A chocolate cake has candles, a chocolate almond coating and a small chip, about the size of the palm of your hand. This technological device has a button that, when pressed, sings the happy birthday song. It also has a marquee that spells out a wish of happiness to the honoree.
This type of development was created by 11-year-old students in the fifth year of school at the Uruguayan American School thanks to the importation of Micro Bits (microcomputers), a revolutionary technology in the United Kingdom that teaches children to program and that Uruguay imported due to the interest of a teacher.
What are they? They are chips, four by five centimeters, with LED lights, two buttons, an accelerometer and a compass. Students can program it to display numbers, letters and other symbols (a heart, for example) by connecting the little device to a computer. On the PC, students execute commands: they choose what they want the device to do and adapt it to its usefulness.
Another example was the making of a toy guitar. The idea is that this object can be used by young children as a form of entertainment. They also developed a Lego car which makes the typical sound when starting a real vehicle. And they are also working on an interactive book: it is a text which in each page the microcomputer will emit a sound according to what is narrating the story.
With Micro Bit, students can perform more complex tasks, according to the challenges set by the student. In fact, it could control a DVD player or be an input to manufacture traditional remote controls for video games, according to the BBC.
This Uruguayan class had access to 10 microcomputers to work with. The teacher only showed them the example of the guitar and the rest of the inventions were driven by the students themselves.
«Las personas que se quedaron sin trabajo podrían utilizar esto para tener un ingreso», comentó uno de los alumnos.
How they arrived.
The idea came from the British news channel BBC, which has a technology development division.
It is now led by the non-profit Micro Bit Educational Foundation, and is supported by tech giants such as Microsoft, Samsung and Cisco.
These small devices were completed in July 2015 and began to be distributed to more than one million children in the UK free of charge. As of this year, the foundation is giving them to schools in the United States and China. However, they can be purchased for $16.
Sylvia Fojo, profesora uruguaya de Ciencias de la Computación de estos alumnos, viajó a Inglaterra y conoció esta tecnología. Enamorada con el proyecto, pidió a sus creadores si podía acceder a una muestra para poder dárselos a niños de Uruguay. Le obsequiaron una muestra. «Somos el primer país de Sudamérica que los recibimos. Somos pioneros en la región», dice orgullosa.
Según Fojo, el interés es cambiar el concepto de la educación por «hágalo usted mismo» y que los niños se sientan más innovadores y productivos a la hora de ir a clase.
«Nuestro objetivo es llegar a 100 millones de personas con Micro Bit y cambiar sus vidas con la tecnología», dijo a la BBC Zach Shelby, nuevo director de la fundación.
British girls interested in technology.
The BBC surveyed 147 girls before they received these microcomputers and another 208 schoolgirls, from a different group, after they were given these devices.
El 23% de las menores que no habían interactuado con esta tecnología dijeron que estudiarían informática en el futuro. Cuando se les preguntó a las que sí utilizaron la Micro Bit, el 39% afirmó que «definitivamente» trabajarían en este rubro cuando sean grandes. La fundación tiene interés en fomentar el entusiasmo del tema en niñas.
Source: El País
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