CANVAS

2018.08.16
[Report] “MIRAI SUMMER CAMP 2018” Programming Workshop

From a CANVAS Facebook post

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We held a three-day programming workshop from August 11–13 as part of the annual “MIRAI SUMMER CAMP 2018” kids’ workshop, organized by Mori Building.
This year, we once again welcomed Eric and Mr. Murai from the MIT Media Lab, and together with Professor Abe from Aoyama Gakuin University, we delivered a special three-day program.

For the first two days, under the theme of “Building a City,” we held a workshop where participants used Pyonky to develop templates for plots of land assigned to each group, ultimately working together to create a single city.
While looking out at the city from the venue and listening to talks on urban planning from Mori Building staff, the groups discussed ideas and developed their cities.
They used cameras to bring their creations to life, built mechanisms that allowed users to enter buildings by touching them, and added features like a zoo, a campground, a lake, and a spaceship. In the end, the city—which everyone combined into a single whole—became a uniquely creative place unlike anything we’d ever seen.

On the third day, the focus shifted completely: we combined Scratch with motors and sensors to build a mechanical device where balls roll in a chain reaction.

When a ball rolling over from the neighboring group hit a switch, an animation of a ball moving on the computer screen would start.When that animation ended, a motor would activate, passing the baton to the next ball and keeping the motion going. After countless rounds of trial and error and teamwork, the project culminated in a huge cheer when the ball finally crossed the finish line.

It was a jam-packed three-day workshop filled with experiences you don’t get to have very often!