Google Launches ‘Project Bloks’ To Help Young Learners Learn To Code
Google is introducing a modular coding kit for kids as part of a new creativity called Project Bloks, an open-source hardware platform meant at making computer programming available to children. The building blocks of the system permit children to join modules together to give associated toys and devices specific instructions.
Jayme Goldstein and Steve Vranakis, executive creative director and project lead at Google Creative Lab, described: "Kids are inherently playful and social. They naturally learn and play by using their hands, building stuff and doing things together".
"Making code physical, known as tangible programming, offers a unique way to combine the way children innately play and learn with computational thinking."
The project is motivated by previous and long-standing academic work and research in the area of so-called real programming—in which children learn basic programming concepts by manipulating physical objects like wooden blocks.
Each of the blocks denoted a specific programming instruction like 'stop', 'start', 'turn' or 'move left,' which when put together produced a set of basic instructions for a robot to follow.
It’s an open platform formed to support the kids learn to program. kids use ‘Bloks’ as a mention design to create a physical ‘program’ that controls real world objects with the help of physical components.
Definitely targeted at kids, this system consists of 3 core blocks —Base Board, Brain Board, and Pucks.
The importance of teaching children to code has been underlined repeatedly in new years – after all, if you're heading for a future where the whole thing is linked, we'll want people who know how to put it all together. This has directed to the introduction of devices like the BBC micro:bit and Raspberry Pi, which deal kids – and adults, for that matter – a reasonable way to get to grips with coding.
Baseboards comprise the sensors that deliver the instructions given by the puck and form the link between the puck and the brain board. These are modular and can be connected in different orders to create different programming flows.
Pucks are the 'verbs'. Extremely easy to make, beginning with something as simple as conductive ink on a piece of paper, these are the 'doings'.
The Brain Board is constructed on a Raspberry Pi Zero, so it's incredibly low-powered and low-cost to make, and capable of relating to anything that has an API.
Currently, Google Creative Lab is looking for parents, educators, developers, and researchers who need to be involved in the development of the product. the user can register their interest at the Project Bloks website.