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Caution: Brains, hands at work

Can science be cool? A preview of a new business proves that it can. Imagine children building robots, creating video games, learning Web design, launching rockets.

By HELEN ANNE TRAVIS
Published December 23, 2005

Their feet dangled from the computer chairs. Their small hands barely fit over the mouse. The monitors loomed high above their heads. But when it came to technology, these kids were pros.

Eighteen students from five area elementary schools filled the media center of Cimino Elementary School on Tuesday to participate in a winter technology camp put on by TechPlayzone, a new company in Brandon. The five-day camp was a preview of the activities TechPlayzone will offer when it opens at the corner of Boyette Road and Bell Shoals Road in January.

TechPlayzone is the brainchild of Desh Bagley, 35, a USF computer science graduate whose own interest in technology was sparked as a seventh-grader learning BASIC computer programming software.

"I looked around; there were plenty of opportunities for kids in gymnastics, karate and music," Bagley said. "But there was nothing for kids interested in technology."

In May, Bagley and her husband, Daryl, a computer science graduate of Texas A&M University, came up with an idea. They would create a place where children could build robots, create video games, and learn Web design and basic computer skills, all while having fun.

"While they are playing, I get to introduce them to engineering concepts," Desh Bagley said.

The campers spent the morning split into teams. Half of the students learned PowerPoint. They created presentations on their pets, their parents or their favorite animal. They searched the computer's clip-art files for the perfect picture. The other half worked on creating circuits. Light bulbs clicked on and off and yellow fans whirred in the air at the children's command.

"Where's the engine?" Kamali Culpepper, 9, asked her companion, Niyah Lowell, 9. The girls were making a circuit that would play Happy Birthday once they could locate its power source.

The children had to leave their computers and circuit boards for a lesson on rockets.

"But can I please finish?" asked Dana Brooks, 8. Her PowerPoint presentation on dogs was not yet done.

But she and her peers were whisked away by David Ciardiello, owner of Mad Science, a science education program. Mad Science and TechPlayzone teamed up for the weeklong camp.

Wearing white lab coats and thick black glasses, Ciardiello and his partner, Hurricane Aly (also known as Alyssa Rucker), used balloons to demonstrate how rockets launch against the force of gravity. The students were then led outside to see the real thing.

The young crowd cheered for the first three rocket launches.

Kent Basham, 10, pointed out a jet in the sky. Looks like we aren't the only ones launching rockets, he said.

The last rocket refused to take off. Ciardiello turned the problem into a n opportunity for more lessons. The children gathered around him as he explained that the rocket's problem was a faulty igniter.

The students returned to the media center and switched spots; those who had been creating PowerPoint presentations were now building circuits. Little hands snapped battery packets in place. Young minds created electricity.

"Instead of being consumers, they are creators," Bagley said. "Once you expose them to opportunities, there's no telling what they can do."

Helen Anne Travis can be reached at 661-2439 or htravis@sptimes.com

For more information, go to www.techplayzone.com/techplay

[Last modified December 22, 2005, 09:29:03]