It’s been a while since we’ve done one of these, hasn’t it? Well, there’s been some cool stuff this week that I wanted to share with you.
BBC Will Give Every Year 7 Student in the UK a Micro Bit Computer – Lizzie Plaugic, The Verge
I’ve frequently lamented that my students know so little about the technology that they use. I grew up on DOS and early Windows and Mac PCs, so I had to at least learn file structure and basic command line stuff. I made web pages in the early days of HTML, so had to learn that. And I try to make my tech students appreciate it, but without a need to learn it, most don’t. This will change things — using a Raspberry Pi-like microcomputer, the BBC and its partners want to make students more tech-savvy by making coding, hacking, and tinkering part of the curriculum in the UK. Read More
This New Device Recycles Plastic Bottles Into 3D Printing Material – BEC Crew, Science Alert
It’s no secret that, while amazing, 3D printing is expensive and wasteful. Over at the University of British Columbia, a device called the ProtoCycler might change that. It’s positioned to reduce the cost of plastic filament by something like 90%, and would create a 1 kg spool of filament from waste plastic. This is a key piece of tech for schools and maker spaces, not to mention businesses that would save tons of money from recycling failed prototypes back into usable filament. Read More
Choosing a Wedding Photographer – Natalie Joy, Faces of Joy
I’m a little biased on this one, admittedly, but Natalie Joy’s reflections on how we chose our wonderful wedding photographer Christian Lee and some lessons learned in the process are, much like NJ herself, charming and insightful. Read More
