Cognitive Age - Brain Age Parody, DustOrMagic Conference

People play "Brain Age" during my presentation using laser pointers for input.

Every year I attend a conference called "Dust or Magic." This conference reviews the best interactive products developed for children over the past year. It's attended by many noteworthy electronic toy developers, video game developers, child researchers, and content developers. This year I was asked to be the closing speaker and I decided to do something really different.

My presentation was delivered through a parody of the successful Nintendo DS learning game called "Brain Age." Before the presentation started, I handed out laser pointers to the 60 or so conference attendees. I instructed the audience to participate with my presentation through the use of these laser pointers.

The content of my presentation covered a variety of topics touching on children and interactive products, including: 1.) children and the time they spend with objects that have screens, 2.) revenue trends in the toy and video game markets, 3.) alternatives to user input in technology toys, 4.) opportunities to be found within the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) initiative out of MIT's Media Lab, 5.) how best for large corporations to get technology traction in the living room, and 6.) a discussion about the idea of childhood and what we can do collectively to improve childhood for children everywhere (I called this part Childhood 2.0).

Within the game Brain Age, the user is often asked write down an answer to a question on the game screen using a stylus pen... a question like "What did you have for breakfast last Monday?". I asked my audience the question "What can you do to make childhood better for children?" Each member of the audience wrote an idea down on an index card, then, at the end of the presentation, I asked the entire audience to go outside, where balloons were handed out for the audience members to attach their index card to. We then released our ideas out into the world.

My presentation is posted on YouTube in 6 parts for a complete runtime length of 34'14".

For more info, visit:
http://www.360kid.com/blog/
http://www.dustormagic.com
http://www.brainage.com

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• BrainAge
• Brain
• Age
• Dust
• or
• Magic
• DustOrMagic
• Cognitive
• CognitiveAge
• presentation
• children
• toys
• video
• games
• 360KID

[straylor]

Thanks! Contact me directly and I have another presentation I did with the Wii you may be interested in. -Scott

[Mangotropolis]

That was literally, the best presentation I've ever seen. xD I've never been much of a speaker myself.. But If I was, I'd totally do something like that.

Even if the video quality.. sucks, Thanks for putting the presentation on youtube. : ) The end was fantastic, what a great way to inspire.

[sugarhi911]

thats awosme!

[ukigal]

Bravo! Engaging, collaborative, informative, and gave me ideas of how to invigorate my presentations.