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Audience
06/21/2016 at 13:11 • 0 commentsThe postulated audience for this project are parents who are STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) workers, K-12 educators, post-secondary educators, homeschoolers, DIYers/Makers/Hardware Hackers, and parents with children in youth groups such Scouts, 4-H, FFA, etc.
The Kano Computer is recommended for ages seven and older. Snap Circuits is recommended for ages eight and older. Of course it would be up to parents to determine if it is appropriate for younger children.
If anyone has suggestions for improvements to this project please post your suggestions, complaints, stuff that you might be confused about (whatever I have failed to make clear), etc. in the comments. If you like this project, please don't hesitate to click the like button.
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Information Wants to Be Free
06/20/2016 at 19:53 • 0 commentsSo much scientific research is locked up behind paywalls even when that research was paid for with public funds.
There is so much competition for public grants among scientists that they seem to only want pursue research that is "sexy" and likely to published in the most prestigious of journals--even when that research is flawed and sometimes dangerously fraudulent. Andrew Wakefield's MMR autism study was published in The Lancet in 1998 and was retracted in 2010 but to this day people still believe the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine causes autism.
There is a growing citizen scientist (amateur scientist) movement spawned from the maker movement that is similar to the Gentleman and Lady scientists that preceded the Age of Enlightenment and before the professionalization of science. Citizen scientists are doing research that often rivals professional scientists and publishing their research in open journals and occasionally in prestigious scientific journals. Of course, most modern citizen scientists usually aren't wealthy like the early Lady and Gentleman scientists but nonetheless conduct their experiment with what ever they can scrounge together.
I think the Maker/DIY/hardware hacking communities inherently understand that a gizmo may look good on paper, but once you start building it, it may not turn out the way you planned. There’s a lot of troubleshooting between idea and prototype trying to figure out what went wrong during the build. You learn a lot from failure. Probably more than you will from success (and as is often said on Mythbusters, FAILURE IS ALWAYS AN OPTION). “Failure is part of science,” according to Stuart Firestein, “Without failures there would be no great discoveries.”
Science isn’t a spectator sport—you actually have to do science. Makers/DIYers/hackers prefer not to read about a device or watch others build their contraptions—they prefer to roll up their sleeves and build their own.
Welcome to the revolution.
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Alarming Decline in Science Literacy
06/20/2016 at 18:38 • 0 commentsWe are starting to see an alarming decline of science literacy in the United States. The US continues to be the most scientifically and technologically advanced nation on earth and continues to lead the world in science and technology output. But as Niall Ferguson, the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, observes:
“It’s certainly true that U.S.-based scientists continue to walk off with plenty of Nobel Prizes each year. But Nobel winners are old men. The future belongs not to them but to today’s teenagers....Every three years the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development’s Program for International Student Assessment tests the educational attainment of 15-year-olds around the world. The latest data on “mathematical literacy” reveal that the gap between the world leaders—the students of Shanghai and Singapore—and their American counterparts is now as big as the gap between U.S. kids and teenagers in Albania and Tunisia." Source
China is catching up to the United States according to the National Science Foundation. Nonetheless, though we have a number of serious issues we must confront such as global warming, we do have immediately pressing issues such as confronting anti-science movements like anti-vaccine, anti-GMO, and chemophobia (think Vani Hari a.k.a. “The Food Babe”).
Lack of science literacy causes fear of GMOs, yet the lives of 2.7 million children could be saved with Golden Rice.
Because of the lack of science literacy, people believe the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine causes autism (it does not). Measles was wiped out in the United States by the year 2000, but “we had 644 cases in 27 states in 2014, the most in 20 years.”
With the impending public health threat of the Zika virus disease spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito and can be spread by the Aedes albopictus mosquito as far north as the Great Lakes, it may be necessary to use the insecticide DDT. That’s right, DDT. It was banned in 1972 due to pressure from environmentalists based on bad science even though it is safe to use as an insecticide. Millions have died (mostly children in Africa) from Malaria. According to Marc Gwadz of the National Institutes of Health, “The ban on DDT may have killed 20 million children.” DDT is not carcinogenic nor toxic and can be consumed in significant amounts with no ill effects (if you don’t wash your vegetables before you eat them—you should wash them considering how many dirty hands have handled them before reaching your kitchen…ewww!). Of course, the scientifically illiterate chemophobes will intransigently parrot Vani Hari, “there is no acceptable level of any chemical to ingest ever.”
Immunizations, food security, and mosquito control are immediately pressing issues that can save millions of lives globally. Science literacy is the best defense against cranks, charlatans, and pseudoscientific demagogues.
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"Hook 'em while they're young."
06/20/2016 at 17:58 • 0 commentsCardinal Glick: Hook 'em while they're young.
Rufus: Kind of like the tobacco industry?
Cardinal Glick: Christ, if only we had their numbers.
--Kevin Smith, Dogma (1999)
Why combine the Kano Computer with Snap circuits? The Kano Computer is recommended for ages 7 and older and Snap Circuits are recommended for ages 8 and older. So, a seven year old can learn to build and program the Kano Computer and when they reach age eight they can start learning how to connect the Kano to external electronic circuits and control these circuits with software they write on the Kano.
Why start learning programming and electronics at such young ages? Programming and electronics can help build critical thinking skills that give kids a leg up towards science literacy.
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Sanp Circuits Introduction
06/20/2016 at 17:08 • 0 commentsSnap Circuits is an educational toy that teaches electronics with solderless snap-together electronic components. Each component has the schematic symbol and a label printed on its plastic case for easy identification. They snap together with what appear to be ordinary clothing snaps. The components also snap onto a 10 X 7 plastic base grid somewhat analogous to a solderless breadboard.
All the kits include manuals printed in color with instructions for ages 8 or older and with easy to follow diagrams to assemble the projects. The illustrations for each project look almost exactly like what the components will look on the base grid when finished. Because the electronic symbol is printed on each electronic component, once the project is completed, it will look like a printed electronic schematic.
Snap Circuits might seem at first to be somewhat pricey. A Snap Circuits resistor costs $1.49 USD. A resistor from Mouser costs fifteen cents. On the other hand, the Snap Circuits Motion set (the set I used for this project) costs $84.95 whereas the littleBits base kit costs $99.00. So, you get a lot more Snap Circuits than littleBits and at a lower price.
As an introduction to electronics, both Snap Circuits and littleBits have an advantage over breadboard and conventional spring connector electronics kits. Some folks might find working with electronics and breadboards a bit too fiddly. Spring connector kits are easier to use than breadboards, but once you build a circuit of any complexity with a spring connector kit, it ends up looking like a rat’s nest of wires that’s difficult to troubleshoot.
It’s much easier to snap together a circuit with Snap Circuits and to troubleshoot problems. If you switch a project on and nothing happens, you can, at a glance, compare the circuit in the manual to the circuit you’ve built and easily find where you’ve connected something incorrectly.
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Kano Computer Introduction
06/20/2016 at 15:09 • 0 commentsI've lost count of how many computers I've built over the years, but I think it is safe to say that the Kano Computer was the easiest build ever. So simple a child could do it. Kano founders, Yonatan Raz-Fridman, Alex Klein, and Saul Klein, wanted to figure out what the next generation’s computer would be like, so they asked Micah, Saul’s seven-year-old son. Micah advised that he wanted to build the computer himself but it “had to be as simple and fun as Lego,” and “no one teaches me how to do it.” The Kano is “a computer and coding kit, designed for all ages, all over the world.” It will get “you programming in minutes, with simple blocks that create real code.” It’s designed to “to give young people – and the young at heart – a simple, fun way to make and play with technology, and take control of the world around them.” (Quoted statements are from the original kano.me website and original Kano Kickstarter page)