Merry Christmas - Be an Erector Engineer!

theodp writes: More than 50 years ago, lucky kids found an Automatic Conveyor Erector Set under the Xmas tree. And while President Obama lamented last year that kids — including his own — were done a disservice by an educational system that failed to introduce computer science concepts 'with the ABCs and the colors', Radio Shack advised 'Parents Who Care' to put a TRS-80 under the tree for their kids to program way back in 1978. So, to bring things up-to-date, what are the hot tech/science gifts that Santa brought children today?

Comments

Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

There's got to be a crude joke about erector engineers in here somewhere...

Re: Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Or unplanned. They're much more awkward!

Re: Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahh yes NRB's while teaching HS maths was never fun. Sometimes I would just work from the relative comfort behind my desk for the most part of a class.

Or was it an RB?

Re: Hmm

[rfengr]

It was, you can buy it: http://hms-beagle.com/heirloom...

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

I read that as Erection Engineer but I'm mildly buzzed from a couple of drinks. That's an unusual state for me. I have an excuse. They are all being a bit loud, getting to know each other, and getting drunk so I have a minute. So, today's novella...

I had an Erector set, several, as a child. My kids had one too but it was not nearly as much fun to play with but they both have fond memories of it. It's kind of sad for kids these days. I didn't have one but my older brother had a chemistry set that had all sorts of things they'd never even dream of letting a kid have in today's litigious society. It had a variety of acids, all sorts of stuff. I'm pretty sure there was radioactive stuff in there as well but that might have been a different science kit? Maybe Little Joey's First Bomb Making Kit or something? I dunno. It's been a minute since I was that age.

At any rate... Yeah, some of the toys are kind of cool. We used to buy black powder and use our empty BB gun's CO2 cartridges. We'd fill them up, tamp 'em down, throw in a waterproof fuse, and then cause hate and discontent with various inanimate things. We stomped through the woods with rifles and spent hours shooting cans and other targets. We had chemistry sets and Ka-Bar knives. We had Lincoln Logs. Okay, those were pretty dumb. We had potato guns, paint can dust bombs, machetes, hatchets, saws, gasoline and a book of matches...

Meh, none of us died or anything and we learned lots of things. Sure, we sometimes got hurt and broke bones skateboarding, fighting, jumping off stuff onto other stuff, etc... But no, we all managed to make it to adults.

Somewhere, between what I was allowed to do and what kids are allowed to do now - there's gotta be a more interesting and educational way. We learned a lot by having fun. Yes, we got hurt sometimes. Shit happens, you know? I had rifles and pistols at my school - like my own. They stayed in an unlocked cabinet in the office. We had a ski slope too. Hell, we had an ice arena. But we also had an observatory and a lab with things like chemicals with a MSDS and Bunsen burners. We had evaporation hoods and PPE. Nobody died. If someone got hurt, we cleaned up the mess and they went to the hospital - and we didn't get hurt at all in the lab. For few days we all went and got glass blowing lessons in case we were eventually going to need to blow our own glass. (No, I didn't do very well but we all got to blow a beaker and some tubing and some other crap, fucked if I know, I'm not a chemist.)

We played rugby and basically beat the hell out of each other - it was a good way to get over being pissed at your roommate. We sneaked off into the woods at night and smoked and drank out behind the Away team goal on the soccer field. I should also add that I ended up at this school because a friend of mine and I (we were pretty young) set his dad's garage on fire. So... That turned out better than I expected but that's besides the point. Where was I?

Oh yeah, it has to suck to not be allowed to do stuff like that now. If you could put it in your mouth, we did. If you could roll in it, we did. If you could take it apart, we did. If it was broken and you wanted it to work, you figured out how to fix it. (That applies to bones, feelings, hearts. and bargains.) We learned stuff, whatever we needed. There was a drive, a need. We don't need to let them learn those things any more. It's like we're afraid to let them learn by making mistakes until they get it right, I guess.

I dunno if I'm being a crotchety old man or if there's really that much difference. My kids were pretty driven to learn. I hold high standards. They don't have to meet them but I appreciate them trying and will love 'em even when they fuck up. 'Cause ya gotta. You have to fix broken things and if you don't know how then you have to learn.

And that's kind of where I was going with that. I think. It really must be sad to have a young kid these days unless you can still get away with allowing them to get an education. How do they learn t

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Life was a bit different alright. It was also uncivilized. Fortunately, society grew up and finally accepted that there are things you should never be allowed to do. Why should kids "go out and explore"? There is nothing to be explored anymore. You're not Livingstone. You're not Armstrong. There are no blank spots on the map anymore. Stay home and Google it, it's safer. Sane and responsible people celebrate the fact that society chose adulthood and safety instead of recklessness. Embrace this new culture: even as an adult, you'll find out you're better off without some things.

Re:Hmm

[Cornwallis]

You're either:

1) trolling, or

2) the most profoundly stupid person in the world.

I vote for #2.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

Yeah, that seems to be the message. I just wonder what the outcome of this grand social experiment is going to be and if maybe we shouldn't have made as many changes as we did. :/

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, you are a total loser.

Re:Hmm

[JaredOfEuropa]

Responsible adulthood? Look at the average adult these days, whiny and complaining about the slightest wrong. "I want" or "I am entitled to" rather than "I can". Helpless when it comes even to simple tasks like changing a flat tyre. And above all looking towards others, or the government, when something goes wrong or something needs to be done. That's what you get if you shelter children when they grow up: what is called the "rubber tile society" over here.

Exploring in freedom (i.e. without adult supervision), making your own mistakes and learning from them. Those things teach self-reliance, healthy curiosity and teamwork, and they are an important part of growing up. Perhaps there are better or safer ways to teach those things to children, but my sad observation is that we haven't even tried to find them. Curiosity and self-reliance are certainly not things that seem to be valued in today's schools and today's society. But without these, how on earth can we expect our children to become adults? "Trying to child-proof the world makes us neglect the more important task of world-proofing the child"

Re:Hmm

[Applehu Akbar]

I had a Meccano set, which was the Euro equivalent. I seldom built anything from the instruction book, but designed my own battleships with elaborate armament and had them annihilate each other. That, and playing Monopoly with my innumerable siblings, got me started on being a Repjblican at an early age.

Re:Hmm

[Applehu Akbar]

-1, Green activist.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

No self-loathing Republican would let their child have one of those there European thingamajigs. ;-)

The missus woke me up. She's ill. My kids got my g/f drunk and now she's sick. They are, of course, in bed. It's only 8:00 so it's all good but we're supposed to go to a car lot later. My daughter wants a Honda Accord. Son of a... I wasn't even drinking when she conned me into saying yes. The good news is that she's picked a very good car. The bad news is she has no intent to pay for it herself. She has money, I know she does. But she's got this look and I have always been a sucker for it.

She's a Daddy's Girl but that's because daddy is more easily conned than her mother. I am fully convinced that they both conspired to come live with me, after the divorce, because I had the cooler toys.

Ah well... She's not a Republican. She's not a Dem either, so there's that. This is too early in the morning and I've still not adjusted to the time-zone difference.

Re:Hmm

[dolmen.fr]

Both. Because (s)he is Anonymous Coward.

Re:Hmm

[Ol Olsoc]

I read that as Erection Engineer but I'm mildly buzzed from a couple of drinks. That's an unusual state for me. I have an excuse. They are all being a bit loud, getting to know each other, and getting drunk so I have a minute.

Drunk people are incredibly annoying until I have a couple drinks myself. Why I loathe coming in late to a party.

I didn't have one but my older brother had a chemistry set that had all sorts of things they'd never even dream of letting a kid have in today's litigious society. It had a variety of acids, all sorts of stuff.

BAM! memory time kicks in. I had one of hose old school chemistry kits, and it had real actual chemicals, and real actual experiments. I hate to go into old guy mode, but as safety culture takes a tighter and tighter grip over the country, Chemistry kits have become lame, almost useless.

I'm expecting vinegar and baking soda reactions to be made illegal soon, and some brown skin kid arrested for doing one in a school science fair experiment as a teacher thinks it might be some terst explodey thing "Well, there were all these bubbles and stuff - and we just ca't be too careful these days!"

We used to buy black powder and use our empty BB gun's CO2 cartridges. We'd fill them up, tamp 'em down, throw in a waterproof fuse, and then cause hate and discontent with various inanimate things.

When we couldn't get into town to get black powder, a friend an I used to pry the tops off of bullets, and empty out the contents. Hope I didn't just make some safety culturists faint!

We had potato guns, paint can dust bombs, machetes, hatchets, saws, gasoline and a book of matches...

And we were learning things as well. Today's kids are in this weird world where safety culture is trying to insulate them from every possible source of injury. So they hit the teenage years with a weird sense of immortality mixed in with normal teenage rebellion, and no idea about this kinda stuff. So we get YouTube videos of teenagers sticking bottle rockets up their asses and lighting them https://www.youtube.com/watch?... , or taping firecrackers to their lips https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

and on and on. Not one of us stupid old time kids would ever do that, even if we stole some of Grandpa's beer and Wild Turkey, and took off to the woods with a box of M81's. We were hell on mailboxes, which was kinda bad. But the point is, we did happen to grow up without doing serious harm to ourselves.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

They don't know how to mend broken bones, computers, bikes, cars, radios, friendships, feelings, or hearts. I presume the AC was trying to troll or they really don't get it. I also imagine they don't know how to fix a damned thing.

Re:Hmm

[A nonymous Coward]

I suppose neither of you clowns has ever heard of sarcasm, and your parents disabled your sarcasm meters.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

Ah good. I'm not just a crotchety old man. I was kind of curious if I was just being biased or suffering from confirmation biases??? Ah well...

So, my kids got my g/f drunk last night and teased me 'cause she's younger than they are. We had a good time. They get along well. This was the first time they've met. I figured it would be a bit more awkward but it was just fine. My kids are kind of cool like that. They had good parenting...*cough*lies*cough*

Yeah, I got my older brothers by default. It wasn't really mine but he was more into electronics not long after. I used to have some 20-in-1 thing and then a 50-in-1 thing and then I started doing my own stuff with whatever looked like it might be fun.

Yup, you can get powder out of the bullets just fine. It actually burns a bit slower and, while this might not make sense, it means it has a bit more punch to it. Do NOT try this at home but if it is a center-fire then you can heat the casing (after removing the powder) and get the primer out as it's held in with some substance that melts faster than the temperature that they detonate. That is *not* recommended but do-able. Somewhere, back home, I have a stack of unopened reloading supplies and I've never had the time to learn how to do it. I'm sure the information is in there. I bet Google will help.

As kids? Well, we did stuff like leave our hand open and THEN put a firecracker on top of it and light it. It's just like someone gave you a hard high five as you're not containing the gases so you're not going to get hurt. We did some stupid shit. We had bottle rocket fights and Roman Candle fights. And it was awesome. And we would have been in trouble had we been caught.

Anyhow, one of the worst things I learned was that I could flip a bottle out the window, at speed, and had remarkable accuracy hitting signs and mailboxes. You'll know when you hit it. I can hit a sign on the highway on a good day. Well, I could - I'm horribly out of practice now. I used to be able to do it while driving and get a bunch of hits.

During the summer, one year - near graduation I think, we'd gone and looked at the road we'd traveled down. I then drove to K-Mart and bought every mailbox they had in stock and left them quietly at the end of each driveway. Considering that's a federal offense (the statute of limitations has long since passed) we were kind of lucky but we never heard a thing. (I'm not sure if it is still a federal offense...)

Mailboxes are protected by federal law, and crimes against them and the mail they contain are considered a federal offense. Violators can be fined up to $250,000 or imprisoned for up to three years for each act of vandalism.

That's from the USPS site - I figure some folks may not know this is a federal offense.

As I recall, I dropped off 23 brand new mailboxes and gave the last two away to some folks who had a mailbox that I missed. Hmm... I'm thinking this was 1973 or so. Yeah, I'd just gotten my license and had driven my car up to school. I had to have been 16. Oddly, I seem to recall disclosing it before enlisting and I know that it was on both of my clearance applications. They never said a thing about it.

Ah well... The kids are awake and ate. I made scrambled eggs, bacon, sausages, and toast for 'em. Well no, they made their own toast and my daughter finished cooking the bacon. Next up, get some of this mess picked up and head out and go to a car dealership. *sighs* The Girl Child wants a Honda Accord. It's a fine car for her and her needs and she has this look, this way of asking, it's not really something I could say no to. They'll all be heading home after one more small holiday and then the New Year's festivities.

I have acquired a bunch of things that go boom. If anyone's in the PCB, FL region on New Year's Eve they should come out and join in the festivities with us. There'll be booze, explosions, music, and a safe place to crash out or a safe ride home. It's a private beach so there won't be any cops. The neighbors are planning on attending so there won't be any complaints. I spent a goodly sum on things that go boom. I wonder if it's possible to take good pictures of 'em.

Re:Hmm

[Stinky Cheese Man]

Exactly why I generally avoid sarcasm. It misfires so easily, and people who don't know you well can't tell if you are serious or not. Say what you mean and mean what you say. It is better to be clear than to be clever.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Life was a bit different alright. It was also uncivilized. Fortunately, society grew up and finally accepted that there are things you should never be allowed to do. Why should kids "go out and explore"? There is nothing to be explored anymore. You're not Livingstone. You're not Armstrong. There are no blank spots on the map anymore. Stay home and Google it, it's safer. Sane and responsible people celebrate the fact that society chose adulthood and safety instead of recklessness. Embrace this new culture: even as an adult, you'll find out you're better off without some things.

That is a great description of most Americans...lazy and lifeless.

Re:Hmm

[LifesABeach]

Because the CEO of Apple says that Americans are to stupid. I've done what Apple did. I've just hired an H1B engineer that only knows about Erector Sets. Once it finishes the project for my child, it will be returned back.

Re:Hmm

[tburkhol]

Meh, none of us died or anything and we learned lots of things. Sure, we sometimes got hurt and broke bones skateboarding, fighting, jumping off stuff onto other stuff, etc... But no, we all managed to make it to adults.

Everyone I knew as a kid had some broken bones and trips to the emergency room. It was just a thing you did. Today, it costs between $10-30,000 to break a leg, so I have no wonder that everyone is much more worried about potential injury to little Johnny. Seriously, if you're talking about trading a new car for a little reckless fire-play, I'm pretty sure Johny doesn't get to play with fire.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

So you were a rich prep school kid, one of the 1%. Congratulations. In the real world kids can't afford that stuff. The only guns in schools are the ones that the drug dealers put in. They can't afford chemistry sets or CO2 cartidges or chemisty sets or GLASS BLOWING lessons. Get a grip. Fools like you have no grip on what reality really is. You live your life and think "why isn't everyone else living like I do" in your prep school in the Hamptons. Idiot.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

It's possible. Bulb setting or Fireworks mode...
Good times. I grew up there and now live in ATL. And every time I go through Alabama or Tennessee... it's Mortar Combat Reload time.

My 40th birthday, I set up "ammo depots" a "firing line" and a "blowtorch drop area" and basically ran the show safely as the kids set off all of 'em.

Odd captcha: Disarms

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Who actually reads this crap?

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

They already make 'em buy insurance. I think my kids either at least broke a bone or broke someone else's. My daughter quit cheering after breaking another girl's nose so she's at least broken that one. With my son, trips to the ER were fairly common. He had an ankle air cast thing and a cast on his wrist at one point so I'm thinking that was broken but that was a lot of years ago and my memory has faulty sectors.

Usually, the larger the scar - the more interesting the story. With that, of course, the more prominent the lesson. To this day, I wake up sometimes with a sore knee, back, ankle, wrist, etc... First thing, "Oh yeah! I remember that. Heh." You can laugh more when you've cried your hardest. You can sing louder when you remember having been silenced. You can jump higher when you've been held down.

Re:Hmm

[vikingpower]

Kudos for "Repjblican". One character closer to "Replebejan". Or to "Re-publican".

Re:Hmm

[vikingpower]

I discovered one day that it is quite easy to get the black powder out of firecrackers. And that eggs are sold in two varieties: calibrated, and uncalibrated. And that medium-calibrated eggs fit perfectly inside of a piece of metal tubing klepto-ed from a construction site. So I froze a couple of dozen calibrated eggs at -30 degrees Celsius in my parents' freezer, and made a back-loader out of my metal tube, using tooling from my dad's workbench. The thing had a plug at the bottom made out of rolled-up gutter zinc, and a hole for the fuse (I re-used firecracker fuses.) I quickly realized that firing it at an angle could lob a frozen egg about 300 meters away. (And I also quickly discovered it was advisable to handle the thing with oven mitts, after the first shot.) I was the terror of the neigbourhood. Oh, and I was 12 years old. Somehow strange that I didn't end up as an artillery officer.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

That sounds awesome! That is also something that I've never thought of launching. As an adult, I have a few dollars. I have a neighbor that raises chickens and even some that migrated to my house (I assume they're revolutionary Communist chickens - it's a long story) but, as near as I can tell, the ones that migrated to The New Land (my lawn) haven't left me anything that resembles an egg. But, I can get some.

I can even get thick black piping and make egg sabots. Hmm... I won't be home until spring, probably, and I don't think my current location is a good area. I am in Florida, I can get away with it, but I'm in a rather ritzy community, on the beach, and don't have a whole lot of property here. I do have several video cameras, a work shop, and a pile of tools - including a MIG welder. I am picturing something with a classic WWI-style AA weapon targeting system and, of course, all in black.

Also, per your other remark. I am glad it amused someone besides me. I actually find it more amusing that someone else failed to get the humor. It says a lot about some people. Of course, you can say most anything about "some people" and be correct. "Some people like sticking mashed peas in their ass." I'm not gonna Google, my kids are wandering around the house and that'd be an awkward conversation, but I presume that there are even pictures of people doing this. And liking it... So, when things like that happen - I get to say, "Some people ____." I'm easily amused.

Re:Hmm

[vikingpower]

Wow yes - with a sabot you would get even better egg-to-barrel fitting (some of mine didn't go that far away because they wire slightly, like 1/2 mm, under caliber). You just need piping with a very thick wall, I'd say 5 mm at least. I am still amazed the thing didn't blow up in my face - I still have 2 eyes and 10 fingers, strangely enough. Moreover, my supply of firecrackers was limited to the buying power of my pocket and newspaper money. You could do a lot better :-P

Re: Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, so things were better when you were a kid than they are now? I bet your the first one to say that.

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

If I've forgotten then remind me in the spring and I'll take pics and video. You can live vicariously through me. If the absolute worst case happens then I have a friend who's a licensed pyrotechnical engineer. He's even done a few famous shows in NYC and D.C. and the set up at one of the Disney theme parks. I will have options.

This might actually give me an excuse to build or buy a 3-D printer. I suspect, with some work, I can get the foam insulation with the right external diameter to match the internal diameter of some black pipe, used in industrial, high pressure, steam environments. Then, I can print a cup sort of thing that has a base (again matching the internal diameter of the pipe - or slightly smaller), a bit like a wine cup, which will go in through the foam and hold the egg steady. I can then simply mill out some 1/4" plywood to match the internal diameter as well and be pretty accurate at matching the internal diameter with that.

I can then securely glue my egg cup to the wood. I'd then place the egg in the cup, wrap the cup with the appropriate sized foam insulation, and then slice along the opposite side (foam insulation is already slit on one side) and do the rest via breach loading. I can use fine threaded caps and have access to a threading machine and own a drill press.

All-in-all, I'd probably not just be limited to frozen eggs as ammunition. I could even make up a pre-loaded breech and seal it with a thin layer of wax and then just thread that entire piece on. So, I'd load the sabot and then thread on pre-loaded breeches (call 'em cartridges if you wish), and be able to make a whole bunch of them up with varied sizes. Once I figure out the firing characteristics, I can do firing tables. I've got a welding machine (I'm not the greatest at it - but I can make stuff stick together) and I can make a stand. Heck, I can make a remote firing system so I might not even lose an arm or an eyeball.

I think this needs to be done. I think the various ammunitions need to be studied. I'd like to see the effects from a frozen rotten egg. I should also find some prescription bottles and fill them with shot, concrete, or maybe a percussion cap and powder. With some help, I could rifle the inside of the tube but that seems like excess and like it might otherwise ruin a bad idea and make it more accurate. I own an obscene amount of property so it's not like I'll be risking the general public's health or property.

I've copied this to a text file and placed it in my /home directory on my computer that is back home and made a local copy. This must be done.

Re: Hmm

[KGIII]

I know that concepts that are longer than what fits on a bumper sticker are difficult for some people and that individual thought is considered an anomaly but I strongly encourage you to take a remedial course in reading comprehension. Allow me, if you will, to quote the most applicable part from my original missive:

That does not mean I want it to be entirely like everything was back then. Not at all. I just wish we would be somewhere different by now.

And, in case you think that I'm selectively quoting, allow me to cite yet another comment, from that same post, that leads into that statement - there more than 140 characters separating them, so I'm not surprised that you had difficulty with the comprehension aspect:

Somewhere, between what I was allowed to do and what kids are allowed to do now - there's gotta be a more interesting and educational way.

Now, I'll refrain from making comments about your mother but I will speculate that you've not actually been afforded the opportunity to get an education. This is something that I'm bothered by and something that I wish I had the opportunity to change at greater values than I am able to.

Finally, allow me to posit that you're a fine example of the subject of my message. Note, if you will, this quote:

How do they learn to fix things?

Rather than attempt to fix things, you asked a question based on your inability to comprehend the message and then make further judgments based on the erroneous conclusions. You're not interested in fixing things. You're interested in being "right." I would further speculate that you are neither able to fix things nor habitually "right" and that it's because the educational system has failed you and because you lacked sufficient motivation to get the applicable education on your own.

Do you have any further questions or comments, or was that enough?

Allow me to close with yet another quote from my initial commentary and, if you will, please give this some thought:

Hell, where do they go to learn to fix their wetware?

Re:Hmm

[KGIII]

That sounds like a blast. I'm going to *try* to record it on video and see if I can get some good snaps. I think I've finally got the order figured out and I even plan on a finale with the aid of a neighbor, my son, and my daughter's affianced. I... Umm... Err... I probably could have bought a small, cheap, new car with what I spent on things that go boom. I don't often have both my kids with me at the same time any more. I figure that we might as well make it memorable. Even the neighbor has thrown in some extras and has some extra mortar tubes.

We'll be using flares. If I'd planned on doing this a little better, I'd have looked into an electronic ignition system. A rough estimate says, with finale, we should be good for about 30 minutes - which should also give an indication about the expense. There's going to be a good time had by all. Lots of kids will be visiting and the house is up quite a ways so we'll be doing it out on the beach (go past the gated communities and the golf course and then stay straight instead of going over towards the State Park - so you have a good idea of where it is) and it should be pretty safe.

I've *paid* for shows done before but I've never done quite this many on my own. (I have a buddy who is a pyrotechnic engineer and he gives me good rates and I do a yearly party back home in Maine.) Hmm... LOL You can come down if you want. You're not *that* far away. There are probably better and bigger shows that are much closer. There are two more spare bedrooms and then the rest of the house. There are still vacancies in town (it doesn't really start to get busy until mid-February but I suspect you know that).

We'll run a small test show on the 30th to ensure that everything goes as planned but that's going to be right around dusk. We're thinking about going to get some more and doing a show at 8:00 and then again at 11:45 - and just setting a bunch off. I'll be sober but I don't know about them so I'm still debating that. This would be a good time to have purchased a drone - I could put it up there and let it record parts of the show. Unfortunately, that has never happened and I've never really learned to fly one. It would be fun, however.

Re:Hmm

[eric_harris_76]

There's a construction company here (StL) that goes by the name Big Boy's Steel Erection.

They erect steel, apparently.

http://www.riverfronttimes.com/stlouis/big-boys-steel-erection/Location?oid=2692539

http://duckduckgo.com/?q=big.boy's.steel.erection

Re:Hmm

[gzuckier]

Yeah, that seems to be the message. I just wonder what the outcome of this grand social experiment is going to be and if maybe we shouldn't have made as many changes as we did. :/

we live in a capitalist society. sit tight and accept that your purpose in life is to be a conduit to funnel money from whoever you "work" for to those few whose role in society is to accumulate it, as efficiently as possible and with minimal fuss.

Re:Hmm

[gzuckier]

They don't know how to mend broken bones, computers, bikes, cars, radios, friendships, feelings, or hearts. I presume the AC was trying to troll or they really don't get it. I also imagine they don't know how to fix a damned thing.

the only way to fix a damned thing is to let Jesus into its heart.

Re:Hmm

[gzuckier]

Both. Because (s)he is Anonymous Coward.

that guy posts everywhere! he must spend all his time online.

Re:Hmm

[gzuckier]

Exactly why I generally avoid sarcasm. It misfires so easily, and people who don't know you well can't tell if you are serious or not. Say what you mean and mean what you say. It is better to be clear than to be clever.

are you being sarcastic?

Re: Hmm

[gzuckier]

It was, you can buy it: http://hms-beagle.com/heirloom...

geez; do they offer financial aid? "i'd like to take out a mortgage to buy my kid a chemistry set, please"

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll try that the next time I have an appliance break down. We could test this. You can break a toaster, each the same way. You can pray for it to fix itself (or somehow get additional, unexpected, assets with which to pay for it and I'll check the manual, online documentation, and dig out a few tools. The first repair the toaster effectively using their preferred method gets to kick the other one in the nuts.

How's that faith doing? (I'm gonna post this as an AC and get some sleep.)

Also, do I let his heart into the appliance or do I let it into me?

Re:Hmm

[vikingpower]

This is fucking awesome - to see a bad youth idea of 12-year old me (a boy in a village along the Rhine) turning into a piece of private artillery in the US. I actually got the idea, initially, from Scrooge McDuck, who once built a jay-cannon. It fired diamond jays to pierce the hull of his main opponent's submarine. I then thought "What could I fire?!?" As it was close to year's end, the only period of the year in which fireworks are legally sold in the Netherlands, and as this was 36 years back, I had access to amounts of black powder that, nowadays, would be considered insane (for a 12-year old, that is). I saw you in a discussion about security crazes, education and nanny-state, and won't go into that now. I will definitely remind you in spring ! BTW, ideas for other types of ammo: 1) balls of frozen applesauce, by using a calibrated mold (heck, you could even use a grenade-shaped mold) 2) Something we did in the Foreign Legion with exercise hand grenades, which were hollow and filled with talcum powder: we removed the talcum & filled them up with mayonnaise, mustard or ketchup. [ Favorite target: an open hatch on an armoured vehicle of the regular French cavalry. Jump, dump, duck, enjoy the cursing. ] Why not make a projectile that has a very thin scale at the front side, and fill it with whatever innocent impact-marker the food industry provides you with ?

Anyway, yes you're right: this needs to be done. Can't wait for the pics / vid / specs !

Re:Hmm

[dl_sledding]

AC troll... Loser.

Snap Circuits

[PvtVoid]

Snap Circuits. Yeah, baby.

Re: Snap Circuits

[bkgoodman]

Snap circuits are neat - but I'm not a huge fan. They are generally fairly very "high level, complex" building blocks. Even most of the definitions of what the pins (of the modules) do aren't described, nor referenced in any instructional way. (Though people have reverse-engineered and posted online). It's a long way off from the radio shack circuit kits of my childhood. They would be a lot better if they didn't dumb it down since much. My 11 year-old still prefers messing with my old Radio Shack kits, where he can understand what's going on enough to be creative, and build his own stuff.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

Konnects, Lego's, chemistry sets, 300 in 1 electronic kits. I've gotten my kid all of these in past 20 years. So far I have one one Civil Engineer, one high school chemistry teacher, one daughter going tho ISU for industrial chemistry and my youngest is 15 and writes in java, jboss and at least one more language I'm forgetting. These skills aren't lost but many parents have gotten lazy. Do some digging and you can find good kits.

Re: Snap Circuits

[gonz]

Snap circuits are neat - but I'm not a huge fan. They are generally fairly very "high level, complex" building blocks. Even most of the definitions of what the pins (of the modules) do aren't described, nor referenced in any instructional way.

I agree 100%. I had exactly the same disappointment when my son started playing with Snap Circuits. It doesn't really try to teach any concepts, and the manual is is written like a boring lab textbook ("OBJECTIVE: To show how a resistor and LED are wired to emit light") and not at all geared towards creativity or exploration.

Re: Snap Circuits

[AthanasiusKircher]

Snap circuits are neat - but I'm not a huge fan. They are generally fairly very "high level, complex" building blocks.

I somewhat agree. I think the target age is off -- I believe they say 8 or older, but they're really ideal for the 4-8 year old range, when kids are enjoying building things and are starting to follow diagrams in instruction books, but aren't really ready to understand the complexities of electronic components. They're great for introducing concepts like what a resistor, capacitor, etc. are, though they rely on a grown-up to explain a lot, since the manuals are both repetitive and often don't explain WHY things are working the way they do in a particular circuit.

Even most of the definitions of what the pins (of the modules) do aren't described, nor referenced in any instructional way.

Uh, you mean these, which are pretty detailed diagrams of what the ICs are? Again, they require an adult to work through and explain to a kid.

Basically, by themselves, they mostly are good for teaching kids to follow diagrams and learn terms like resistor, transistor, etc. They are exploratory in the sense that they can get kids excited about circuits by seeing instant results, which are a lot more exciting than blocks. (My son first started working with them when he was 3, and they were much more awesome to him than any other similar building toy to him, since they made flashing lights and fans go at different speeds and within a couple months he was looking at the kits in the back of the manual and begging me to get the kits with C3 -- a different capacitor -- etc. By his fourth birthday he was sitting in his room "building his own radio," and dancing to the music it played.)

i agree that the manuals could be a LOT better. But with adult guidance and suggestions, kids can understand more details about what's going on and learn how to build some of their own variations. Then, by the time the kid is 8 or 9, he/she will be ready to explore with a better kit of real components... and presumably ready to be arrested for "building a bomb" by clueless people who can't imagine why a kid should learn how to build things like circuits.

Re: Snap Circuits

[rfengr]

Well my son does like making the propeller launch into the air.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

". It's a long way off from the radio shack circuit kits of my childhood"

*Electronics* is a long way off from your childhood. It was more about physics and the excitement. Now it's about "what software can you install on a Chinese piece of hardware"?

Electronics is more or less dead because it is a mature subject. How many kids you think will get excited about how a diode is used to rectify the AC from a mains transformer? Especially if that knowledge eventually leads to no way to earn a living?

It's a hobby, but pretending there's a future for kids to study this shit is doing kids straight up *harm*.

The only ones benefiting from electronics are the universities who will psychopathically encourage students to buy a bachelor's degree for jobs that do not exist.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Minupla]

I somewhat agree. I think the target age is off
Agreed - my kid has been using them since she was 4. She's moved on to soldering now, but they were useful for getting her started. She could explain a short circuit at 4, which was cool.

Min

Re: Snap Circuits

[ArylAkamov]

I ended up breaking apart the coil and putting a nail at one end and pulsing the power to make a crude coil gun and ended up harvesting photo flash capacitors and making a three stage coilgun inside a vacuum cleaner handle. I miss being a kid.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

More reasons to ban those dangerous contraptions. You could have injured yourself or someone else. It's best to keep those things away from kids AND irresponsible adults.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably autistic, possibly retarded.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Hognoxious]

Lego's

Bzzzzzzt! Wrong.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

I suggest Lego Mindstorms. They are much more complicated thatn they seem. Buy the $350 EV3 (latest version) Core (education) kit directly from Lego Education. It is $50-$100 cheaper than the commercial kit, and has a "free" $80 rechargable lithium batter. It also has more gears and fewer swords.

Check out a local FIRST Lego League team or Jr Lego League team. (www.FirstInspires.org, grades k-8)

Once they master that, consider an arduino and lots of sensors.and actuators if they want to become an engineer.

If not, let then install custom ROMs on phones or tablets.

Re: Snap Circuits

[Anonymous Coward]

It worked!

My pedantic asshole trap caught one!

Re: Snap Circuits

[Hognoxious]

That's actually a people smarter than you trap with "pedantic asshole" written over the top in crayon.

Re: Snap Circuits

[rpstrong]

No, it caught one one pedantic asshole.

Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about a fucking clue? Electrical Engineering is a dead-end profession in the West, and programming is a never-ending treadmill of tech "fashions" that you must keep running on.

A real gift would be a social change. But keep dreaming that knowing the same things as a billion Indians and Chinese is somehow gonna give you an "edge".

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Everything is a dead end profession because it's a global economy, and we are all overpaid. It's all about who you know and who's willing to share their life boat. Network, make friends, don't completely sick at your job and you'll do fine.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

And very long hours. After three jobs in a row of "Seatlle hundreds" (16 hours a day Mon-Thu and 12 hours a day Fri-Sun), I quit programming. For someone in their forties, those hours will kill you.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems every job around here expects those hours. After moving into customer service, I really miss the pay but I don't miss the brutal hours. Also, I like being able to take an entire week off each year.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Tech jobs in Seattle are brutal. I lost my job after cutting back to sixty hours after my wife was unable to take care of herself after she was diagnosed with cancer. After she died, my old company offered my old job back. I shouldn't have accepted.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

After being called lazy because I stopped going to 11pm scrum meetings, I finally got fed-up and quit programming for hire. I still do it for fun, but I will never put up with working sixteen hour days and no vacation.

Re: Up to date?

[rfengr]

I'd up mod you if I had points. I have been an EE for 20 years, and don't think I will steer my kids into it. Same for my wife who is also an engineer. We like our work (the technology), the people we work with, but hate our employer. The keep hammering for more billable hours, cutting benefits, etc. I have about had it. If I didn't have young kids I'd quit tomorrow and try working for myself. Those who clamor for more STEM are not STEM workers.

Re: Up to date?

[rfengr]

Damn.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as the severe shortage of programmers exists, expect the long hours to continue. At the start-up where I work, we pay about 20% more than Microsoft, but still can't even get people to come in for interviews. We have nearly twice as many open developer positions as we have employees total. I've lived in the area for over twenty years and nearly all of my friends and family work in tech, and not a single one of them is unemployed. We all have multiple job offers. That is why we have to work so hard to make-up for all of the open positions.

Re:Up to date?

[50000BTU_barbecue]

I don't think he's the negative one here... Jeez.

Re: Up to date?

[50000BTU_barbecue]

Same here, I've worked in EE for 25 years, as a technician at first. I don't see much of a future for it here in Montreal, I'm lucky I found a job here, it's off the island but at least I'm working in my field. At the same numerical wage as 15 years ago, minus the benefits, and with no vacation time except for the legal minimum. I worked the 24th. All day. I slept the 25th because I also work evenings doing contract work.. so I can make enough money to pay the immoral taxes in Quebec. (I made the mistake of going on unemployment last year, oops, the province considers this a revenue so it wants even more taxes from me.)

I wonder how the kids at Bombardier feel these days, with their bosses getting welfare to the tune of a billion dollars US yet shipping the jobs to Mexico.

Sure, just study more... What kind of life is this?

All I'm doing is running in place to pay taxes with the same salary as 15 years ago.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

At the start-up where I work, we pay about 20% more than Microsoft, but still can't even get people to come in for interviews.

Then it sounds like you're still not offering enough. "Microsoft + 20%" isn't enough to convince me (and lots of other people) to move to NW Washington just for a job.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Check your anger and grow up, kid. It's called "pragmatism". We live in a global economy and that's where we're going to be for the rest of our lives. Same for you children, grandchildren and grand-grandchildren. It's not going away. Ever. You can't fight it. You either learn to live within the system or the system casts you off. So, who's the coward again, the one who knows how things are or the petulant man-child perpetually in denial who dreams of some big revolution that will never come, and is not man enough to face reality?

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Merry Christmas, uncle scrooge!

Re:Up to date?

[braindrainbahrain]

OP speaks the truth. Electrical Engineering is dead

Re: Up to date?

[cyber-vandal]

If only there was some way of getting new people into the industry by teaching them how to do the job.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're not angry, you're not paying attention. Things change all the time. We live in a Roman Empire, and that's where we're going to be for the rest of our lives. Same for your children, grandchildren and grand-grandchildren. It's not going away. Ever. You can't fight it.

The Roman Empire is a historical footnote now. The same way your bizarre fetishization for an obsolete system will be.

Collaborators are rarely fondly remembered, Mr Quisling.

Re:Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, I'm just a realist. All I get as replies are collaborators and bizarre Calvinist "productivity worshipers", even though we live in a society where productivity is from machines! Yet somehow they conflate productivity with some sort of personal virtue.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is anyone familiar with FLSA? If you are subjected to mandatory overtime and not compensated accordingly, that is illegal in the US, and you have the right to litigate. Google about the at&t lawsuit a few years back, brought by SAs.

Companies willfully miscategorize employees as 'management' to try and avoid the expense of having to pay people for their work.

Re: Up to date?

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as the long hours continue, expect the severe shortage of progammers to exist.

LittleBits

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering buying this for my child in the near future.

http://littlebits.cc/

Re: LittleBits

[Ukab the Great]

LittleBits make Erector look not very impressive.

Re: LittleBits

[Anonymous Coward]

Erector, perhaps; what about Meccano? I'm an old fart. A couple of years ago I got out my early '60's Meccano set and made a car with a clutch, a two gear transmission with synchromesh, and a differential, to show my kid how cars work. Give an interested kid a bunch of suitably varied and useful parts, and they'll make something cool. No?

Re:LittleBits

[Anonymous Coward]

Sexist, anti-boy advertising = boycott from our family.

Re:LittleBits

[fermion]

It looks nice and teaches the modern skills. I had an erector set and it taught the skills that were in place at the time. I certainly used those skills, spatial recognition, using tools, hand eye coordination, structural elements, in high school, college, and throughout my life. Fortunately I had access to computers early enough, some of the Atari machines could be programmed from a keyboard, to get those skills as well.

That said, there are no fundamental differences that when I was a kid. Just like then, kids have access to tools, but most do not know how to use them. How many people who are 40 can build even a dog house, how many can solder, how many can bake a batch of cookies.

The difference is that the number of semi-skilled jobs, or the jobs that pay well and can be learned quickly, are dwindling. Kids who do not learned skills, like those taught in these kits, are going to be at a disadvantage, just like my peers who do not know how to use computers now are unemployed or working menial jobs.

It's different now

[glitch!]

When I was younger, I read the RadioShack catalogs from front to end. At one time, I lusted after the SSB CB Base station and 5/8 base antenna. I bought and assembled a couple of the kits with plastic bases, and even a couple of "surprise boxes". When they put a TRS80 in every store, I was even more surprised. I played with it and even got the moon landing to work out.

I bought a different computer, but what exactly is the problem here?

Re: It's different now

[Z00L00K]

Today a raspberry pi would be the modern replacement of a TRS80.

Not an identical replacement, but as a relatively cheap computer.

Do they still have...

[NorthWay]

Can you still get those 501-in-1 electronic kits they used to have? With door bells, radios, and whatnot. Haven't seen ads for anything like that in ages - mail-order catalogs used to carry those, but I guess kids aren't trusted to be thinking for themselves today...

Re:Do they still have...

[KGIII]

http://www.amazon.com/Elenco-5...

I think I might have to buy one.

Cat got your tongue?

[Anonymous Coward]

Kids want only tablets and phones. Finding a way to program in these electronic devices is almost futile: Lame IDE kits, obsolete and broke ports of languages, webserves that cannot read local files... When I was kid I did carve for a C64 or Apple II, now I my tablets only drops birds and wait to hearts for recharge. Meh.

And if you didn't got it: WANT KIDS TO BECOME CODERS AND ENGINEERS? PORT THE TOOLS TO ANDROID AND IOS!

Re: Cat got your tongue?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, my son received a Windows 2in1, a Linuz LiveUSB, and Upgrading and Repairing PCs 22nd edition. Said 2in1 had the Windows partition removed before lunch and Linux installed before dinner, he is going through some errors now in boot. The problem is the fact that
1. Plug and play tech has seriously reduced our patience
2. Very few people want to figure out how things work, they just want to play with the results.

Re: Cat got your tongue?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would you want your kids to be engineers or, worse, coders? Do you want them to be unemployed and poor?

Re:Cat got your tongue?

[gzuckier]

Kids want only tablets and phones. Finding a way to program in these electronic devices is almost futile: Lame IDE kits, obsolete and broke ports of languages, webserves that cannot read local files... When I was kid I did carve for a C64 or Apple II, now I my tablets only drops birds and wait to hearts for recharge. Meh.

And if you didn't got it: WANT KIDS TO BECOME CODERS AND ENGINEERS? PORT THE TOOLS TO ANDROID AND IOS!

that's kind of an obsolete attitude, that kids are supposed to do things and build things. the proper citizen of today's world is a consumer. you don't build stuff, you buy it. you don't have experiences, you buy them. you don't even educate yourself, you just buy an education. free market 1, humanity 0.

Sphero's SPRK

[Anonymous Coward]

I was looking into some of the other stuff Sphero did outside of the BB-8, and they have an education app/ball. Pretty fun once you start putting your own programs on it - http://www.sphero.com/education

Well duh

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Well duh, an iPad of course, because downloading and "installing" apps is all that any kid needs to learn these days.

Re:Well duh

[John Bokma]

My daughter loves ScratchJr on my iPad. And also Monument Valley (check it out). She got a quilling set today and searched on YouTube on instruction videos. She's 8 years old. So, yeah, really bad those iPads. You remind me a bit of my mother who at first got a bit upset with me because I was very often behind my ZX Spectrum.

Re:Well duh

[nascentmind]

I am kind of OK with kids solving something using iPad etc but don't you think at her age she should be building/solving something with her hands? What I believe is that using a pen and paper would help them build/solve a lot more better than using a some gadget. The problem solving boundaries are always stuck inside what the application/device can do. From my own experience even now doodling something on paper helps me clear my doubts rather than sitting in front of VIM. As I am a visual learner I tend to draw abstract topics which helps me think clearly.

Re:Well duh

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

My daughter loves ScratchJr on my iPad. And also Monument Valley (check it out)

Well goody for her, not having to get her hands dirty actually doing something with physical objects (Ewwwwww!)

Seriously, fuck off. Your whiny response just shows that you AND the daughter you think is yours are both going to grow up to be humorless fucktards with a pedantic streak as wide as Alabama. So please, go play with your new shiny toys and let the rest us of make a fucking joke in peace, you jackoff.

Re:Well duh

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

I am kind of OK with kids solving something using iPad etc but don't you think at her age she should be building/solving something with her hands?

Obviously he does not, as judging by his defensive response. He's probably the kind of guy who's never actually held a screwdriver in his hands, built anything more complicated than a sandwich, and needs help from benevolent strangers to get his gas cap off.

Re:Well duh

[John Bokma]

Look up quilling and you'll see we agree. I also (still) take notes with pen and paper.

Re:Well duh

[John Bokma]

Reminds me of the time when someone described me on Usenet as a "height challenged bald old man with glasses" :-)

Re:Well duh

[John Bokma]

Maybe look up quilling set...

Re:Well duh

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Reminds me of the time when someone described me on Usenet as a "height challenged bald old man with glasses" :-)

I wouldn't be offended. Some of the most powerful and influential people in history have been "height challenged bald old men with glasses".

Re:Well duh

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Maybe look up quilling set...

Thanks for the suggestion, but I have stuff to do. Building cabinets for the downstairs room, fixing a lamp, and finishing some molding for a presentation case I'm making. I have some coding I need to get to later, but my point is that some of us actually do things with our hands besides masturbating and fondling our iPads.

Re:Well duh

[John Bokma]

Good to hear, I thought you had a hard on for me, which is OK, but I am not a height challenged bald old man ;-). Still, as an old guy who likes to do things with his hands you might appreciate quilling.

Re:Well duh

[Anonymous Coward]

Well duh, an iPad of course, because downloading and "installing" apps is all that any kid needs to learn these days.

So having the ability to download and install an app makes you an engineer in your mind. No wonder the world is so fucked up with thinking like this.

Re:Well duh

[gzuckier]

My daughter loves ScratchJr on my iPad. And also Monument Valley (check it out). She got a quilling set today and searched on YouTube on instruction videos. She's 8 years old. So, yeah, really bad those iPads. You remind me a bit of my mother who at first got a bit upset with me because I was very often behind my ZX Spectrum.

i was just thinking about scratch... crayola now sells an animation studio for $30; a stick figure dummy thing with registration marks on it that you pose and take photos of with an app on your phone, then you pick a body to dress the dummy's image in and some backgrounds, and the software interpolates motion.
and I used to think scratch was amazing.

The Dumbing of America

[Gim Tom]

By the time I was five or six I had an electric train set that my Father taught me how to put together and wire up each time I would use it. I wasn't much, if any, older when I had a chemistry set with chemicals in it that would get you on a terrorist watch list if you bought them today. Before I was ten my Father had taught me how to solder and I got a very nice soldering iron when I was ten and used it to assemble my first radio receiver kit. It used vacuum tubes, which took hundreds of volts to work. What would the parent police think or do today to the parents of a ten year old who was given a 300 degree C soldering tool and left alone to use it to build a radio with high voltages. Yes, I also had an Erector set, and toy guns and latter a BB gun and all of the other things that made kids from the 1940's and 1950's into the engineers and scientists that got us to the moon in 1969.

To learn you have to do and try and sometimes you fail and sometimes things might have some risk but not to try and not to do is a complete dead end for society.

The most hopeful thing I see on the horizon is the Maker Movement, although I think that sometimes it tends to candy coat real learning. Learning is not always easy or fun but LEARNING that is is almost always worthwhile and enriching is one of the most important lessons anyone can have and the earlier the better.

Re:The Dumbing of America

[Anonymous Coward]

Toy Train set at 7, along with an Erector Set.
Getting the two to play well together wasn't easy, and I got more than one pretty cool blood blister by jamming an errant finger into the Erector Gearbox.
By eight I was getting into Electronics, but with Solid State; a TRF AM receiver using two 2N170s and a 2N107.
At ten, I built my first Heathkit- a HR10.

But before putting all that stuff together, I was taking stuff apart, and I think that is what is mostly missing today. Not only the interest in taking stuff apart, but even the possibility. How is a kid going to take an iPad apart, and what then? Aside from the Battery, not much use can be made of the parts inside. (Even after five decades, I still have boxes of really neat Junk in my Garage. Need a 7360 Balanced Modulator Tube? I have several... I made my first Donald Duckifier when I was 13. My own design.)
At the age of 14, Frank Oppenheimer took an interest in me, and I spent a Summer designing and making things for his new Exploratorium, out of whatever was in the Parts Bins. Gotta fill the Bins. But with what?

For example, Quadcopters are a good alternative today. They crash regularly, and so repair parts are readily available. Parts that can be re-purposed. Cheap out-of-collimation Binoculars are full of interesting Optics, and Lasers are preposterously cheap compared to the days when we paid _$200_ for a small Ruby rod from Edmund's.
An old broken down Laser or Dot Matrix Printer is full of Electro-Mechano-Optical goodies. Parts is Parts. Some might call me a Pack-Rat. I prefer "Technology Archaeologist".

Of course, taking things apart takes some skill, but for every Tamper-Proof Screw, there is an Anti-Tamper-Proof Hammer, and optional accessories. This has been noticed at the National Labs; they often have Disassembly Fairs for Kids, and more than one Adult has been seen taking a Sledge Hammer to something too disinclined to be taken apart. (Wear Eye Protection, a step skipped in earlier decades.)

We don't need to go back to the "And Easy Hobbi-Games for Little Engineers, complete with Instructions. Oh, easy for Leonardo!" days, (Note the very appropriate quote for Today...), since every sensible Household should be full of broken Stuff, a decent selection of Tools, well laid out Storage, access to the Internet, and at least one mildly destructive Child. (I _hated_ those "300 In 1" Electronics kits. Too limiting, and after a while, I had a _much_ better selection of Parts.)

Santa was very good to this Little Engineer this Christmas. There were the Useful Presents, a Hawaiian Shirt, (In hideous taste...), a Sailing Jacket, a Waterford Biscuit Jar, an LCD Display Microscope, (I have a fairly well equipped Home Laboratory),... and then there were the Useless Presents- an old European Racing Bicycle with a busted Shifter, a Macbook Air Magsafe Power Supply whose DC Cable the Mice had gotten to, and a Tillerpilot, which acted much like the Wave Stabilizer used on the Queen Mary in that first week of April, 1958, and probably pretty much for the same reason.
I've already fixed the Magsafe: RG174 Coax; and I'll finish up the rest fairly soon.

Re:The Dumbing of America

[Minupla]

My (Canadian for the record, but who cares) 7 yr old daughter has been soldering since she was 4, was taught by some nice folks at the Defcon Hardware Hacking Village. So there are kids out there doing this stuff still, but it requires a bit more intent on behalf of the parents and the kids, because it is a bit counter culture now.

It's getting better tho. Groups like the defcon r00tz group, kids-targeting maker groups, etc, are rolling back the crazy a bit. If anyone can tell me where to buy a real chemistry kit, that'd be awesome.

And yes, she's been burnt by a soldering iron. We didn't sue the folks teaching her, and they pointed out to her they'd done the same thing a bunch of times. No big deal for any of us.

Min

Re:The Dumbing of America

[freeze128]

Yes, I had some erector sets as a child, but what was really neat was the RIVITRON set I had. It had plastic plates with holes in them, and a bunch of rubber rivets that were a teeny bit larger than the holes. You put the rivet on a tool that stretched it out so it would fit in the holes, and then released it so the rivet would expand, and secure the plates.

Sadly, it was recalled due to too many stupid kids swallowing the rivets and choking on them.

Re:The Dumbing of America

[Garble Snarky]

So you think nothing of technological significance has happened since the moon landings? You think there were no dumb people in the 40s and 50s?

Re:The Dumbing of America

[radarskiy]

from "Forgetfullness" by John W. Campbell (writing as Don A. Stuart)

"What are these people of Rhth?"

Ron Thule's voice was a whisper from the darkness. "I come from a far
world, by what strange freak we will not say. I am a savage, a rising
race that has not learned the secret of fire, nor bow, nor hammer. Tell
me, Shor Nun, what is the nature of the two dry sticks I must rub, that
fire may be born? Must they be hard, tough oak, or should one be a soft,
resinous bit of pine? Tell me how I may make fire."

"Why---with matches or a heat ra--- No, Ron Thule. Vague thoughts,
meaningless ideas and unclear. I---I have forgotten the ten thousand
generations of development. I cannot retreat to a level you, savage of an
untrained world, would understand. I---I have forgotten."

"Then tell me, how I must hold the flint, and where must I press with a
bit of deer horn that the chips shall fly small and even, so that the
knife will be sharp and kill my prey for me? And how shall I rub and wash
and treat the wood of the bow, or the skin of the slain animal that I may
have a coat that will not be stiff, but soft and pliable?"

"Those, too, I have forgotten. Those are unnecessary things. I cannot
help you, savage. I would greet you, and show you the relics of our
deserted past in museums. I might conduct you through ancient caves,
where mighty rock walls defended my ancestors against the wild things
they could not control.

"Yes, Ron Thule. I have forgotten the development."

"Once"---Ron Thule's voice was tense---"the city builder made atomic
generators to release the energy bound in that violent twist of space
called an atom. He made the sorgan to distribute its power to his clumsy
shells of metal and crystal---the caves that protected him from the wild
things of space.

"Seun has forgotten the atom; he thinks in terms of space. The powers of
space are at his direct command. He created the crystal that brought us
here from the energy of space, because it made easy a task his mind alone
could have done. It was no more needful than is an adding machine. His
people have no ships; they are anywhere in space they will without such
things. Seun is not a decadent son of the city builders. His people never
forgot the dream that built the city. But it was a dream of childhood,
and his people were children then. Like a child with his broomstick
horse, the mind alone was not enough for thought; the city builders, just
as ourselves, needed something of a solid metal and crystal, to make
their dreams tangible."

Re:The Dumbing of America

[Gim Tom]

There are several Amateur Radio clubs in this area that have classes in soldering and basic electronics for kids of all ages. In November at the largest convention (we call it a HamFest) in the state there was an area called "The Student Shack" where children from pre-school through junior high and beyond were able to learn to solder and build a simple circuit (LED flasher I think) that they could keep. There were also hands on exhibits of radio and communications technology from old restored mechanical Teletype machines (which were connected so that the kids could send them Text messages from their cell phones) to modern software defined radios and world wide digital communications technologies. The place was crowded with eager kids for both days of the event and was successful way beyond our expectations. Maybe there is some hope.

Re:The Dumbing of America

[Anonymous Coward]

Nowdays it is difficult to find lead biased solder that would melt at 300F now the lead free solder melts around 500F and the china made solder irons do not go that high

Bring back the TRS-80

[randomErr]

The TRS-80 and similar system have something no other system has:

* A simple DOS like system (Linux is just a steep learning curve)
* A solid Basic / JavaScript system at boot up
* Simple IO communications
* Easy hardware maintenance
* Self-contained system

Raspberry Pi is a step in the right direction but if something goes wrong I can't soldier in a new RAM chip or pull the processor. People really like a simple all-in-one unit. The wide range of choices and lack of uniformity makes it hard design a solid education program.

Re: Bring back the TRS-80

[bill_mcgonigle]

I got the boy a Kinoma Create - it hooks up to WiFi and he'll be using the Google block language on his Chromebook to get started (he's been using Lightbot to get the idea). There was also a GoPiGo under the tree for his next step.

Re:Bring back the TRS-80

[aquabat]

Yeah, DOS was a great thing to learn on because it was simple and useful at the same time.

tldr: wah, I want the '80s back.

Say what you want about DOS, but it was simple enough that, as a teenager, I could read the printed OS manual and understand almost everything it could do. It was a great way to graduate from the VIC-20 at home and the TRS-80s at school, into "real" computers, whatever the hell that means. So when someone at University introduced me to Slackware and ftp.cdrom.com back in '95, I was already primed to deal with that particular learning curve.

I think that simplicity is key to successful skill aquisition. It lets you ramp up the learning curve in bite size chunks. With the VIC, I got to deal with big connectible components, like the Datasette, the RF modulator, power connectors, cartridges, etc. I learned that you have to always turn off and unplug before switching cartridges if you don't want to blow a fuse (ask me how I know this). I also learned how to take apart a VIC-20 and identify, purchase, and change a fuse. And there used to be all kinds of interesting things in Radio Shack to look at, besides all those fuses. Like the Tandy computers at the front of the store, running Shamus. Already having experience with the TRS-80 model 1's and model 3's at my junior high school made me feel like an expert when I sat down at these and played away my after school time. I lusted after these machines, or even just a floppy drive of my own for the VIC, but they were financially unattainable.

So yeah, simple, but usefulness is also necessary. Turtle Graphics in grade nine was boring as hell, because all you could do with it was move the cursor around on the screen. But with BASIC, you could write an actual game that other people could play. I devoured everything I could find in print on programming BASIC. I got, by specific request, the VIC-20 Programmer's Reference guide for my 13'th birthday (my parents must have thought I was nuts) and the Usborne programming books were solid gold. Again, I think it was important that the programming environment of these computers was simple enough that an interested kid could digest and apply the information available. And there were tons of games for them, so you had examples of what was possible. These systems were more than generic computing tools; they came with really good educational documentation, and there was a significant ecosystem around them geared to that end as well.

I remember in high school, seeing MS-DOS 5.0 for the first time, and the paradigm shift that happened when I realized that BASIC wasn't the computer, but rather just another program on a disk. It was sort of all there already on the Tandy, but it didn't really click in my head until I experienced that bare command prompt. This is where I found the aforementioned printed DOS manual. I would sneak into the lab after school and mess around with reinstalling DOS on a bare 10MB hard drive (which I didn't know was a thing, before then). God, I loved fdisk, and all those extra flags on the "format" command. So yeah, there was that second paradigm shift, when I grokked that the OS itself was just another program on a disk. The computer was now interconnected component hardware and the BIOS screen. Too cool. I also brought a screwdriver to school and spent an unauthorized weekend locked in the lab, taking apart and reassembling a couple of the computers. Luckily, they never figured out who burned that one motherboard by forgetting to unplug the video cable from the live monitor.

When I went to University, I was already pretty comfortable with assembling hardware and installing DOS from floppies. Without this, I think linux would have defeated me, or at least taken me more time than I had to spare after classes. A buddy and I spent all night in the Physics Reading Room ftp'ing Slackware onto fifty-seven 1.44Mb floppy disks, and then a couple more nights in his basement installing it onto a partition of his Cyrix 386SLC2 based PC. I remember being blown away on th

Re:Bring back the TRS-80

[nascentmind]

There is world outside of Raspberry Pi. You can always buy the MSP430 with IC's in DIP package. Burn one of the GPIO's, no problem. Remove the IC from the DIP and a put a new one costing really really less.($1 or $2) I suppose. Buy a cartridge of them and you are good to go. You can blink LED's, write your own baremetal OS etc. The tools are also good with gnu tools also available.

Re:Bring back the TRS-80

[metaforest]

I'm actually developing a system that returns to the fundamentals because I'd like to see kids get experience developing code and hardware that they can actually get their heads around.

32 bit core... could be ARM or MIPs doesn't matter, simple core is best NO fancy SoCs...
Simple I/O subsystem to ease understanding and enhance hacking.
1 FPGA to support the custom 'OG' video system that allows [Vic-20/C-64/ATARI/Amiga]-like hacking of 1080P with cheap(ish) hardware.
Tokenized BASIC, VB-style, with support for external functions a full 2-pass macro assembler (for said external functions)
CLI with disk/system operations.
An old school expansion bus using modern low cost connectors.
Prototype version will replace the motherboard in a TRS-80 Mod 100, TRS-80 Mod 102, or NEC PC8201A
Eventually it will have its own case and form factor.

All of it as open source as possible.

donations to Apple's new campus

[Anonymous Coward]

My kids each got their own 13" Macbook Air.

What they don't know is that they're going to get Raspberry Pi Zero's when availability improves, a pile of robotics components, and some age/context appropriate literature on Python.

Woo Hoo and Merry Christmas!

[Irate Engineer]

I'm an Irate Erection Engineer!

Gamepads

[Anonymous Coward]

2 sons (8 and 9) received usb gamepads. They have no console, but they like video gaming with friends. Now they have the means. But first they must learn:
How to load an OS onto their SD card.
How to boot my Raspberry Pi.
How to download, compile, install, and run a SNES emulator.

So we're a linux family.

Re: Gamepads

[Anonymous Coward]

Who built the Pi for them? I don't see very many creative, intuitive hardware / mechanical / chemical engineers in the pipeline.

Kano

[Anonymous Coward]

Santa brought a Kano for my five year old today am hoping that will help her to learn.

Dot and Dash were put to bed

[Anonymous Coward]

My 6 year old just tucked her two robots, Dot & Dash, in and wished them good night. These two robots are made available by Wonder Workshop. These robots can be programmed to play a recording. Dash can move. They have an interface to legos and even have a kit to play a xylepho. Can be programmed using a version of MIT's Scratch.

Truly

[JustNiz]

I'm also one of us that remember dicking about with electronics and designing/building/programming early computers at home...
That culture of exploration seems to have died with us.
I have a 10 year old son. Neither him or any of his friends or school mates are interested in anything that isn't completely pre-packaged, comes with full instructions, and is 100% convenient. If anything requires any creative thinking or even any slight effort on his part, it just gets left unfinished in a drawer.
Sadly I think thanks to the sick liberal values in society and promoted by mass media, this level of laziness and total absence of scientific curiosity is completely typical of the current generation of at least middle class US kids now, and simple market demand explains the complete lack of electronic sets, chemistry sets etc in toy stores these days.

Re: Truly

[rfengr]

Sounds similar to my kids. They like to build stuff with dad, but don't have the initiative to explore and screw around that I had at that age. I think one issue is that it take a lot to duplicate, for example, a simple iPad game. Whereas I grew up playing Zork, and wrote my own text adventures (convoluted GOTO and GOSUB) in basic, which to me seemed like an achievement since it looked similar. Or, getting a robot to shoot a laser across the screen on my C64 as a tried to make a robotron type game. It was cool to a 10 year old. That can't b done these days without a lot more effort.

Re:Truly

[kheldan]

I understand exactly what you're talking about. When I was 15 years old I was designing and building expansions for the CDP1802 microprocessor trainer from the 1976 Popular Electronics article, adding a BASIC interpreter to it, extra RAM, serial interface, and fixing an old Teletype to use as a terminal and data storage device (paper tape). These days the most adventurous ones think that Arduino means they understand electronics, and meanwhile they couldn't build a crystal radio to save their lives because it's not digital -- and they think that anything with analog circuitry is not worth bothering with. Little do they know.. Meanwhile there are more and more so-called 'conveniences', which I see as just serving to make people even lazier than they already are (so-called 'self-driving' cars, for instance) and providing a disincentive to actually learn anything (or retain anything they learn). Instead of being a country full of innovators, we're becoming a 'service economy', and just garden-variety consumers. Seriously, I fear for the future.

Re:Truly

[hambone142]

We built match rockets. I do agree that video crap has mostly ruined curiosity from children. In my day, "getting bored" actually stimulated creativity. Now it is replaced with meaningless time wasting.

Re:Truly

[feufeu]

Anyone has tried to think why this is so ? My 2 cts FWIW:

I think that the world today is so much more commercialized than it was when we were kids (I'm born in the early 70's) and the whole show only works with ever expanding market volumes. Which implies that the tinkering kid is not as nearly a good consumer as the one who never gets beyond the next and the next unboxing event of some premade stuff. And some of us are even shareholders of that economy... In short, we all are much more consumers than we were a few decades ago.

A lot of stuff gets passed down from one generation to another also, which means that my kids would have had a nice collection of Legos even without ever getting a gift on their own. Now add to that what is to be foud under the christmas tree. There's too much stuff around to get bored.

I try to teach the kids to screw around with stuff, to make them understand that a bicycle from that thrash that we've fixed is so much better than a new one etc. but it's hard when those bloody grandparents come along with yet another gift...

Re:Truly

[sjames]

I actually see some potential with Arduino, but the kids may need to be lead beyond the IDE and the libraries. It actually reminds me a bit of the old days with the C64. It has less RAM, but you have 32K for program memory. Back in the day, if I could have afforded to blow up the C64 and have a new one in days (or on the shelf just in case) I would have done even more with it.

The datasheet for the 328p is excellent and a careful read shows a good bit of functionality not offered in the Arduino libraries.

That doesn't get you to analog yet, but it provides a good base to start from. There's a lot of interesting things you can do with it if you add some analog support circuitry.

Re:Truly

[bungo]

Sadly I think thanks to the sick liberal values in society and promoted by mass media

Maybe.... or maybe it's just your son and his friends.

My Son 12 yr old asked me for a soldering iron for his birthday. He now tries to fix any electronics that are broken. He pulled apart a Christmas penguin (with internal led lights) and tried to get it working again.

He took the iron and some other tools to school to show his friends, so his friends have some level of interest as well.

For Christmas I got him a number of soldering kits from Maker Shed http://www.makershed.com/ , as well as a couple of Arduino boards.

Re: Truly

[Anonymous Coward]

Sometimes these genes skip a generation

Re:Truly

[kheldan]

There's a lot of interesting things you can do with it if you add some analog support circuitry.

Yes, but: All I ever see is kids using it like Legos; they buy pieces and snap them together, and they think that's all there is to electronics, is snapping pre-made pieces together, which really isn't true. The same kids struggle to figure out how to light an LED without burning it up. I usually recommend to them that they at least go buy kits to assemble that will potentially teach them some basic electronics, or at least go build a crystal radio from scratch, because there's all sorts basic theory you learn even from doing that, and you get a device that does something anyone can understand that way. Some take my advice, some stubbornly stick to the incorrect notion that you can't do anything of value with less than a microcontroller.

Re: Truly

[corychristison]

My six year old son has expressed interest in taking things a part to see how they work.

It started over a year ago when I had to replace the screen on my Nexus 4 phone. Since then he is pretty interested in electronics and wants to know more about what is inside. Some of things he makes with lego (old fashioned, plain jane lego, none of the Kinects or whatever they are called) is rather impressive. He shows creativity with a nack for functionality... reminds me a lot of myself when I was younger.

I think the next step is Mecco (that's what we call Erector sets in Canada). But not the kid friendly crap. I've been trying to f

Re:Truly

[Anonymous Coward]

For fucks sake, there is no such thing as ''a Lego'', so there can't be several ''Legos''.

Still, at least you didn't put an e or an apostrophe. Or both.

Re: Truly

[corychristison]

(Accidentally hit the Submit button. Touchscreens...)

I've been trying to find a source for big lots of Meccano but I can't seem to find much more than the simple 3-in-1 kits with very few parts and too many instructions.

Amazon has some bigger kits, but they are either stupidly expensive, or dont ship to Canada... rather frustrating.

Re:Truly

[sjames]

Get 'em a few pro-minis, a breadboard and assorted parts and a soldering iron. They'll need the iron just to get header pins on the mini so they can use it with the breadboard. Show them how to de-solder the pad that disconnects the regulator so they can run it on a LiIon battery such as an 18650. (they will get better results if they set the clock divider to get 8MHz operation). Perhaps also get them one of the Unos with the socketed DIP so they can pull the AVR and use it to program the mini over USB.

It will take some guidance, but it's not hard to gently introduce the analog world using an RC circuit and the DIO threshold for timers and touch sensors. To be fair, a lot of professional design these days also seems to focus on just enough analog circuitry to support digital. The key point is that guidance is required.

It didn't take so much guidance in our day since there was little option but analog circuits if we wanted anything to do with electronics. Beyond a full adder, the component count for digital was huge but a crystal radio only needed a child's handful of parts.

Re:Truly

[JustNiz]

Its an American thing. Wierdly they seem to feel the need to additionally pluralise the word Lego. As a Brit living in the US, the first time I heard it called "Legos" sounded ignorant to me, until I realised its cultural so I gave up worrying about it.

Re:Truly

[JustNiz]

Unfortunately I think your kid is rare enough to be considered an anomaly these days.
Looking around at our culture, I honestly wonder where the next generation of "natural" engineers will come from. Sadly almost certainly not the US.

Re:Truly

[Stickybombs]

Exactly how us Americans feel about Brits' pluralizing of Math, into Maths :D

Re:Truly

[JustNiz]

Again the Americans are wrong.
One doesn't say "I'm learning mathematic", the correct form is "I'm learning mathematics".Since clearly mathematics is a plural, the proper contraction is maths, not math.

TRS-80

[Anonymous Coward]

They would still learn a lot more with one of these than a modern PC with all its distractions and focus that isn't programmer-centric.

Alfred Morgan

[Anonymous Coward]

Go search for BOYS' [First, Second, Third, Fourth] BOOK OF RADIO & ELECTRONICS by Morgan.

A lot of us get our start that way, and there is no reason someone couldn't write a similar, inspiring set of books today. Dangerous experiments like those described made us who we are.

Bah, humbug...

[__aaclcg7560]

As a child I wanted an Erector Set. My parents gave me Lincoln Logs instead. My childhood was ruined.

Re: Bah, humbug...

[rfengr]

Meh, I did get one, but the fucking motor did not work, and I really wanted to build the elevator. Turned me off to erector sets. Had more fun blowing up capacitors and melting wire with a battery charger.

Re: Bah, humbug...

[Anonymous Coward]

Kids. No interest in taking that motor apart and fixing it, just expecting it to work! ;-)

Look, not busting your cops, really, but if someone had posted that their kid's didn't work and the kid didn't immediately try and fix it, all the dinosaurs around here would lament it.

Re: Bah, humbug...

[rfengr]

Ah, but I did take that motor apart, and the armature unwound. I was 6.

Re: Bah, humbug...

[Anonymous Coward]

(original AC here) Very cool! That's a lot of wire, ain't it?

Re: Bah, humbug...

[__aaclcg7560]

I took apart an old car radio with vacuum tubes when I was five or so. Needless to say, it was a shocking experience. My mother was always amazed that I made it out of childhood without electrocuting myself.

Hate em

[goombah99]

I dislike snap circuits because the block units tend to roll up too much of the complexity making them more magical and less electrical. I liked my ancient electronics kit that had discrete components with springs that clamped the wires you used to make connections. What was good about that was you could make errors or try shorting things out or removing things and see what changed. Plus they included some fun stuff like high voltage shock circuits you could build.

Now the thing is I could be wrong about preferring discrete components. These days no one at all builds analoc circuits from scratch. You want a thermometer, well no worries, no need to bias a themistor or measure the voltage on a reversed biased junction. No just buy a thermometer chip with an SPI data bus and connect 3 wires to your arduino. Simple! And absurdly that hideously complex way of making a thermometer turns out to be cheaper and easier than the discrete component approach. No need ot learn any analog electronics.

SO maybe I'm just old fashioned in liking discrete components. kids won't ever use that stuff, the magic bits will all be rolled up for them into block elements they can snap together on their SPI bus.

Re:Hate em

[AmiMoJo]

I've used thermistors in s few products this year. They are great for things like monitoring battery packs during charging, because they are small enough to get right where you want to measure and extremely cheap. Micros have plenty of analogue inputs these days so a dedicated chip is a lavish expense.

Adafruit has a tutorial and example code for using a thermistor with an Arduino. The Arduino is a good starter platform, as it's easy to connect analogue stuff to and get results from.

Re:Hate em

[Hognoxious]

Thermisters? See, even the names of basic components are designed to perpetuate the male domination of STEM fields.

Start a campaign the rename them thermadams. Start it now!

Re:Hate em

[Ol Olsoc]

Thermisters? See, even the names of basic components are designed to perpetuate the male domination of STEM fields.

Start a campaign the rename them thermadams. Start it now!

No no! you see, that was a mistake, probably made by a testosterone fueld member of the patriarchy. We shal correct it, so that is like the others:

Transisters, resisters, so we march on to remove sexist names, and replace them with ....other sexist names?

side note - working with some female technicians, there are some awkward moments when dealing with male and female sockets and plugs. Though most of the ladies would get it out of the way by talking about the gender early on.

And let's not forget the learning verse for the color codes of resistors!

Bad

Boys

Rape

Our

Young

Girls

But

Violet

Gives

Willingly

for

Gold

or

Silver

Cannot believe my electronics instructor used that one. It was the 70's for certain, but sheesh.

Re:Hate em

[Anonymous Coward]

I was taught the same in the late-90s. The new hires we get now have no idea how to read resistors, but in a work setting I can't teach them...

Re:Hate em

[gzuckier]

Thermisters? See, even the names of basic components are designed to perpetuate the male domination of STEM fields.

Start a campaign the rename them thermadams. Start it now!

No no! you see, that was a mistake, probably made by a testosterone fueld member of the patriarchy. We shal correct it, so that is like the others:

Transisters, resisters, so we march on to remove sexist names, and replace them with ....other sexist names?

side note - working with some female technicians, there are some awkward moments when dealing with male and female sockets and plugs. Though most of the ladies would get it out of the way by talking about the gender early on.

And let's not forget the learning verse for the color codes of resistors!

Bad

Boys

Rape

Our

Young

Girls

But

Violet

Gives

Willingly

for

Gold

or

Silver

Cannot believe my electronics instructor used that one. It was the 70's for certain, but sheesh.

Remember when I first learned that code, i ended up in the hospital for a week after trying to decode the value of a coral snake.

Re:Hate em

[metaforest]

I just learned it by rote... there was no mnemonic in my basic electronics class in high school.

Bk Br R O Y Gn Bl P Gy W (Gd / S)

And the other common color sequence learned by rote:

o/w O g/w BL bl/w G br/w BR.

A Progression of Toys...

[Anonymous Coward]

...a progression of professions. Start with an erector set, but mechanical engineers are the lowest paid engineers. Progress to simple electronic kits, but electrical engineering is a dying profession. Get a Raspberry Pi, but all software is now offshored. Sell all those used kits; now, sales is a lasting profession.

Erector is Meccano

[tepples]

Erector, perhaps; what about Meccano?

Last time I checked (two minutes ago), Erector products were made by Meccano.

Re: Erector is Meccano

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but "Erector Set" evokes the civil engineering sets, not the more refined mechanical sets originated by Meccano.

Re:Erector is Meccano

[gzuckier]

Erector, perhaps; what about Meccano?

Last time I checked (two minutes ago), Erector products were made by Meccano.

only in the US
growing up in canada, we were lucky to be exposed to both erector (the real ones, from gilbert company) and meccano. plus all the gilbert science kits with their little bottles of cyanide and pitchblende and whatnot, as well as the british science kits with their mysterious "spirit lamp" labeled "fill with paraffin".

Wow so many Slashdotters are out of touch

[breakspirit]

From reading these comments, it really seems like most of you haven't been in a toy store in decades. I can assure you that there are tons of science-based toys on the market. Definitely way more now than there were when I was a kid in the 80s. I know lots of kids that are super interested in science and getting down and dirty with real technical learning. Sure, plenty of kids these days are glued to cell phones, but technical kids have always been and will always be the minority in society. Trust me, American children aren't as fucked up as Slashdotters seem to think.

When I was a kid, we had stores, not online market

[Anonymous Coward]

When I was a kid, we had stores, not online marketplaces...

Re:When I was a kid, we had stores, not online mar

[feufeu]

Yeah, and no seatbelts in the back seat. And leaded fuel. Bring back the good ole days !

Arduino beginner's set

[GNious]

My Xmas wish-list this year was basically an Arduino starter's set (Arduino, breadboard, various LEDs and other components), in the hope that kids and I could have fun together trying to build stuff.

Re:Arduino beginner's set

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't. And you're a horrible parent for forcing your frustrated aspirations on your kids.

LEGO Mindstorms

[jonwil]

For kids who are into robotics (or parents who want to get their kids interested in robotics) LEGO Mindstorms is a good place to start.

Its easy to assemble, usable with all the other LEGO bricks out there and easy to program with the LEGO supplied development environment.

Plus the programmable brick runs Linux under the hood and every single thing running on the brick itself is open source (as far as I know anyway). The brick even has bluetooth for talking to the outside world.

Re:LEGO Mindstorms

[Anonymous Coward]

Help convince LEGO to produce "Lovelace and Babbage" play set / Raspberry Pi case https://ideas.lego.com/projects/102740

my list

[cellocgw]

Let's see...
First electric train (Lionel) at age 6; played with trains almost daily for years. First Estes rocket at age 13 (I think); with Erector sets in between (temporally). I enjoyed the pace and care required to build balsa& tissue paper model aircraft -- which I then flew with the usual semidestructive results.

My latest (gift from child this Xmas) is the ThinkGeek solar-powered marble kinetic sculpture kit. I hope I never lose the enjoyment of building stuff.

What's the deal...

[CanadianMacFan]

Why is everyone trying to force kids into a certain path? I know this article doesn't do that but does talk about wanting to introduce programming in the education system.

How about introducing children to a wide range of activities and then encourage the ones that they like? Not everything has to lead into a career. Let children have some fun. Maybe what they discover will turn into a hobby. Maybe it will just be some fun. It could make them some friends. Or they could possibly find their calling.

Winston Chuchill

[braindrainbahrain]

There is an apocryphal story that Winston Churchill enjoyed playing with Erector set as a boy. While he did not become an engineer, he was technically astute enough to push for the development of the tank during World War I, and later the development of code breaking and radar during World War II.

Re:Winston Chuchill

[Anonymous Coward]

Very apocryphal. Churchill was in his 20s when the first mechanical engineering construction sets for boys were developed. He was born in 1874, while Meccano was conceived by Frank Hornby in 1898 and patented as "Mechanics Made Easy" in 1901. At this date Churchill had recently returned from his role as a correspondent for the Morning Post in South Africa during the Second Boer War and had entered Parliament as the MP for Oldham.

Erector Sets were largely copied from Meccano and appeared in 1913.

Churchill was a cavalry officer, a newspaper correspondent, a historian and a politician. He had no "interest" in mathematics, science or technology. The interest in the tank was as a means to reduce casualties on the British side, the development of codebreaking and RDF were means to an end, decisions being made on the advice of trusted advisors.

Re:Winston Chuchill

[Anonymous Coward]

Meccano (what you Americans call an Erector Set) dates back to 1898, but Winston Churchill was born in 1874. He was already three years into military service when Meccano appeared. Frank Hornby basically invented all the core ideas in Meccano so it's unlikely there was an earlier toy. Churchill wasn't an academic or a deep thinker, but he rejected classical thinking.

Churchill's real organisational strength was the belief that he needed all the smart people he could get, and had to fund any project with the slightest chance of a deliverable. Radar came from that. His belief that the First World War needed mechanisation came, as I recall reading at least, from his general modernity and his experience of bitter, brutal defeat against enemies using swords and killing up close.

Re:Winston Chuchill

[braindrainbahrain]

I did a little search about Churchill. Seems the anecdotal story about Churchill and Mecanno is out there but I surmise it all began with this story included in one of his biographies, "The Last Lion:: Winston Churchill" by Martin Gilbert. The story is about how he helped his young nephews to assemble a Mecanno bridge, which ended up being 15 feet long once he was finished.

Re:Winston Chuchill

[Anonymous Coward]

You notice that anything pointing out that Erector was pretty much a copy of Meccano isn't appreciated much hereabouts? In many ways, the US in the 19th and up to the mid-20th centuries had the same respect for intellectual property rights as China has today.

Always the victims

[Anonymous Coward]

And while President Obama lamented last year that kids — including his own — were done a disservice by an educational system that failed to introduce computer science concepts 'with the ABCs and the colors',

Always the victim. Always lamenting and bitter. It was the educational system's fault, not his or Michelle's. The concept of personal responsibility simply does not exist for these people.

Re:Always the victims

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like you think you're the victim here...

Re:Always the victims

[rochrist]

Or just an asshole.

Re:When I was a kid, we had stores, not online mar

[Anonymous Coward]

You could get seat belts for cars since 1945. They were a factory option for Nash in 1949 and Ford in 1955. Maybe your parents didn't love you enough to buy rear seat belts?

Who needs analog? WE DO!

[Announcer]

This story is based on real life events. A small company I was working for was bought-out by another small, but out-of-state electronics company. The new owners were well versed in bit-banging and CPU. My former company was 99% analog. We used op amps and R/C circuits for timing/filtering. They used code on CPU's. The new owners flew me out to their facility on three different weeks, to help their staff incorporate this whole new product line into theirs.

One interesting discussion I had with them involved creating a 0.5 second power-on reset signal for a USB interface chip, to allow the rest of the unit to "settle" before bringing up the USB interface. One guy said he'd just use a little 8-pin CPU and some code. I suggested an op-amp, some resistors, and a cap. They looked at me like I had two heads.

I reminded them that because these devices were intended to be used in environments with high levels of radio frequency energy, and high sensitivity receivers, (transceivers) RFI ingress and egress were important! The op amp and R/C circuits were virtually RF immune, and generated NONE. A CPU generates some, and is sensitive to RF.

Case-in-point: They had a high-current, DC switching system (multiple DC power ports that could be controlled remotely) that was driving them completely bonkers, because of random resets or other unpredictable behavior when they switched loads on and off. When I tried to explain current loops and grounding, they again looked at me like I had two heads. One even said, "But isn't ground, just GROUND??" (Insert FACEPALM here!)

I had to briefly explain OHM'S LAW to them! Ground planes have a measurable (albeit small) resistance, and when you are passing a dozen amps or more, you start to see dozens of millivolts from the E=IR drops... sometimes, switching spikes were high enough to false-trigger CPU inputs or other circuits, because the CPU was "riding" up and down on those voltages! When I showed them one of our old ANALOG designs, with separated ground paths... and explained WHY those paths were separate... I think they finally "got it". Their next complete redesign didn't have the issues of the first.

I summed it up by saying, "It is an ANALOG WORLD, guys!" ;)

Re:Who needs analog? WE DO!

[Hognoxious]

I'm not an EE, but I'm at least peripherally aware of all that stuff you said.

I'm somewhat baffled about why the takeover wasn't the other way round.

Re:Who needs analog? WE DO!

[Anonymous Coward]

Because for how much analog is still important, as in all the examples he provided, you can still make faster and more flexible products if you understand and incorporate digital methods. Our products use digital in-the-loop of the control systems - replacing what once would have been done with analog filters and op amps - and as a result our bandwidth, step response, output impedance, etc. are all user programmable. They're just numbers in the control algorithm I wrote. The analog guys still have to get clean measurements to the ADC and the DAC output to the load, and that's still very important and rather complicated, but to customers all of that stuff "just works" like it did on the boxes they bought in the 1970s or 80s, while the features I provide win us their new business.

Re:Who needs analog? WE DO!

[Announcer]

Because my former boss wanted to sell. He was ready to retire.

The products we made are very reliable, solid, and well-made. He always had high standards, and insisted that any 3'rd party suppliers met those standards before he would accept their products. The new owner is keeping up that tradition.

To answer another comment, the NEED for using analog was primarily for radio frequency energy issues.

Re:Who needs analog? WE DO!

[Hognoxious]

Nothing to do with analog being better.

Rather, it seemed the people from the parent company are totally lacking in general knowledge and common sense.

They probably suck at reading comprehension too.

Re:Who needs analog? WE DO!

[gzuckier]

This story is based on real life events. A small company I was working for was bought-out by another small, but out-of-state electronics company. The new owners were well versed in bit-banging and CPU. My former company was 99% analog. We used op amps and R/C circuits for timing/filtering. They used code on CPU's. The new owners flew me out to their facility on three different weeks, to help their staff incorporate this whole new product line into theirs.

One interesting discussion I had with them involved creating a 0.5 second power-on reset signal for a USB interface chip, to allow the rest of the unit to "settle" before bringing up the USB interface. One guy said he'd just use a little 8-pin CPU and some code. I suggested an op-amp, some resistors, and a cap. They looked at me like I had two heads.

I reminded them that because these devices were intended to be used in environments with high levels of radio frequency energy, and high sensitivity receivers, (transceivers) RFI ingress and egress were important! The op amp and R/C circuits were virtually RF immune, and generated NONE. A CPU generates some, and is sensitive to RF.

Case-in-point: They had a high-current, DC switching system (multiple DC power ports that could be controlled remotely) that was driving them completely bonkers, because of random resets or other unpredictable behavior when they switched loads on and off. When I tried to explain current loops and grounding, they again looked at me like I had two heads. One even said, "But isn't ground, just GROUND??" (Insert FACEPALM here!)

I had to briefly explain OHM'S LAW to them! Ground planes have a measurable (albeit small) resistance, and when you are passing a dozen amps or more, you start to see dozens of millivolts from the E=IR drops... sometimes, switching spikes were high enough to false-trigger CPU inputs or other circuits, because the CPU was "riding" up and down on those voltages! When I showed them one of our old ANALOG designs, with separated ground paths... and explained WHY those paths were separate... I think they finally "got it". Their next complete redesign didn't have the issues of the first.

I summed it up by saying, "It is an ANALOG WORLD, guys!" ;)

indeed. the difference between a hack and a talent is the ability to accept nonideal behavior from whatever it is you work with.

Electronics, the new Erector Set.

[kyubre]

I've four sons, aged 8 to 28. They each got an Arduino powered kit from Sparkfun.com. After gifts where opened, and appetites satiated, we all spent several hours in my home lab learning how to solder, troubleshoot and eventually change the software running to power their boards ( a mix of a Simon Says game and digital alarm clocks).

I remembered building miniature bulldozers and tanks with my dad out of our Erector Sets and then having "pulling" contest to see who had the best design. I enjoyed my boys jesting about who could make the most useful mod to their kit.

Over the years, Erector Sets gave way to Kinnex, and Kinnex gave way to video games, But our ability as parents to ignite creativity has never changed, only our commitment to do so.

Spirograph and gyroscopes

[n3rdb0y]

One of my brothers was bemused by the fact that his iPad/gaming obsessed kids spent most of the day playing with low tech toys I got them (Spirograph, gyroscopes, mecanno set, football etc) and not with the various electronic games etc they had got them. It was more to help them do something different than stare at screens all day, use their imaginations and have fun in a different way.

Re: Snap Circuits disappointment

[Chaset]

Ditto here. The wife got the grandparent to get it for the kids. It is a bit of a disappointment. I wish it at least had a couple of different resistor values, a few caps, and maybe a discrete transistor or two. In terms of documentation for the "IC" blocks, the manual did contain some description, and the PDF on their web site contains the internal circuit diagram (well, sort of. The inside of their custom ICs are still "black box".) I had one of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... as a kid. It was wonderful. I wish my folks didn't get rid of it after I moved out. My brother had one o these http://cba.sakura.ne.jp/ex/mx1..., which I inherited after he moved on to bigger and better things. Both of those beat the pants off of snap circuits.

Legos and Wooden Trains

[Anonymous Coward]

These make up the majority of my son's toy "box". I am amazed at how much variety there is even with the wooden tracks even though they pretty much limit to 2-D vs. Lego's 3-D.

I started out designing the tracks, moved on to building what he asked for, and now he only needs me for assistance in the most intricate tracks.

I am really excited for when he starts to bring his own ideas to life with Legos.

The closest he has gotten to programming thus far is the robot turtles game. However, I don't believe this has in any way put him at a disadvantage. The same sort of problem solving he is learning through the toys I played with as a kid won't hold him back. One of the greatest things I learned was confidence that I could build anything I imagined.

The Man Who Save Christmas

[tmjva]

IMDb entry germane.

DON'T Bring back the TRS-80

[Anonymous Coward]

Raspberry Pi is a step in the right direction but if something goes wrong...

Nothing goes wrong with the Raspberry pi, it just "goes". If you smash it with a hammer you buy a new one for $5.
Don't dumb it down and them complain that it was dumbed down.

science kits

[gzuckier]

there's still lots of science kits available at places like michael's which have lots of hands on: rock tumbling, astronomy, whatever. astronomy is particularly good, because a talented and ambitious and diligent (and/or just lucky) kid can still make actual discoveries just like a tenured prof.

Re:When I was a kid, we had stores, not online mar

[gzuckier]

When I was a kid, we had stores, not online marketplaces...

when i was a kid my major metropolitan area was still a one horse town so i bought all this stuff via mail order, which is just like amazon but slower.

LitteBits, Strawbees, BareConductive, Roominate

[Anonymous Coward]

LittleBits are phenomenal and have nearly no limit for growth. However i would say they have to be at least the age of a young teen to get much out of it. Younger then that Legos. Strawbees are good for any age and are incredibly safe and easy to replace. Bareconductive is great cause it allows kids to literally draw circuits onto paper and build a house of paper, push buttons and leds. Little girls can do anything boys can, but if you've got a little girl and are having a hard time getting her interested in engineering, try Roominate. Roominate is a set of educational toys aimed specifically at girls and created by two aweomse women with Stanford Masters degrees.