Arts and Crafts for the Digital Age
“Who wants to weave potholders when you can build a robot instead?” runs the tagline for a NY Times article this week (“Arts and Crafts for the Digital Age”). It is a provocative question, and one that is not really addressed in the article itself, but I find it sad that the natural assumption is that working with robots or creating projects that flash and beep is somehow more satisfying than a low-tech craft such as weaving and knitting.
At first blush, the PicoCricket Kit resembles a plastic box of arts and crafts supplies, crammed with colored felt, pipe cleaners, cotton and Styrofoam balls.
But this is a craft kit for the digital age. It includes electronic sensors, motors, sound boxes, connecting cables and a palm-size, battery-powered, programmable computer.
By combining the traditional materials with high-tech ones, children as young as 9 can invent interactive jewelry, fanciful creatures that dance, musical sculptures and more, said Mitchel Resnick, an assistant professor of learning research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab.
I am by no means a Luddite: Much of my work is centered around the Internet, after all, and I see the value in teaching children about programming and even robotics. As we journey further into the digital age, such knowledge will surely prove valuable, or even essential. But are the rewards reaped from building these kits so much greater than those gained from knitting a sweater, or weaving a runner for the table?
One of the PicoCricket guides…instructs users on how to turn a birthday cake made mostly of felt, cardboard and drinking straws into an ingeniously interactive one, a cake that can be programmed to shut off the lights in its electrical candles when someone blows on them.
After a day or two of blowing, I would think interest in these interactive candles would be snuffed out. The process may be instructive, but the results seem sadly disposable.
I suppose that younger children need some framework within which they may work: An empty canvas can seem daunting. And Mr. Resnick certainly encourages creativity, saying, “The hope is to get people started with simple projects and let their imaginations run wild.”
Let us hope as well that the child who learns to program a chip also learns to use hammer and handsaw, or that the felt that is integrated into the dancing cake is self-made.