Woah! That's awesome! I wanna do that!
March 9, 2010 10:13 AM Subscribe
What are your favorite technology demos? What inspires you to follow technology?
Myself and a few other students will be running a computer science/technology camp for kids in grade 4 to 6. Part of our camp will be to show them all the cool stuff in technology. We're now looking for some videos to show the kids what's out there and how they can use technology in ways they may have never thought of before. Here are some ideas of what we're looking for:
Johnny Lee's Wii Remote Demos -- we plan on buliding some of these demos so the kids can interact with them
Microsoft's Surface
Digital Guitar
the "sixth sense"
So what are some of your favorite tech demos you've come across recently? What are some technology-related demos or projects you've seen that make you say "Woah! That's awesome! I wanna do that!"?
Myself and a few other students will be running a computer science/technology camp for kids in grade 4 to 6. Part of our camp will be to show them all the cool stuff in technology. We're now looking for some videos to show the kids what's out there and how they can use technology in ways they may have never thought of before. Here are some ideas of what we're looking for:
Johnny Lee's Wii Remote Demos -- we plan on buliding some of these demos so the kids can interact with them
Microsoft's Surface
Digital Guitar
the "sixth sense"
So what are some of your favorite tech demos you've come across recently? What are some technology-related demos or projects you've seen that make you say "Woah! That's awesome! I wanna do that!"?
Lego Mindstorms The kids will get into it because its basically toys you can program and you learn tons about mechanics, physics, and computer science
Part of what annoys me about tech demos is many are for technologies that are only theoretical or impractical for every day users. As much as I love Popular Science they do this A LOT, they've just opened their archives and you can see how many Science Fantasy stories they cover. Stuff like that is cool to look at and dream about but seems somewhat unattainable to actually get into. As I kid I saw a lot of that stuff but didn't really know what to do with it; I think Mindstorms and a lot of the home robotics stuff can be really stimulating to budding science geeks because its real, it's cheap and can be driven by creativity.
posted by Scientifik at 10:50 AM on March 9, 2010
Part of what annoys me about tech demos is many are for technologies that are only theoretical or impractical for every day users. As much as I love Popular Science they do this A LOT, they've just opened their archives and you can see how many Science Fantasy stories they cover. Stuff like that is cool to look at and dream about but seems somewhat unattainable to actually get into. As I kid I saw a lot of that stuff but didn't really know what to do with it; I think Mindstorms and a lot of the home robotics stuff can be really stimulating to budding science geeks because its real, it's cheap and can be driven by creativity.
posted by Scientifik at 10:50 AM on March 9, 2010
Try starting out with web 2.0 things like Prezi, blabberize, google docs, tumblr blogs, etc.
Also, making movies is surprisingly easy and engaging. Just put together some stock video, images, and music and load up Movie Maker / iMovie.
Web cams are cheap, and you already have a digital camera with a video recording feature.
posted by jander03 at 12:32 PM on March 9, 2010
Also, making movies is surprisingly easy and engaging. Just put together some stock video, images, and music and load up Movie Maker / iMovie.
Web cams are cheap, and you already have a digital camera with a video recording feature.
posted by jander03 at 12:32 PM on March 9, 2010
Response by poster: Thanks guys, good ideas.
We were planning on using Lego Mindstorms, but it didn't work out. (Long, uninteresting story.) I definitely agree about it being a great introduction to robotics and programming. We'll be mentioning this in the camp for sure if the kids are inclined to pursue it.
posted by Kippersoft at 4:13 PM on March 9, 2010
We were planning on using Lego Mindstorms, but it didn't work out. (Long, uninteresting story.) I definitely agree about it being a great introduction to robotics and programming. We'll be mentioning this in the camp for sure if the kids are inclined to pursue it.
posted by Kippersoft at 4:13 PM on March 9, 2010
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posted by Chocolate Pickle at 10:32 AM on March 9, 2010