ITP Techblog

You know what they say, you never really know something until you teach it? Well that was me and the five nervous looking Microsoft staffers I took to Manurewa Intermediate last week. Jumping headfirst into the challenge of teaching a crowd of excited kids.

We showed the kids what goes on inside a computer by playing Pacman (sorta), but more importantly, we showed them how much fun it is to do things in tech. How something like a video game can be boiled down to a series of commands between different bits of a computer.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, don't worry, come along to an OMGTech! workshop and i'll take you through it too. It's not rocket science, but hopefully it could lead to creating a few kids capable of it!

In December, we will officially launch this exciting new initiative and your company needs to be a part of it. I know that as a reader of the ITP blog, you work for a tech company, you might even own the tech company. We need YOU.

We need you to show the next generation that "wow" moment. Remember that moment in your lives? I remember it. I was only ten years old. I had a Pre-Computer 1000 and I was given a magazine with a bunch of code in it. It promised me that if I typed each line of the code into my computer I would get a text-based adventure game. So I switched my computer to BASIC mode and typed it in, one painstaking line at a time. The entire time, I was dubious that it wasn't just a waste of my life. Then it worked… I got the tiny blinking cursor, and it was like magic, I could type in commands and I could play my game.

For some of the kids that we deal with, they don't have any gear. They don't have access to tech, and they don't have access to the techy books that can give them this information. Most of all, they don't have access to people like you.

Here at OMGTech! we're not worried about our kids. Our kids are fine. They understand that if they don't get something, they can search for it online and get the answer straight away. They understand that they can learn whatever they want to. See whatever they want to, all at the click of a mouse button.

We need to take this to the other kids. The ones that don't have that. And we need you to do it, For you it's only one day, but for them it can change their entire life. Will you join us?

Viv Chandra is a volunteer with OMGTech! and occasional/annual Techblog guest poster