Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: What's The Best Geeky Gift For Children?
Everyone's suggesting gifts to teach the next generation of geeks about science, technology, engineering, and math. Slashdot reader theodp writes:
In "My Guide to Holiday Gifts," Melinda Gates presents "a STEM gift guide" [which] pales by comparison to Amazon's "STEM picks". Back in 2009, Slashdot discussed science gifts for kids. So, how about a 2016 update?
I've always wanted to ask what geeky gifts Slashdot's readers remember from when they were kids. (And what geeky gifts do you still bitterly wish some enlightened person would've given you?) But more importantly, what modern-day tech toys can best encourage the budding young geeks of today? Leave your best answers in the comments. What's the best geeky gift for children?
I've always wanted to ask what geeky gifts Slashdot's readers remember from when they were kids. (And what geeky gifts do you still bitterly wish some enlightened person would've given you?) But more importantly, what modern-day tech toys can best encourage the budding young geeks of today? Leave your best answers in the comments. What's the best geeky gift for children?
Without all the action figure stuff that serves as training wheels their imagination, unless they've demonstrated that they need it.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
- old tube AM radio to take apart (I was 5 years old and had already been passionate about electricity and electronics for the previous 3 years or so)
- crystal radio kit
- build-it-yourself motor kit (very cool - I had to wind the armature myself)
- countless ignition cells and lantern batteries
- 100-in-1 electronics educational kit
- walkie talkies
- wood burning kit (never did any wood burning 'art' with it, but it was my first soldering iron)
Along with new geek gifts for kids, consider old 'junk' that they can take apart, experiment with, and learn from; it won't cost much, and they won't be worried about breaking some new bit of shiny and pissing off Mom and Dad. And remember that the greatest gifts a parent can give to a geek child are TIME and COMPANIONSHIP. Take them to places that they'll love, but that they wouldn't normally go to or wouldn't discover on their own. When I was a kid my father took me to a local hydro-electric generating station. (I grew up in Niagara Falls Canada). And this was no tourist visit; he had a friend who worked there, and we were up on a narrow, high catwalk above the generators - a place where only employees were supposed to go. I'll remember that 'til the day I die.
The above ideas aren't specific to Christmas - but this is a good time to remind ourselves of the gifts we can and should be giving kids all year to feed their passions and build their confidence.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
suitable for all children from age 3 to 123
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
If you are a member of a hackerspace, how about:
An optics kit
Some lego-enhanced optics components
Other cool optics components using legos
A home built robot
3d-print an industrial robotic arm
A modular clock kit
Any sciency kit
Any sciency toy
There's a long list of interesting things you could *build* for your child, or build *with* your child, and if they break something or want to modify/extend something, you can build them a replacement or an extension.
What about for the geology geek/rock hound/pebble pup? They'd love for you to get them some opals, or fire agates, or celestite, or maybe some lapis, or perhaps a massive Moroccan trilobite.
Not all geeky children gifts need to be technology-based. You aren't going to get a rockhound geek encouraged to get out and learn more by giving them a calculator.
Slashdot's playing a really stupid exclusionary game by basically denying geekdom to massive subsets of science with this Ask Slashdot thread, especially since the originally-referenced thread practically was meant for Geologists.
WhipSlash, you and everyone else should know better than this. What a goddamned shame.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Assuming they're old enough. Lego's suck for learning real engineering. If that's a no-go maybe Lego Technic, but I still think the Erector sets your better buy.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I agree with the lego bricks and if you want to go one step further, get a mindstorm ev3. Yes, mindstorm is expensive but it beats almost any stem toy on the market. It has a low learning barrier to entry but is still pretty powerful and most importantly is not single use. I have bought my kids quite a few other stem toys like sphero, ozobot, mbot, snap circuits, littlebits, preprogrammed toy robots, etc... but most of them either have limited customization or you have to be a programmer to make them do anything cool. The mindstorm kit was the most expensive stem toy I have ever bought but it is the only one that my kids still play with on a regular basis as the rest are now mostly just collecting dust and collectively all the other dust collecting stem toys cost more than the mindstorm set and the mindstorm can basically replicate the functionality of all of them. The only real problem my kids have with mindstorm is that they can only create one thing at a time and must destroy it before creating something new.
A rock tumbler requires patience but has an awesome payoff.
A metal detector has a sense of adventure, finding bits of jewelry and coins at a playground or park.
Pine Book laptop. $89. Awesome.
https://fossbytes.com/dollar-8...
Just kidding
http://saveie6.com/
Best geeky gift for kids? Time to play, have fun. Less tech toys that are meant to 'train them for tomorrow'.
It's a nukular technical term.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Geeky like me? Get him an assortment of tools and all the cardboard, construction paper, popsickle sticks and rubber bands you can find. Hell, if I hadn't run out of that earlier I would still be in the basement building my own toys!
Then I turned 30 and my dad said I'm too old ... other story.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Why is it interesting? He graduated Physics, worked at NASA, and now draws comics and writes books full time.
The other poster called him a "cunt". Any reason why?
Because the world needs even more musicians. Not.
Christmas isn't about job preparation - it's about fun and family and being happy for what you have. Why not take a break from nerd-dom and go watch "The Ultimate Gift"?
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
I stopped reading xkcd when he decided to use his comic as a platform for political advocacy.
Yeah god forbid a cartoonist uses politics for inspiration for his work. What will the world come to.
Also, I think whatever humor value it provided in the past is vastly outweighed by all the mouthbreathers who are compelled to post "obligatory" xkcd links on any given subject.
So what you're saying is you have no sense of humour and you're an asshole who looks down on people for finding something funny written by a guy who doesn't sit in the same square of the political compass as you. We here at Slashdot would like to thankyou for your inspirational and informative view of books you've never read which will be enjoyed by people who you will never understand.
But maybe I have this all wrong. Maybe you don't find it funny because you don't understand the topics enough to see the humour in them. Fortunately Randall Munroe has a good book that would suit you well:
Obligatory XKCD