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Here's where you'll find all the latest news about technology for children. We love to follow cool new inventions on Kickstarter and we hunt out all the latest announcements about tech toys and gadgets for the coming Christmas holidays. You'll also get our take on children's technology stories in the media.

REVIEWS$show=/search/label/review

Our kids technology product reviews are intended to help you work out whether a toy, gadget or kit is a good fit for your child or family. There's lots of cool stuff available, but is it the right choice for the child or teenager that you are buying for? We'll help you make the right choices and get the best value for money.

GIFT GUIDES$show=/search/label/gift%20guide

Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and friends assemble. We create gift lists to help you make good choices for kids technology which helps them develop the right skills for the future. We research the best in Coding Toys and Games, Making / Craft Tools and Kits, STEM/STEAM related gifts, Programmable Robots, Electronics Kits and Gadgets for Tech Age Kids and Teens.

PROJECTS$show=/search/label/project

Get crafty with technology. Here we'll post all our ideas and projects using technology to get creative and making with kids. You'll find anything from making a lemon battery to a glow-in-the-dark Minecraft sword. Our projects are tried and tested on our own kids or at events we run, so we are sure you can have a go at home with your kids. Some of our projects use specific tech gadgets which we provide links for you to purchase.

STEM$show=/search/label/stem

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. In recent years there is an increased focus in these areas of study. We like to include Art and Design too, so we often talk about STEAM (A stands for Art). At Tech Age Kids we believe Coding is a new literacy and children need to understand how technology works, practice making skills and grow in their curiosity to make a better future for us all.

CODING$show=/search/label/coding

Coding is increasingly being recognised as an important skill for children to learn. Some will learn to code at school or at a coding club, but it's brilliant if they get support at home too.

ELECTRONICS$show=/search/label/electronics

We think it's really important for kids to get hands-on with electronics and learn how to make circuits and write code to control hardware. Younger kids can start with conductive playdough. For kids who like to combine craft and tech, littleBits are fab. And we love SAM Labs wireless electronics components for making it easy for kids to make Internet of Things inventions. Lots of electronics kits for kids have support for the Arduino microprocessor environment. The DuinoKit Jr is one of our favourites. Arduino is a fab skill for older kids and teens to develop.

ROBOTICS$show=/search/label/robotics

We love robots at Tech Age Kids, especially programmable ones. We've got lots of them and write reviews and projects that use them. Our programmable robots for kids buying guide is a good place to start if you're not sure what's available. Roby the mBot Meccano robot dog is one of our popular projects and has been with us to lots of events. Our Ozobot LEGO trailer is fab for kids who love LEGO and robots.

MAKING AND CRAFT$show=/search/label/making

We're advocates of the creative use of technology, but this needs to be balanced with developing physical skills such as papercraft, woodwork, clay modelling, technical drawing and soldering. If children don't develop these skills as they grow up then physical making projects can become frustrating rather than fun. The Maker Community uses the term 'making' as a broad term to include all sorts of artisan skills or craft activities. Being able to make things can lead to life-long hobbies or even careers. It's a great feeling to be able to take a project from an idea in your head to a real object that does something. We're particularly interested to explore products that combine maker skills with tech skills such as electronics but others focus purely on the physical making skills that are still important to modern making.

Turing Tumble: Gaming on a Mechanical Computer



Turing Tumble is a physical toy that teaches kids aged 8+ how to build marble-operated mechanical computers. That idea probably takes a bit of getting used to, but it's a pretty neat concept that teaches kids some of the fundamentals of computing in a really accessible way.

The problems that kids need to solve with Turing Tumble are introduced in the context of a futuristic graphic novel.


Finding ways to teach kids how computers work at the lowest level is tricky so I was really interested when Paul Boswell (the inventor) contacted us about Turing Tumble. A lot of kids have a big gap between knowing the names of the parts inside a computer and being able to program them using human-friendly programming languages. The relationship between those two things is often a mystery.

The idea of Turing Tumble that you must place different kinds of pieces onto a vertical board which then routes marbles according to your placement. When a marble reaches the bottom of the board it triggers the release of another marble on the same side.


Using this approach you can build complex behaviours from simple parts which are basically how computers operate at the lowest level. Turing Tumble shows this in a very tangible way.

Turing Tumble doesn't just give you a bunch of problems to solve, the problems are built into a graphic novel. My kids have said that they want more story-based learning. They have recently really enjoyed Curly Bracket and the Hidden Code, Escape the The Room: Stargazer's Manor and the Mysterious Benedict Society series and puzzles.

I've had chance to preview the Turing Tumble material with my 8 and 10 year old children and they loved the story-based approach which features space engineer Alia who is trapped on planet Eniac (a nice nod towards computing history.) The graphics are very high quality and the story is fast-paced and engaging.The puzzles do a great job of showing how you can build complex systems from simple building blocks. I can see that the later puzzles are going to be pretty challenging.

We also love that Turing Tumble is a physical toy. We're not concerned about screentime per se, but that it displaces practical hands-on activities that develop kids physical skills. It's always good to have more options that involve physically doing stuff.

We like that the game is named after Alan Turing, the computing pioneer who formalised the idea of computability, Boswell says that Turing Tumble is theoretically Turing complete - it could solve any computable problem if you had a big enough board!

Boswell notes that he was inspired in part by the Digi-Comp II mechanical computer, children's author Laurie Wallmark mentioned the Digi Comp in our interview with her.

Paul Boswell has taught Computing as a professor at the University of Minnesota and has three kids and both sets of experience come through in the design of Turing Tumble.

Boswell is seeking crowdfunding, check out the Turing Tumble campaign on Kickstarter.





24 days of Scratch coding book cover and cute penguin
Name

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Tech Age Kids | Technology for Children: Turing Tumble: Gaming on a Mechanical Computer
Turing Tumble: Gaming on a Mechanical Computer
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Tech Age Kids | Technology for Children
https://www.techagekids.com/2017/05/turing-tumble-gaming-on-mechanical.html
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