Skip to Content
Uncategorized

A Robot with Pom-Poms

The Media Lab toy makes programming children’s play.
September 1, 2005

The decades-long partnership between the Media Lab and Lego has spawned a new company and an innovative robotic toy that blends craft activities with engineering. This fall, the Montreal-based Playful Invention Company (Pico) will launch Cricket, a programmable computer about the size of a candy bar.

Cricket, which comes with kid-friendly software, is part of a craft kit that contains familiar art-class materials. In addition to pipe cleaners, fuzzy pom-poms, felt, and popsicle sticks, there are Lego bricks and electronic components such as motors, lights, and sensors. With Cricket, kids can, say, build a xylophone out of pieces of fruit, programming it to play different notes when fruit chunks are touched with a metal wire to complete an electric circuit. “It’s a balance between traditional craft activities and engineering,” says Media Lab professor Mitchel Resnick, SM ‘88, PhD ‘92, whose team invented Cricket.

The Pico Blocks software that accompanies Cricket gives kids an easy introduction to programming. Instead of struggling with a complicated computer language, kids click, drag, and snap together blocks of commands, controlling how and when a motor should start or a light should go off. The on-screen command blocks look more like puzzle pieces than code.

Already, a number of science museums across the United States have test-driven Cricket during creative-invention workshops. Karen Wilkinson, a science educator at San Francisco’s Exploratorium, says that she is especially pleased to see that Cricket appeals to a more diverse group of kids than do straight robotics or programming classes. – By Tracy Staedter

Keep Reading

Most Popular

DeepMind’s cofounder: Generative AI is just a phase. What’s next is interactive AI.

“This is a profound moment in the history of technology,” says Mustafa Suleyman.

What to know about this autumn’s covid vaccines

New variants will pose a challenge, but early signs suggest the shots will still boost antibody responses.

Human-plus-AI solutions mitigate security threats

With the right human oversight, emerging technologies like artificial intelligence can help keep business and customer data secure

Next slide, please: A brief history of the corporate presentation

From million-dollar slide shows to Steve Jobs’s introduction of the iPhone, a bit of show business never hurt plain old business.

Stay connected

Illustration by Rose Wong

Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review

Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.

Thank you for submitting your email!

Explore more newsletters

It looks like something went wrong.

We’re having trouble saving your preferences. Try refreshing this page and updating them one more time. If you continue to get this message, reach out to us at customer-service@technologyreview.com with a list of newsletters you’d like to receive.