Wiring Your Brain

A few blog posts back, we talked about "the Force" games where players move balls by concentrating to make their brain waves active, thereby spinning a fan that gets the ball floating.

But be prepared to hear a lot more about brain-computer interface (BCI).

Open-source software is opening the floodgates on a rage of applications that can improve life for people with disabilities and that may eventually find their way into our everyday lives. From Twittering with the brain by looking at the letters you want to type, to artificial retinas that use cameras that send signals to the brain, BCI are bringing science fiction to reality.

It a little (or a lot) scary to think about implanting chips into your head and your brain being hooked up and read by computers. But it’s also incredible to think about the ingenuity that is creating this technology and the possible ways it could improve lives. Humans are such clever animals. M

y grandparents grew up without highways or calculators, and look at how much has changed within their lifetimes! I am fascinated to see what will change within mine.

For a more detailed explanation of how BCI works, check out this article on HowStuffWorks.

Putting Your Energy to Work for Your ipod

Soon you’ll have another reason to envy all the energy young children have. New consumer devices that convert human kinetic energy into power for cell phones and mp3 players will be on store shelves just in time for the holidays.

One such contraption is the nPower™ PEG (Personal Energy Generator). As you walk, ride your bike, or even kayak, magnets inside the PEG bounce back and forth off springs to amplify movement and generate electricity. According to the website, this device will charge your BlackBerry at the same rate as a regular wall charger; a half hour of walking will get you an 80% charge.

Since the nPower™ PEG Is excepted to cost around $150, I probably won't be getting one anytime soon. But I am very excited about the possibility of recharging my ipod while walking the dog.

Gamemaker Student Projects

Gamemaker Whizards program their own games by working at their own pace to learn the art and logic of gamemaking. Using CTWorkshop tutorials and the help of knowledgeable instructors, they learn a range of concepts and techniques that they can use outside of class to create new games at home. Returning Gamemaker Whizards are challenged with more complex gamemaking techniques that keep them learning.

Norfolk Animation Club Projects

In our Animation Whizards Club, students learn the art of stop-motion animation, story-telling, and digital movie-making. It takes creativity and patience to invent an original story, create all the props and characters, capture footage with webcams, and put it all together with sound effects and titles. But it’s well worth the effort- just check out these projects.

Needham Summer Club Architecture Projects

In Amazing Architects, kids unleash their creativity as they craft a unique office building, space station, dream house, or whatever their imaginations invent. They decide the function and locality of the building, design the layout, and use a highly customizable computer program to tailor the structure to their creative concept. But it doesn’t stop there; after completing their building, students make a photo slide show of their masterpiece to take home and share.

These 8 projects were created by participants in our Summer Club program in Needham in the Summer 2009. The detail in these designs will blow you away.