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Google Launches 'Project Bloks' Toys To Teach Kids To Code (thenextweb.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the learning-experience dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Google has launched a hardware project dubbed 'Project Bloks' to help teach kids how to code. There are three components to the learning experience: Brain Board, Base Boards, and Pucks. The Brain Board features a processing unit that is based off of Raspberry Pi Zero, which controls and provides power to the rest of the connected components. It does also interact with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth devices. The Base Boards are connective units that let users design instruction flows. Finally, the Pucks are the components you interact with. They're shaped with switches, arrows, buttons, dials and more, and can be programmed to turn things on or off, move avatars, play music, and more. What's neat is you can record instructions from multiple pucks into a single one. Some of them can be made with simple, inexpensive materials like paper with conductive ink. You can watch the official introduction video on YouTube. Google did release a subsequent video about the project called "Developing on Project Bloks."

54 comments

  1. Somehow these things look super fragile by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I doubt they will survive long exposure to young children.

  2. Well... by EmeraldBot · · Score: 1

    Judging by the name, it certainly looks like children were involved in the design process. Aside from my snarky remark, I'm not really impressed. If you've ever worked with those old 1000-in-1 electronic kits, you've done pretty much what they show here, hell, probably much more. Even if this didn't emulate a toy we've already had for ages, there are so many products marketed towards kids entering programming, and none of them seem to have really taken off at all. Lego Mindstorms has probably been the most successful of them all, but even then it's not something I've see many kids using, mostly adults actually. Google has a really bad record of throwing an overhyped (and overused, sometimes) idea into an oversaturated market, and it doesn't look like anything's changed today :/

    And let's be honest, this is probably going to silently abandoned two years from now and it'll never grace Slashdot again.

    --
    "Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
    1. Re:Well... by prelelat · · Score: 1

      I don't think it's like the 1000-in-one type kits. t's quite a bit different, though you did point out something it's exactly like, Lego Mindstorm. It's no different than that. As for if this will take off or not? Well google is heavily used in the classroom for education in north america, and I could see that being leveraged to expand education programming for this. Schools love lego mindstorm and this seems like a step to overtake that market. I don't see anyone buying it really for home use, as a gift really but in school they will eat that up.

    2. Re:Well... by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Yep. The core problem is that only very few kids are interested in coding and these usually find that interest as teenagers, not before. Hence this is just as futile as all the other "teach everybody and their dog how to code" projects. While there is strong indication at least a large part of the industry behind this wants cheaper coders (and completely misses that this would be really, really bad coders), the individuals driving this just seem to be fundamentally ignorant about the realities of who can learn what. Coding, mathematics, advanced engineering, etc. are not things many people can learn and that is not going to change. You have to bring too much in talent and motivation to the table for these things.

      So essentially, this is just another stupid hype.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    3. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      though you did point out something it's exactly like, LEGO MINDSTORMS. It's no different than that.

      FTFY

    4. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bringing a product to market is difficult no matter who you are.

      Suggesting something is going to fail is easy. Putting something out there in a market full of failures, that's difficult.

      You're probably right, but I'd rather do something interesting and fail than stand by the sidelines predicting failures.

    5. Re:Well... by rgbscan · · Score: 1

      They are almost a direct rip off of "littleBits" which have been out for a couple of years.

  3. Modular Robotics Blocks by dslauson · · Score: 1

    They have something like this at the Denver Museums of Nature and Science robotics exhibit. It's these, actually.

    The focus is more on electronics and robotics than logical structure, but similar. They were very fun to play with. My kids spent most of their time at that station.

  4. I want my C bak by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "One of the cool things about tangible coding is you have kids who can't read or write yet, and dyslexic kids who can..."

    Then name the fucking thing Project Blocks, and stop fcuking wtih teh enlirhs language!

    1. Re:I want my C bak by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm just dyslexic enough to read the name as "Cock Blocks".

      No thanks.

  5. finally, i can code by turkeydance · · Score: 1

    potty-training still needs some work, though

  6. LOL by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm still LOLing at the Europeans even today, most of whom are mourning the first of many nations to leave the EU. It's a matter of time before the rest of the EU fails, too. I'm so thankful for being a Canadian, because we are smarter and better than the Europeans and Americans. Unlike the United States and most of Europe, Canada is not a failed state. Look for Canada to become the dominant power as China sinks deeper into recession, the United States spirals downward in decay, and the EU breaks apart at the seams. I really wonder if Civilization V will include the effects of the decay of the United States and EU and the rise of Canada as the world's dominant superpower.

    I know the European and American moderators won't like hearing this and will quickly hide it at -1. It doesn't change the fact that your countries are decadent and in rapid decline, soon to be passed by Canada.

    1. Re:LOL by EmeraldBot · · Score: 1

      I'm still LOLing at the Europeans even today, most of whom are mourning the first of many nations to leave the EU. It's a matter of time before the rest of the EU fails, too. I'm so thankful for being a Canadian, because we are smarter and better than the Europeans and Americans. Unlike the United States and most of Europe, Canada is not a failed state. Look for Canada to become the dominant power as China sinks deeper into recession, the United States spirals downward in decay, and the EU breaks apart at the seams. I really wonder if Civilization V will include the effects of the decay of the United States and EU and the rise of Canada as the world's dominant superpower.

      I know the European and American moderators won't like hearing this and will quickly hide it at -1. It doesn't change the fact that your countries are decadent and in rapid decline, soon to be passed by Canada.

      That last sentence is the first change you have made in entire days. You would think that if you have the time to obsessively wait until each story comes up and then post a stupid rant, you'd at least be willing to change something. I'm pretty disappointed, to be honest.

      --
      "Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
    2. Re:LOL by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      that and canada is a subject of Britain. Canada literally licks the queen's 90+ year old cheesy vag

  7. proper motivation by Thud457 · · Score: 1

    whatever happened to giving them a stream of encrypted porn and letting them have at it?
    Kids these days are soft.

    --

    the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

    1. Re:proper motivation by NadNad · · Score: 1

      whatever happened to giving them a stream of encrypted porn and letting them have at it?

      Kids these days are soft.

      They're being soft is both the cause and effect of not being able to see that porn?

  8. And then what by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You teach kids to code with toys and then when they grow up they only know how to code with toys. I don't think these do damage, but I don't think they help in the long run regarding coding abilities. Someone really needs to do a long term study.

    1. Re:And then what by exomondo · · Score: 1

      You teach kids to code with toys and then when they grow up they only know how to code with toys.

      Yeah that's why everything in the world is built out of Lego, you teach kids to build things with Lego and when they grow up they only know how to build things with Lego.

  9. Do you really need to teach them coding? by rfengr · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sheesh, just leave it alone. Seems like they are trying to teach "coding" a younger and younger age. The interested ones will figure it out on their own.

    1. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The attitude towards new coders and teaching coding from many in the industry is getting pretty disgusting.

      In the open source community the vitriolic attitudes toward newcomers is dismissed as a "that's just the way we are because we want quality code". When Google comes along with these Bloks they are dismissed as "no no, we don't need those to help kids learn, they can learn on their own". When Microsoft comes along with code.org it's first "a trap", then when it's pointed out that in fact there is nothing Microsoft-specific about their curriculum at all and it's all open standards the argument becomes "they're trying to teach kids to take our jobs and saturate the market". So we can't train local workers and heaven forbid we suggest H1Bs, how exactly do we get more tech workers?

      Why are you people so worried that some low-paid graduate will take your job? Are you really that incompetent that the only thing keeping you in your job is that there is not even an entry-level candidate to take it on?

    2. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am not familiar with code.org, but I have seen contests done by Microsoft in schools and universities that give prizes for projects. The projects must be written in Microsoft technologies.

    3. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's not a question of competence, it's a question of ROI.

      Five lazy and marginally competent bricklayers at $10/hour beats one astonishingly efficient and hard-working one who is five times better, who wants $100/hour. Toward which will future wages trend? You guessed it, $10/hour.

      Likewise, the dumbest CEO in existence having money is an automatic win over the smartest and hardest-working engineer without it. He just hires five of you. He gets that money by siphoning off the differential between $10 and $100.

    4. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      of course, because they are trying to promote their products. but im talking about a curriculum for CS intended for adoption by schools (not some competition or optional courseware for their own technology like this), which was broadly dismissed here as being a microsoft plot to further adoption of their technologies by people who hadnt even looked at the course to realize it was nothing of the sort. same thing goes for these code bloks, immediate response is to dismiss them as being unnecessary.

      though to be honest this community is packed full of people who are completely disconnected from reality: ipod being "lame", ipad being pointless, year of the linux desktop, death of microsoft, etc, etc.

    5. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fisher Price makes a medical set for toddlers.

      Nobody confuses this with teaching toddlers medicine. Even Fisher Price wouldn't seriously entertain the idea that the kids learn medicine from playing with this toy. They might suggest the child improves hand-eye co-ordination, or that they can tie the name of the item to what it is, but that's where it ends.

      Google makes a project bloks toy for children.

      Everyone confuses this with teaching children how to code. Even google.

    6. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      if you arent worried about quality then why worry about qualifications at all? just get a bunch of mcdonalds workers in for $8 an hour, sure your code will be shit but it will be cheap.

      Five lazy and marginally competent bricklayers at $10/hour beats one astonishingly efficient and hard-working one who is five times better, who wants $100/hour

      actually it doesn't, distilling it down to hourly rate is ignorant. we are talking about programmers here, not bricklayers, so you are needing office space, workstations, software, insurance, hr costs, etc. for 5 employees rather than one. more than that is that it comes down to quality, if you dont care about quality then just get the cheapest person/people, but you get what you pay for.

    7. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      I started programming when I was 3, thanks to the local nursery buying a programmable toy. Just hoping kids figure stuff out for themselves doesn't sound like a very good plan.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    8. Re:Do you really need to teach them coding? by h4ck7h3p14n37 · · Score: 1

      I think this product looks pretty neat. It sort of reminds me of the old computer games Rocky's Boots and Gertrude's Secrets.

      The idea is to introduce kids to some simple logic and control elements and get them to play.

    9. Re: Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Really? What you learned was not programming. It may have sparked your interest, but that's about it.

      Almost all the good coders I know, learned and taught themselves. They stumbled onto programming because they wanted to learn how a computer works and/or wanted the computer to work for them, not the other way around.

      Notice how I said almost. The couple people I know who were forced into programming because their families said "it's a great paying job and computers aren't going anywhere" are the ones that struggle to this day. The furthest they've gotten is help desk.

    10. Re: Do you really need to teach them coding? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, I see no point in teaching kids English.

  10. This belongs to the garbage with visual languages by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Back in the 80s (at least in west europe) many 6/7 years old kids were just fine learning programming on C64/Spectrums (me personally on Apple II). None seemed to have a problem with BASIC and text editing. How comes now we have to give kids half assed visual languages and stuff like this. Kids are not stupid, they can code just fine with traditional languages. Me and my neighbors were doing BASIC and simple assembly(to change video modes) and we were around 7y old. I had so much fun trying to dechyper English manuals word by word with a dictionary. I'm Italian and I didn't speak english. I'm sure python would be just fine for the average kid.

  11. Great start... by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 3, Funny

    Google Launches 'Project Bloks' Toys To Teach Kids To Code

    Good job they're not trying to teach kids to spell.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  12. OH YEAH THANKS PENTAGON ERIC SCHMIDT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Global spy corporation teaches kids to code.

  13. what the fuck is the matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    this preoccupation with forcing young people to code will only backfire. make them learn plumbing/welding/machining. bring back manufacturing. enabling fat kids to sit on their asses for no good reason will only continue to exacerbate everything thats wrong with 'murka.

    1. Re: what the fuck is the matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That stuff is for robots. We need to identify early on, the potential robot programmers.

  14. Code code code... huh? by wjcofkc · · Score: 1

    Can we go back to calling it programming yet? Code is the product of programming. Code is something you create and put to use through programming. Unless of course you say "coding" as a verb.

    --
    Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
    1. Re:Code code code... huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Coding is translating human thought into computer thought. (en)coding if you will.

      Anyway you haven't been around long if you think calling it "coding" is a new thing.

      -- 1991 efnet #coders chan op and co-founder.

      captcha: artifact

    2. Re:Code code code... huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Can we go back to calling it programming yet?

      Which do you think came first, and when?

      Code is the product of programming.

      And a program is the product of programming and you can program a computer to do something.

    3. Re:Code code code... huh? by exomondo · · Score: 1

      Can we go back to calling it programming yet?

      Not in place of "code", no. You can use it in place of "coding" if you like, they are pretty much interchangeable. Why do we have to use one rather than the other?

      Unless of course you say "coding" as a verb.

      Or indeed "code" as a verb the way it is used in the title and summary.

    4. Re: Code code code... huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      1995 AOL private chat room "coders" and "puntpunt" cofounder.

      We created puntpunt because all the trolls and noobs would flood the punt chat room.

      Punt stood for punters. We used to make programs that would kick people offline, freeze aol, PW crackers, etc.

      Then came the deltrees.

  15. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  16. Re:WE NEED MORE WAGE SLAVES by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Protect our jobs! We're so shit at them that if we teach children to code then they will take them from us! Keep the children stupid!

  17. Not again by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 2

    Not this fucking shit again........

    Everyone must learn to code or you'll starve to death in the new economy!!

    --
    Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    1. Re:Not again by ShakaUVM · · Score: 0

      >Everyone must learn to code or you'll starve to death in the new economy!!

      Well, computer science IS everywhere these days.

      But I see it more as an attempt to solve the rather difficult problem of how to get people started on programming. The people who do best in computer science classes in college are almost universally people that have done coding before as a hobby or something. This would be another way of providing that knowledge.

      Do you get equally upset at science museums for trying to teach students about electromagnetism prior to AP Physics?

  18. BASIC? by whiplashx · · Score: 1

    BASIC seemed to work just fine when I was 6 years old, I didn't need it dumbed down.

    I used a book called "Usborne Guide to Computer Games" to get going, got it from the library: https://2warpstoneptune.files....

  19. Microbiology Code by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Honestly, if they want kids to be prepared for where things will be when they're ready to enter the workforce, I'd bet on microbiology skills. With the recent advancements in gene editing (CRISPR), I'd wager we're headed for an inflection point similar to where electronics was in the 70's. The programmers of tomorrow will be (for the most part) the steel workers of today.

  20. This again... by Areyoukiddingme · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Endlessly reinventing the same tired old wheel.

    We have a name for this. It's called Visual Programming, and it sucks. Really, it does. Even better, this physical version of the concept retains all the suck of the original, then adds extra suck, when you run out of the control bloks you need.

    This whole concept bizarrely teaches physical limitations in the one realm where physical limitations do not apply: programming[1]. Your programs are limited by the number and type of "lines of code" that you have in the bucket. *boggle* Project Bloks is likely to drive a new generation of coders to develop a level of terseness that would make a Perl devotee weep. Is that really what you want?

    I'm sure this is entertaining for about 5 minutes. After that, even the five year olds shown in the video will lose interest. Thankfully, there will be no new generation of Perl mavens with a bucket full of regexes.

    ---

    [1] In this house, young lady, we obey the.... yeah yeah, put your hand down, you in the back. You know what I meant.

  21. very familiar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Reminds me of
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raytheon_Lectron

  22. Misguided by jandersen · · Score: 2

    I think this is just another simplistic "solution" to a problem not quite understood. We have seen similar projects in the past - in the 70es it was "University for All"; everybody should be pushed through some sort of higher education, it didn't really matter which or whether it actually gave useful skills. Not that education isn't a good thing, but as it turned out, having a major in creative arts wasn't always what the economy needed. And, it is not a bad thing as such if everybody knows how to write code - at least you may then have a basis for understanding what computers can (and not least: cannot) do, but the real problems for the economy are not as simple as "not enough coders". And the problems with the economy are not the most important in society either; I would say inequality is a far more important problem to solve. Inequality lies behind most of the unrest in the world, just as it always has.

  23. What a waste of time by fredrated · · Score: 1

    Teach a kid to code and you create a carpenter. Teach a kid to think and you create an architect. Which is better?

    1. Re:What a waste of time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Carpenter. Next question?

      [ Look, why don't you stand over there away from the tools and design something. Try not to drool, it rusts the steel. ]

  24. Physical version of MIT Scratch by skaag · · Score: 1

    Just look at this: https://scratch.mit.edu/

    You will notice Bloks is basically the physical implementation of MIT's web based Scratch language for kids.
    Furthermore, I think the web based version would be a great natural next step for those children, since it will allow them even more freedom and sophistication plus the ability to share their creations with other children.

    Say what you will about the evil empire, It's good to see something like this coming out of Google.

    --

    All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain... time... to... die...