education

December 13, 2015 By drtechniko

How To Build A Simple Computer Out Of Anything

What is a computer?

A while ago I taught a group of 1st graders a class about computing. I wanted them to understand the concept of a computer in a simple and tangible way. So I came up with an activity where the kids would be able to build and test a simple computer anywhere: in the classroom, at home or at the playground.

Here is what I told them to do:

“Build a computer that can produce random numbers using anything you have at home.”

They go: “Really? We can use anything we like?”

And I go: “Yes. Anything you like. Except of course your mom’s or your dad’s computer. You can’t use a computer to build a computer. That would be cheating. You are also not allowed to generate the random numbers in your head. The computer must do that.”

And then they go: “What are random numbers?”

It took me a few cycles to recover from such a disarming question. I thought “Wow, the world around us is full of randomness (especially the computing world) yet how does one explain it to a six year-old?”

I said: “It’s numbers that are not in order. They are completely mixed up and you can’t guess which number comes next. Like when you throw a dice. Can you guess which number will come up when you throw a dice? No, right? That’s a random number.”

Solutions as surprising as a random number

The kids surprised me with their creativity. Here are some of their cool “computer” designs:

domarien-prng — Spin the wheel to get the next number. I love the added touch of fake buttons to make this look like a real computer!

Riley_s_random_number_computer__-_nikos_michalakis_gmail_com_-_Gmail — Stir the pot to shake the numbers and open it to pick the next one. Computing in the kitchen!

isabel-prng — Throw the dart-marker at the target and write down the number closest to the mark. I would have never thought of that one!

Surprised yet again

What’s more surprising than the creativity of the children is the lack of creativity of the adults. Having already seen what the kids came up with, I posed the same question when I interviewed a series of college students for a software engineering position. They were about to graduate from one of the top computer science programs in the US.

I asked the candidates:

“Design a computer for generating random numbers using anything found in this interview room.”

9 out of 10 of them gave me the same answer:

“I can do this by flipping a coin.”

And then I thought: “Should I tell them a 6 year-old can do better than that?”

What’s your design?

Does you kid have a cool design? Post a picture to the DrTechniko Facebook Page. I will personally respond to you.

I hope we learned something useful today,

DrTechniko

March 25, 2012 By drtechniko

Story 5 – The Rude Rollerball Pen

I’m a rollerball pen and I’m rude and so bored.

You must play with me. I will not be ignored.

You will draw me a circle inside a huge square

Or I’ll draw in your nose a long curly hair.

Time’s up!

What is this that you drew? Do you think I’m a fool?

Oh! You used a big Square and you drew a big pool

And you painted a Circle as a shiny red ball.

Not that bad. It’s because of my skill after all.

—-

I am a rollerball pen and I’m rude and need food.

I must eat something yummy or I’m up to no good.

You must feed me a Circle from out of a Square

Otherwise I will smudge lots of ink on your chair.

Time’s up!

Let me see what you drew now, you wily old fox.

Ha! You used a fat Square and you drew a fat box

And out of a Circle you made a sweet pie

It is mine! It’s all mine! There’s no need to ask why.

—-

I am a rollerball pen and I love to be rude.

So be nicer to me or I’ll paint in the nude.

You will cut me a Circle from the edge of a Square

Or I’ll pee on your clothes. You’ll have nothing to wear.

Time’s up!

Let me see! Let me see. Do we have matching styles?

So you used some flat Squares and you drew some flat tiles…

And then out of a Circle you made a deep sink?

That’s so rude! I am leaking! I ran out… of… ink…

July 15, 2011 By drtechniko

Online schooling: Should we offer it to children?

Last week I finished an online digital painting class at schoolism.com taught by the legendary Bobby Chiu. To show you how effective the class was, I learned how to turn this:

Into this:

And then into this!

All from the comfort of my home and time schedule using only Photoshop and a digital tablet.

I’m not a professional illustrator (yet), but I feel like I learned some amazing skills from a world expert on the subject and I felt like a kid having fun. So, I wondered “Could kids benefit from online schooling?”

So I thought of some benefits and drawbacks of online schooling compared to traditional schools:

Benefits:

Get to learn from world experts, homeworks included (e.g., schoolism.com, MIT OnlineCourseWare) no matter where you live.
Use superior interaction with content through technology (boardworks.co.uk).
Get help with Adaptive/Personalized learning (knewton.com).
Learn at your own pace and schedule.

(The online schools I include above do not target children per se, but I don’t see why their models couldn’t be adapted for children.)

Drawbacks:

Schools are not just about knowledge transfer, they ‘re also about making friends and getting exposed to the real world away from home.
It’s hard to enforce the “rules” when the teacher is not physically around.

As far as “enforcing rules”, a “virtual teacher” technology can easily be applied to record scores and progress as if the teacher was around (with deadlines, online testing etc.). So the most serious drawback of online schooling is the lack of the ability to socialize. Even though there are options that mimic social interaction online a la Facebook (schoology.com), unless kids leave home and meet other kids in person, they will miss out on a big part of life lessons if we replace schools with online learning.

So how about turning schools into “social activity centers” to get kids to play and interact together while they get schooled online? For the first time in history, we could give kids the opportunity (especially in developing countries) to get quality education from anywhere anytime at the fraction of the cost of traditional schools.

What do you think?

July 9, 2011 By drtechniko

StoRy 4 – Discussion

Many times I’ve heard people ask first graders “what is your favorite class in school”. The child is forced to choose one subject: sports, math, language etc. That trend continues throughout school and students tend to become one-dimensional. Too much focus too early ends up hurting our problem solving skills, because we lose the opportunity to build extra thinking tools and models that can be composed together.

StoRy 4 illustrates that taking a step back, thinking outside the box and composing abilities can solve a problem even if it appears to be unsolvable. Not until the Number 4 and the Letter R realize they can combine their spelling and counting abilities can they figure out that R is the fourth letter in the word FOUR.

The story also introduces the array, a data structure that appears everywhere in science (especially in computer science). An array, is basically a list of items that can be identified by an index/position. In our story, the array is an array of characters (F-O-U-R), also known as a word.

Here are some comprehension questions you can ask your children:

Q: What is the 4th letter of the word LETTER? What’s the position of the letter B in the word NUMBER?
A: T. 4.

Q: What’s more useful: Counting or Spelling?
A: Both are equally useful.

Q: Why was the Number 4 smiling at the end?
A: Because at the end, FOUR had 4 boxes and R only 1 inside the crossword puzzle. Moreover, it was all because the Letter R jumped into the box thinking that this would make it win the argument against the Number 4. If the Letter R hadn’t jumped into the box, then the Number 4 would not appear in the crossword puzzle at all.

I hope we learned something useful today,
Dr. Techniko