| FWIW a number of years ago I created a concept for a virtual pet toy that was aimed at exploring alternate approaches which might encourage girls--who may not have been previously interested--to learn to code and other computer science related concepts (such as state machines). One interesting aspect that GoldieBlox's research mentioned was that they found girls became more engaged when there was a story with a purpose (e.g. help this puppy) or opportunity for story-telling. This made me wonder if there would be potential for combining an already popular electronic toy concept (virtual pets) with a programming environment that was also a story-telling environment. The behavior of the pet would be determined by a state machine generated from the story. For example: Hello my name is [Oinky].
When I am [tired] I [sometimes] want to [play].
When I am [hungry] I [always] want to [eat].
Then the state machine for the virtual pet could be generated from that. (And associated graphical appearance, sounds etc.) Another appealing aspect of the virtual pet form factor was that low-resolution pixel art was accessible (in terms of skill required) and wouldn't look out of place. (I also believe there's a lot of value in a tangible physical "thing" that people can carry & show-off.)I ended up getting a bit distracted by the more generic question of how to produce a platform of enclosures & electronics that would enable people to prototype hand-held Arduino-based devices. (And then other things.) But I still think the idea is worth exploring. Some online notes on these two projects: * http://www.labradoc.com/i/follower/p/project-pet-designer-to... * http://www.labradoc.com/i/follower/p/project-arduino-enclosu... Offers of investment and/or consulting welcomed. :D (With regard to a non-gendered Computer Science curriculum "Computer Science Unplugged" might be of interest: http://csunplugged.org/ ) |