The Case for Useless Robots

Lego Mindstorms Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lego_Mindstorms

Lego Mindstorms Projects

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/10-jaw-dropping-lego-mindstorms-projects/

Article about 2019 VEX Worlds

https://www.kitv.com/story/39780374/top-school-robotics-teams-head-to-2019-vex-worlds

SIMONE GIERTZ’S LATEST INVENTION: A ROBOT THAT SPILLS SOUP ALL OVER HER

https://nerdist.com/simone-giertz-soup-serving-robot/

Seven absurd inventions set to change the world forever

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/inventor-simone-giertz-designer/index.html

Gas Stations in Space

Robotic Refueling Mission NASA facts and many sets of press releases

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1787
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/spx16-research
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/rrm3

Press Conference Kennedy Space Flight Center December 4, 2018 Jill McGuire (Broadcast on NASA TV)

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/issrdc_2013-07-17-1600_mcguire2013.pdf

Blurry Circles

History of SketchUp

https://mastersketchup.com/history-of-sketchup/

SketchUp for Kids

http://learningfromcities.blogspot.com/2014/01/sketchup-for-kids.html

Teaching 3D with ModelMetricks

http://www.3dvinci.net/forteachersmodelmetricks.htm

How to Create Your First 3D Model in SketchUp: A Beginner-Friendly Introduction

https://i.materialise.com/blog/en/first-3d-model-in-sketchup-tutorial/

Finding, making, and using incredible SketchUp textures

https://blog.sketchup.com/article/finding-making-and-using-incredible-sketchup-textures

File Systems

Comparison of Linux file systems along with a good explanation of journaling

https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/33552/htg-explains-which-linux-file-system-should-you-choose/

An old Ars Technica piece on the history of file systems with fantastic history sections

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems/

An article about why USB sticks use FAT32

https://www.howtogeek.com/177529/htg-explains-why-are-removable-drives-still-using-fat32-instead-of-ntfs/

Chicago USO Event

Online Coding Camps in Minecraft

https://blog.connectedcamps.com/online-coding-camp-in-minecraft/

Get Started with a Raspberry Pi

https://www.imore.com/how-get-started-using-raspberry-pi

Minecraft Story Mode

Minecraft Story Mode

https://telltale.com/series/minecraft-story-mode/

Adventure Maps

http://www.minecraftmaps.com/adventure-maps

How To Install a Minecraft Map

http://www.minecraftmaps.com/info/how-to-install-a-minecraft-map

C Programming Language

A tutorial on C by the author of a famous online book about network programming

https://beej.us/guide/bgc/html/single/bgc.html

A decent tutorial just on pointers

http://pw1.netcom.com/~tjensen/ptr/pointers.htm

Telling Interactive Stories in Scratch

Our story so far

https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/256976067/

How to make stories in Scratch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJO-oI8dBTs

How to use Scratch for digital storytelling

https://www.commonsense.org/education/blog/how-to-use-scratch-for-digital-storytelling

For teachers

http://www.literacyfromscratch.org.uk/teaching/creating.htm

Make your own virtual pet in Scratch

https://wecancodeit.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Make-Your-Own-Virtual-Pet-in-Scratch-r1.pdf

Scratch resources for teachers

https://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/scratch-programming-classroom-activity-ideas.shtml

Cardboard Circuits

WikiHow: Making a Simple Electrical Circuit

https://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Simple-Electrical-Circuit

Electrical Circuit Projects for Elementary Students

https://learning-center.homesciencetools.com/article/circuit-science-projects-for-elementary/
https://www.shareitscience.com/2017/09/DIY-paper-circuit-board-games-STEM.html

An Electrical Circuit Quiz Board

https://www.teachingtreasures.com.au/K-10Projects/quizboard/quizboard.htm

How do Multiplayer Games Really Work?

About Game Servers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_server

Client-Server Networks vs Peer-to-Peer Networks

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/understanding-the-differences-between-client-server-and-peer-to-peer-networks/

What Gamers Need To Know About Network Synchronization In Games

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/gamers-network-synchronization-games/

Paper Clips Run Amok

Paperclip Maximizer

https://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Paperclip_maximizer

AI and the Paperclip Problem

https://voxeu.org/article/ai-and-paperclip-problem

The Way the World Ends: Not a Bang But a Paperclip

https://www.wired.com/story/the-way-the-world-ends-not-with-a-bang-but-a-paperclip/

FizzBuzz

About the modulus operator

https://www.khanacademy.org/computing/computer-science/cryptography/modarithmetic/a/what-is-modular-arithmetic

A detailed article about FizzBuzz

https://www.tomdalling.com/blog/software-design/fizzbuzz-in-too-much-detail/

Twenty Ways to Fizz Buzz

https://ditam.github.io/posts/fizzbuzz/

A complex mathematical solution to FizzBuzz

https://read.klipse.tech/the-most-elegant-implementation-of-fizzbuzz/

TIC-80 Maps and Music

Bruno’s platformer tutorial

https://medium.com/@btco_code/writing-a-platformer-for-the-tic-80-virtual-console-6fa737abe476

A neat, free, tracker for making chiptunes

http://deflemask.com/

Tutorial to make a simple platformer on the TIC-80

https://www.infinitelimit.net/article/simple-platformer-tic-80

Cell Towers

The First Cellular Phone

https://www.aarp.org/politics-society/history/info-2018/first-cell-phone-call.html

Invasive Species (disguised towers)

https://www.wired.com/2013/03/dillon-marsh-invasive-species/

How Cell Towers Work

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ct0wFde9XcI

How Cell Towers Work

https://wonderopolis.org/wonder/how-do-cell-towers-work

How Text Messages are Sent

https://lifehacker.com/this-video-explains-how-your-texts-are-sent-from-one-ph-1784867035

The Cell Phone Tower Debate

https://www.wired.com/2005/08/cell-phone-tower-debate-grows/

Triangle Generator

Introduction to Python

https://www.w3schools.com/python/python_intro.asp
https://kidscodecs.com/resources/programming/python/

Python for Kids

https://kidscodecs.com/python-for-kids/

About Loops

https://www.tutorialspoint.com/python/python_while_loop.htm
https://www.pythonforbeginners.com/control-flow-2/python-for-and-while-loops

More Python activities

https://kidscodecs.com/create-turtles-python/
https://kidscodecs.com/python-animation-bird-wave/

Requests and Responses

How to Inspect Web Page Elements

https://www.lifewire.com/get-inspect-element-tool-for-browser-756549

What is a Server?

https://www.lifewire.com/servers-in-computer-networking-817380
https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/server

HTTP Responses and Requests

https://wiki.kidzsearch.com/wiki/Hypertext_Transfer_Protocol

Browser caches

https://askleo.com/whats_a_browser_cache_how_do_i_clear_it_and_why_would_i_want_to/

Web browser history

https://kidscodecs.com/web-browser-history/

Chinese New Year Lantern

Lanterns Go High Tech

https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/inpictures/taiwan-lantern-festival-tradition-tech-180306063854438.html

History

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lantern_Festival

Video (in Mandarin Chinese)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3T29HMQ428A

Festivities

https://www.ourawesomeplanet.com/awesome/2018/03/taiwan-lantern-festival.html

Traditions

https://www.thebeijinger.com/blog/2018/02/02/celebrating-lantern-festival-beijing-traditions-and-lantern-fairs

DIY Paper and Wire Lantern (Instructables)

https://www.instructables.com/id/Paper-and-Wire-Lantern/

Atlas Institute Science and Art Education

https://www.colorado.edu/atlas/2017/08/10/lighting-way-science-and-art-education

Luminous Science

https://www.playfulcomputation.group/luminous-science.html

Laboratory for Playful Computation

https://www.playfulcomputation.group/

NeoPixel LEDs (individually addressable)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B018XAELE4/ref=od_aui_detailpages00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

micro:bit

https://uk.pi-supply.com/products/microbit?aelia_cs_currency=USD&feed_country=US&gclid=CjwKEAjwutXIBRDV7-SDvdiNsUoSJACIlTqltlEE-BbPdjgzEWv_A7qkXEW7RmkC0Bat4JiAP1XexhoCWX3w_wcB

micro:bit coding environment

https://microbit.org/

Lantern Light Festival

https://lanternlightfestival.com/

Man in the Middle Attacks

The Difference between HTTP and HTTPS

https://www.globalsign.com/en/blog/the-difference-between-http-and-https/

Should I Buy from This Site? How to Know if a Website is Secure

https://www.digicert.com/blog/buy-site-know-website-secure/

What is an SSL certificate?

https://us.norton.com/internetsecurity-how-to-ssl-certificates-what-consumers-need-to-know.html

Defend against Man in the Middle Attacks

https://www.networkworld.com/article/2180467/wireless/mit-researchers-craft-defense-against-wireless-man-in-middle-attacks.html