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In lugnet.org.ca.rtltoronto, Steve Hassenplug writes:
> Some day, you're going to make a great dad. NOT. :)
They're not his kids. Now on the other hand, watching Chris handle his own
children will be a hoot. "Boutros-Boutros! You get cleaning your room now!"
> I must point out something interesting that I found in the Lafayette Lego >Robotics Club. It's very common to have a kid and his dad show up for a >meeting, then the next meeting, the kid has a Mindstorms set, then the next >meeting, the dad also has a set. But that really doesn't matter, here.
Trust me, we do the same--we've helped sell a LOT of Mindstorms systems over
the years. There's a couple of differences though-one, we're not out to
push Lego. I used to be part of (oh, and here comes out the horrible truth)
an Amiga user group. And most of the time the people would try and convince
others they should buy an Amiga or Toaster, not help other existing Amiga
users who'd come for help or to learn new things to do. Effectively, we
felt we had to be Commodore Canada's marketing arm-yet we weren't really
good or qualified representatives.
We're not out to sell or push Lego, even if it's a side effect of what we do
and we like the product. In fact, there are people in the group who hate
and don't about Lego, but are there for the design challenge alone.
The second difference is that we're not out to provide experiences for
people as a direct goal. More on this...
> At our meetings, I spend a lot of time explaining my robots to kids that >can't otherwise figure out how they work. That stuff doesn't happen at >rtlToronto. That was nice.
No, we certainly do do that, and it's a major part of what we do. We had a
light day with rtl12, but on a larger event, one of the major draws is
accessibility of asking people questions. The major difference is that we
can't deliver engineered, valuable experiences for people, meaning, we're
not teachers, educators or child care professionals, so we we don't get into
the business of teaching robotics or even helping kids into it by holding
structured events for them and providing them the hands on instruction,
materials and other requirements to give them something out of it. There
are already businesses in Toronto that do this, and I'm sure they do a good job.
We don't want to be the equivalent of day care or baby sitting (which we've
been referred to once early on), and we don't want to be teachers or
instructors running a special course (because we can't possibly deliver
something of quality) so we do what we can, within a limited scope-which is
to offer advice and explain what we're up to.
Calum
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: rtl 13...
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| In lugnet.org.ca.rtltoronto, Calum Tsang writes: <snip> (...) And the 'have fun' factor--don'tforget how important that is... When Rob brings in his 1 to 4 axle multiplexor, there's neat-o stuff for ya! When Iain shows off his Tiji 'bot--awesome! (...) (22 years ago, 12-Nov-02, to lugnet.org.ca.rtltoronto)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: rtl 13...
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| (...) Some day, you're going to make a great dad. NOT. :) (...) I can see good reasons for both (kids or not). It's kind of like the 'custom sensor' argument. I could argue either side. I must point out something interesting that I found in the (...) (22 years ago, 12-Nov-02, to lugnet.org.ca.rtltoronto)
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