this is a reminder that learning doesn’t have to end with graduation. We can keep asking questions, reading, exploring, and sharing what we discover with the people we love.
Whether I learn about Ada with Charlie and David this evening or start on my own and share what I’ve learned with them later, I still have the opportunity to discover something new. And perhaps that’s the best lesson of all. You don’t have to know everything to learn something new. You just have to be willing to begin.
Grateful, Thankful, and Blessed,
GreatfulMoments.com
Thank you,
Glenda, Charlie and David Cates
