As promised, here is the next photo continuing the Indoor/Outdoor species theme…while I spend some off-grid time with family.
What I am reading: If you’re considering adding an Amazon Echo Dot Kids Edition to your home, Consumer Reports drills down into the privacy tradeoffs of the device in the article What Parents Need to Know About the Amazon Echo Dot Kids Edition by writer Allen St. John.
Connected Camps writer Matthew Farber explores the Echo Dot Kids Edition from the perspective of a parent of 7-year-old in his article, Family Life with Virtual Assistants: A Review of Echo Dots Kids Edition. The Connected Camps people approach technology and kids from a philosophy very much influenced by folks like Seymour Papert and Mitch Resnick—kids need to be creating the technologies they use, not just consuming technologies. In the last section of his review—Making Virtual Assistants—Matthew offers links to Chatbots for Good, a “free online course from IBM Watson for kids to build chatbots that evoke empathy.” (Little to no background knowledge is required.) If you’re looking for a hands-on project exploring virtual assistants, this could be a good one. Do let me know if you try it out. Write me (using my contact form) about your experience and I’ll schedule a video chat with you.
