Core Dump: 3 New iOS Educational Apps Worth Downloading

ABC House

Image: PeaPod Labs' ABC House

Usually I stick to profiling the work of specific developers, but there are three apps I’ve come across recently that I think are worth talking about and worth downloading and using with children at an appropriate age and stage of development. The apps deal with three specific areas that are focussed on and important for children’s learning and development.

Consider this my version of Jonathan Liu’s recent “Core Dump” posts – which are excellent and you should check out.

1. A literacy app: Montessori Letter Sounds

Montessori-inspired app developer Les Trois Elles has produced a beautifully designed app that provides children with a range of activities to explore phonics and basic letter recognition and development. The I-Spy game is probably the highlight, and a “trace the letter” game is saved by the inclusion of phonics. I think we have enough letter tracing apps, especially given that tracing a letter with you fore finger does not mimic writing a letter that effectively – and if we are engaging children with iPads we surely are at the beginning of a journey that may change the very need and nature of learning to write by hand (definitely another post for another day there).

The European look and feel of this app provides a different feel and in turn provides children with a different type of digital experience. We should not assume that just because all apps are on a touch screen they provide the same experience. The choices developers make, and we make as parents in choosing the types of apps our children play with, impact on our children’s digital experience purely through the colors, audio and design of an app. It matters to have a diversity of experience: there are not enough apps that have gentle colors of this one.

Other app developers could learn from their methods of recognizing children’s achievement. In the I-Spy game, successfully spying the right object prompts a marble to pop out of the wall and roll down a plank. The marbles continue to collect until the game has been complete. there is no “You’re fantastic” or “Great work” in a cheesy voice after each successful guess. One issue for preschoolers, for whom this app is best suited, is the inclusion of a game dynamic where the second lot of games and activities are only unlocked when you have enough marbles. It is a clever approach, but I’m not convinced it is suitable for 3 or 4 year olds.

Still, a great early literacy app because of the commitment and thoughtfulness to the design.

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Geek Country Greets Its Astronaut

Andre Kuipers from Space

Image by Samsung Mobile NL

The Netherlands is a small country but just like most of its neighboring countries in Europe, it is also a space nation and is duly represented by its space ambassador Astronaut André Kuipers. Kuipers is currently sharing the confined International Space Station with its space roommates, and treats the world to amazing pictures of the Earth, taken as part of his PromISSe mission.

The Dutch people take quite some pride in their home-grown astronaut, who never misses an opportunity to give back — as he did recently by greeting, from Space, the Dutch student satellite Delfi-C3 4th Anniversary.

As a recognition for his scientific work and contribution, the European Space Agency and Samsung Mobile have teamed up with Spanish artist Notasso, to create a fine piece of art, so big that you can see it… from space.

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Geek Fitness Week: Get Fit in a Bit With FitBit

FitBit

Earlier this week I covered a book (Fitness for Geeks) and fitness tracking service aimed at kids (GeoPalz). The book has a chapter devoted to fitness devices as well as plenty of software mentioned for those interested in tracking variables related to their exercise and daily routines. The GeoPalz service, while tracking kids’ steps throughout their day, also offers parents the ability to track their progress using a few devices other than the GeoPalz device. With both the book and the GeoPalz service, one frequently mentioned data tracker is the FitBit.

Earlier this year I reviewed a fitness tracker from BodyMedia. I was so impressed with the device and the feedback it gives me that I’ve continued to use it and wear it every day (well, except for one day every few weeks when I need to recharge the battery). One number I look for every night when I sync the device with the online activity manager software is the MET — Metabolic Equivalent of Task. It’s a number that gives you an idea on your activity level, with a sedentary, sitting-at-your-desk all day earning you a 1.0. Moderate exercise will often get you a 2 or higher… and running a marathon (which I haven’t done) I hear gets you up around the 8 or 9 range. (I mention the MET number only because I’ll be referencing it again shortly.)

While I like the BodyMedia, I’m quite aware it isn’t the only fitness tracker out there. After reading about the FitBit in the Fitness for Geeks book and then seeing that it’s promoted by GeoPalz, I contacted the company and asked for a test unit to try out. For the past few days I’ve been a body monitoring machine, with both BodyMedia on the arm and the FitBit attached at the waist. I was curious to see how the FitBit compared to the results I got from the BodyMedia (such as number of steps taken per day) as well as what other services or variables it tracked. Here’s the rundown for those of you looking for a fitness tracker of your own.

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Build Your Own Zoo in Zooloretto Mini

Zooloretto Mini pens

Collecting animals in my enclosures in Zooloretto Mini.

zooloretto-mini-boxOverview: You’re building a zoo, so you need to get some animals to fill your enclosures — but you only have three enclosures and you can’t just mix and match animals, so choose wisely. Animals that don’t fit will have to go into the barn, which costs you. Zooloretto Mini is a smaller, sleeker version of Zooloretto that is easy to learn and quite portable.

Players: 2 to 5

Ages: 7 and up

Playing Time: 30 minutes

Retail: $37.99 (though you can probably find it for much cheaper)

Rating: Superb: good things come in small packages, and this is one of them.

Who Will Like It? Kids will love the zoo animals, particularly the babies. Gamers will like it for the tough decisions you get to make and the press-your-luck factor. Also, if you like Zooloretto but you want something just a smidge simpler, Zooloretto Mini is a great variation of an excellent game.

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Go Off Your Rocker With Crazy New Improv Party Game

Off Your Rocker box and components

Off Your Rocker box and components. Photo: Stratus Games

Overview: Off Your Rocker is a party game that emulates the Party Quirks game from the legendary improv show Whose Line Is It Anyway? One player takes on the role of “psychiatrist” and the rest of the players, the “patients,” all have a secret trait that they must exhibit. The psychiatrist hopes to guess the patients’ quirks and the patients are trying to impress one another with their answers.

Players: 4-12

Ages: 12 and up

Playing Time: 45 minutes

Retail: $20

Rating: This is that rare party game that combines zany interactivity with a solid yet simple mechanical structure. As a patient, it’s a lot of fun to learn your secret prompt and know that the psychiatrist player doesn’t know it. As the psychiatrist, it can be challenging and hilarious to watch your friends act crazy.

Who Will Like It? Fans of improv and theatresports will love Off Your Rocker, as will anyone who has always dreamed about seeing their friends pretend to be trapped in a bottle. It’s a great family game, especially with kids who love to perform.

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So Happy Together: GeekMom Joins Wired


Almost two years ago at the GeekDad booth at Maker Faire, one question came up over and over again: “Yeah, but where’s GeekMom?” My pat answer at that point was that, when I took over GeekDad, I always intended the blog to be for geek parents, which is why we had four Core Contributors who were moms. It generally satisfied people, but we all knew it wasn’t the best answer.

Fast forward a couple of months, and our geek patron Chris Anderson called me up, asking “Hey, GeekMom.com is available; want me to pick it up?” The answer was an easy and enthusiastic yes.

That October, with Chris’s blessing, and completely separately from GeekDad and Wired, those four geeky moms (Natania Barron, Cory Lawton, Kathy Ceceri, and Jenny Williams) and I started up GeekMom.com as the perfect home for an underserved, but certainly not insignificant, audience.

Now, two years after the first inkling of an idea, GeekMom has come “home,” and both genders of geeky parents can now find fun, interesting stories and reviews here at Wired. As Publisher of both blogs, I couldn’t be more proud or more excited.

So please, go check them out, add them to your RSS feed reader, follow them on Twitter, and make them feel welcome at Wired.com.

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A Google-a-Day Puzzle for May 10

Our good friends at Google run a daily puzzle challenge and asked us to help get them out to the geeky masses. Each day’s puzzle will task your googling skills a little more, leading you to Google mastery. Each morning at 12:01 a.m. Eastern time you’ll see a new puzzle, and the previous day’s answer (in invisitext) posted here.

SPOILER WARNING:
We leave the comments on so people can work together to find the answer. As such, if you want to figure it out all by yourself, DON’T READ THE COMMENTS!

Also, with the knowledge that because others may publish their answers before you do, if you want to be able to search for information without accidentally seeing the answer somewhere, you can use the Google-a-Day site’s search tool, which will automatically filter out published answers, to give you a spoiler-free experience.

And now, without further ado, we give you…

TODAY’S PUZZLE:

What piazza were you standing in if you saw a Giraffe win a horse race last August 16th?

YESTERDAY’S ANSWER (mouseover to see):

Search [Sir Benjamin Hall landmark] to learn that it’s London’s Big Ben, which is the bell inside the clock tower. Search [largest bell London] to find it’s “Great Paul” in St. Paul’s Cathedral.

Homepage photo: LaertesCTB/Flickr

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Last Chance to Support Serpent’s Tongue – Become Power on Kickstarter!

Serpent's Tongue

Prototype components — not final. Image: Becoming Magi

Part collectible card game, part role playing game, Serpent’s Tongue – Become Power is a Kickstarter campaign in its final few days. It blew past its threshold very quickly, and has added many extra rewards and special things for those that support it. So, while it will be funded, the higher the final tally the better the final rewards.

Similar to yet different from Magic: The Gathering, in Serpent’s Tongue, you actually verbally cast a spell when you want to use one. You use your Codex to decipher a symbol, which leads you to specific syllables to use to pronounce the incantation. You then say it aloud, while the other players pay close attention to make sure you do it correctly.

Designed for 1-8 players, this game has a great deal of promise. It’s simple enough to learn quickly, but has enough complexity to keep you and your friends busy learning and perfecting your set of spells for a very long time. Knowledge of and familiarity with your spellbook and the Codex will help you succeed.

There are only four days left in this campaign. You can get enough bits of the game to play by yourself for $25, or you can get a full core set to play with one other person for $45. Plus there are many, many other levels of participation. Check out Serpent’s Tongue, and also visit their Become Magi website, which contains more videos, forums, and a lot more explanation of the game.

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The Avengers Sequel, Disney Park Attractions Officially in the Works, Surprising Nobody

Avengers one-sheetConsidering that The Avengers has been shattering box office records right and left since it opened, and that it passed the $700 million mark worldwide yesterday, it can hardly be considered a surprise that a sequel is already in the works.

Still, it’s nice to get official notice that the process has begun, and Disney CEO Bob Iger gave such notice yesterday during a conference call discussing the company’s quarterly earnings. He didn’t say when we should expect the film to hit theaters, but confirmed the schedule for the individual heroes’ movies they’d floated before: Iron Man 3 and Thor 2 next year, and Captain America 2 in 2014.

In a potentially exciting development, though, Iger also mentioned that Avengers-based attractions are being planned for Disney’s theme parks. This could be particularly interesting at Walt Disney World, where Universal’s nearby Islands of Adventure park already has Marvel superhero-based rides and other attractions.

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GeekDad Interview: Starhawk Developer Dylan Jobe

After a long wait, Starhawk releases this week. The game, a third person shooter and spiritual successor to the game Warhawk, features a rich single player campaign and a deep multiplayer experience. To find out more about the game, we talked to Dylan Jobe, president of Lightbox Interactive, who developed Starhawk for the Playstation 3. Read on to find out more about the game’s inspiration, why it’s the best shooter for younger players, and what Starhawk feature is the best addition to any shooter game in years.

Banks: Starhawk has an old-west-in-outer-space feel, reminiscent of Firefly and other great shows, movies, and books. What were your inspirations for the story in Starhawk?

Jobe: We had a lot of inspiration from classic westerns and classic sci-fi. We were privileged to work with a guy who worked on Star Wars characters with George Lucas, a concept artist named Ian McCaig. He designed Darth Maul and a number of other characters. We brought him in and he helped us on the world and universe in the early stages.

When we got into more nitty gritty development of the actual screenwriting with dialogue and the actual story, we brought in a writer from Austin, who had a lot of experience with westerns, a guy named Koen Wooten. His family helped as wranglers for Last of the Mohicans. He did prop work for True Grit and Appaloosa. He was very familiar with the genre, but we were fortunate to work with him because he loves games very dearly.

We often referred to classic westerns when we wanted to tell a story about a man and his family, even though it takes place in the vastness of the frontier. In many respects, the classic western tale pertains to a white half, black half kind of structure, isolated small town in the vast expanding west in the United States. So there were a lot of classic American western influences in the conflict between Emmett and his brother Logan to the industrial expansion of mines and towns throughout the frontier. There were many, many parallels to American history. Continue Reading “GeekDad Interview: Starhawk Developer Dylan Jobe” »

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Dork Tower Wednesday

Dork Tower 1068

Dork Tower #1068 by John Kovalic

Read all the Dork Towers that have run on GeekDad.

Find the Dork Tower webcomic archives, DT printed collections, more cool comics, awesome games and a whole lot more at the Dork Tower Website.

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New York’s Five Boro Bike Tour: We Hit the Road with 32,000 Happy Cyclists (Including Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson)

Tyson and Nye at Five Boro Bike Tour

Cycling and science geeks Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson at the finish of the Five Boro Bike Tour with young riders Matt Ginsberg and Ben Krohnengold. Image: Stuart Krohnengold

Bikes on bridge

My son enjoys the view from the Queensboro Bridge. Image: Kathy Ceceri

I still remember my first Five Boro Bike Tour. It was only a couple of years after the event started in 1977, and about 7,000 of us in our Merino wool tights and jerseys with the logos of Italian bike teams printed on them were escorted through the city streets. The draw was 40 miles of biking past breathtaking views of Manhattan and the four outer boroughs (the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island) with no buses, rude drivers and other hazards of city life to worry about. The Tour‘s purpose back then was just to introduce New Yorkers to the joys of biking through their own city streets, and it definitely delivered.

By the 1980s the ride had swelled to about 40,000 participants, and I was not only riding in the event but helping to organize it. My husband and I had one of our earliest encounters in the tunnel under the United Nations. I was standing in the road, making sure my marshals were in position. He was headed up the FDR Drive towards me at about 20 miles an hour, leading a team of tough, ultra-fast cyclists whose job was to hold back the mob of bike messengers and other aggressive riders from outpacing the cop cars. It was my first time working on the ride, and somehow no one had bothered to inform me that the Team Masi volunteers rode literally curb to curb. Luckily, I turned to see him frantically waving me aside in time to jump onto the concrete divider seconds before being squished like a bug.

With death-defying memories like that, it’s no wonder that my husband and I kept coming down for the Five Boro, even after we moved upstate. But once the kids came along, my involvement became limited to sitting on the sidelines with our boys and cheering as Dad pedaled by. It took a few years, but eventually the kids grew up, and this year I had the privilege of bringing my younger son along on his first Five Boro Bike Tour.

Continue Reading “New York’s Five Boro Bike Tour: We Hit the Road with 32,000 Happy Cyclists (Including Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson)” »

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Prismatic Art Collection Diversifies Fantasy Art

Prismatic Art Collection logo

Those storied illustrations plastered on generations of Dungeon Master’s Guides and Monster Manuals and psychedelic microbuses may have a special place in geeks’ hearts, but you have to admit: fantasy art has some pretty well-worn tropes. Wizened sorcerers with pointed hats, ripped barbarians wielding massive blades, and the ubiquitous chainmail bikini.

Tracy Hurley and Daniel Solis decided they were tired of the cliches. The cheesecake poses, the ridiculous outfits, and the lack of heroic diversity. So they set to work on commissioning the kind of artwork they’d like to see in their fantasy games. With their Prismatic Art Collection project, now up on Kickstarter, they state, “In geek culture, there are plenty of Lukes, but not enough Landos or Leias. We want to change that.”

Hurley is a blogger and freelance writer whose work has appeared in numerous roleplaying products (Wizards of the Coast, Paizo, and Evil Hat Productions, to name a few). Solis is the co-founder of Smart Play Games and a prolific game designer (we’ve written about him before). I spent some time chatting with both of them a couple of weeks ago, just after the project went live.

Check out our interview after the jump.

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The GeekDads Episode #114: Beard Sharing

geekdadrobotlogo500xtra1

Ken, Matt, and Jonathan spend nearly the entire episode going on and on and on about The Avengers. SPOILERS ABOUND! DO NOT LISTEN TO THIS PODCAST IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN THE MOVIE! Enjoy!

GeekDad.com is the parenting blog at Wired.com, edited by Ken Denmead, Matt Blum, Jonathan Liu, Z and Chris Anderson. It is a community of like-minded geeky parents writing about our experiences raising our kids in the digital age, and about our obsessions with technology, family-friendly projects, and pop-culture. The GeekDads podcast is a biweekly discussion of anything and everything that impacts us as geeks and parents.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.

You can subscribe directly with this RSS feed.


You can download or listen to GeekDads Episode 114.mp3.

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Revisiting Stacking Uncovers Child-Friendly Role Play

Double Fine Productions Triple Pack

Double Fine Productions Triple Pack

With all the excitement around Double Fine Production’s Kickstarter success it’s easy to forget where they have come from, and their other successes in unusual video-game development strategies.

Case in point are their “Amnesia Fortnight” games where the developers were granted two weeks to forget their current big project and tasked to develop an original prototype. This resulted in Stacking, Costume Quest, Iron Brigade and Sesame Street Once Upon a Monster. It also signaled a switch from big boxed games towards smaller directly-delivered experiences.

Two of these Amnesia Fortnight games, Costume Quest and Stacking, along with Double Fine’s classic game Psychonauts, are available on PC. Amazon currently offers them in a triple pack as well as selling them separately for download.

Always keen on a videogame bargain, this led to me trying out these games with my kids. I found that they’ve taken to them pretty quickly. Stacking is particularly interesting, not only because of the steam-punk presentation and open world to explore, but because it offers a role-play upgrade system executed with Russian stacking dolls — hence the name.

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National Instruments Introduces miniSystems to Bolster STEM Education

The myDAQ data acquisition unit with a miniaturized electrical grid, part of the miniSystems line

National Instruments is working hard to make STEM education more accessible to both students and teachers. Last year, National Instruments (NI) announced the release of LabVIEW for Education, an academic version of its widely popular and very customizable system design and development software. Also recently, NI overcame the hurdles of costs and accessibility to data acquisition by delivering myDAQ, an inexpensive, durable unit that allowed kids to work at home and freed up teachers to tackle more complex concepts in the classroom.

This year, the Austin-based company upped the ante for STEM education once again by introducing a number of hardware add-ons that allow students to have access to equipment at a low cost, allowing for education, experimentation, and innovation outside of the classroom. These miniaturized systems provide students the opportunity to explore everything from electrical grids to dynamometers to air foils and shaker tables. The miniSystems give students an experience that fits in the palms of their hands, rather than a theoretical idea from a textbook.

NI’s Brad Armstrong says, “Our inspiration was Thomas Edison’s Menlo Park where he brought in the best and brightest and gave them equipment and said ‘do what you want.’ That drove a lot of innovation and that’s what we’re trying to do with kids — not just limit learning to the classroom.

“The students can take [the miniSystems] home,” continues Armstrong. “It’s a legitimate miniature version of something they might work with in industry and the programming that they use with it, though not as complex, is very similar.”

So the next time a student asks “When will I ever use this?,” the answer can be, “Right now.”

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Cathedral Uses PlayStation Game in Worship Service

Exeter Cathedral

Exeter Cathedral

Following a positive response to the live videogame theater event, and the subsequent TEDx talk I’ve been invited to bring a video-game element to an Exeter Cathedral service. As you can see on the Exeter Cathedral Facebook page:

Andy Robertson will be facilitating an interactive video game throughout our worship where together we will enter a virtual creation and bring our own touch of transformation to it.

The service will make use of the PlayStation 3 game, Flower. The plan is that it will be played collaboratively by the congregation while the game’s music will form the background for other elements of the service. The controller will be passed around while other parts of the worship continue, and then brought to a conclusion as the first level of the game is completed.

The event is one offshoot from the live theater shows that I put on in April. The songs, comedy and radio-plays each respond to a particular game and were recorded in front of a live audience at Exeter’s Bike Shed Theatre. As you may have read in my previous post, footage from the shows were also included in my TEDx talk, where I aimed to justify spending all this artistic talent on mere video-games.

I was inspired to choose Flower for the Cathedral service after experiencing a public performance of it at the GameCity festival in 2009. There, the game was performed by one person in a old shopping center, but for me it was an undeniably spiritual experience. I’m really looking forward to discovering how the experience fits, contributes to and changes the Cathedral service.

Although at first this may sound like an odd thing to do, a videogame is actually an excellent fit for this sort of expression of faith. Not only is it inclusive, in that everyone can participate, but it also visits themes of creation, nature and our response to the world. The proof will be in the pudding this Sunday (13th May at 7pm). I will be to report back after the event.

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Castle: I Can’t Quit You

Castle & Beckett in the season finale. photo copyright ABC

I have a love/hate relationship with Castle, the television show.

Love because I’ve grown to adore Nathan Fillion in the lead role. There hasn’t been such a wonderfully goofy male lead in a mystery since Pierce Brosnan in Remington Steele. The writing has improved since the show’s first season and the banter among the mystery writer Rick Castle, his partner, New York City police detective Kate Beckett and the show’s supporting characters from Castle’s home and the police precinct are often stellar. Stania Katic has grown into the role as Beckett and I love the way she projects a warm competence. And, naturally, the romantic banter between Castle and Beckett makes the show.

At its best the show is incredibly fun, such as the zombie murder tale, “Undead Again,” that aired on April 30th, or last year’s steampunk-oriented episode.

But the show is far from perfect.

Sometimes the mystery plots are just awful. There are episodes where it seems like the writers got two-thirds of the way through the script and decided they better pick a murderer instead of various clues leading to a logical conclusion.The police procedure stuff is all wrong, too. This isn’t normally that much of a problem, as this is television, not real life, but sometimes the police stuff is so staggeringly off that it throws me out of the story. Like the coroner announcing at the beginning of Monday’s episode, “Always,” that the bruises on a corpse’s shoulders are from carrying something that weighed 30 pounds. Oh, c’mon. That’s just silly.

The worse problem, however, is the way the relationship between the leads has been written this season. [Editor's note: some spoilers ahead.] Continue Reading “Castle: I Can’t Quit You” »

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Let Your Geek Flag Fly Puts Crowdsourced Poem to Music

Last week, we shared a geeky poem that the GeekDad Community had written. It was a fun activity and the end result was pretty good too. Lucky for us, John Anealio thought so too. The “top 10 geek-rock artist” decided to pick up his guitar and turn our poem into a really great song. Take a moment to listen and enjoy and, if you like it as much as we do, you can download it for free at Mr. Anealio’s site. Thanks, John!

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A Google-a-Day Puzzle for May 9

Our good friends at Google run a daily puzzle challenge and asked us to help get them out to the geeky masses. Each day’s puzzle will task your googling skills a little more, leading you to Google mastery. Each morning at 12:01 a.m. Eastern time you’ll see a new puzzle, and the previous day’s answer (in invisitext) posted here.

SPOILER WARNING:
We leave the comments on so people can work together to find the answer. As such, if you want to figure it out all by yourself, DON’T READ THE COMMENTS!

Also, with the knowledge that because others may publish their answers before you do, if you want to be able to search for information without accidentally seeing the answer somewhere, you can use the Google-a-Day site’s search tool, which will automatically filter out published answers, to give you a spoiler-free experience.

And now, without further ado, we give you…

TODAY’S PUZZLE:

The famous tourist attraction named after Sir Benjamin Hall is not the largest of its kind in its city. Where will you find the one with that distinction?

YESTERDAY’S ANSWER (mouseover to see):

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