Well, the new maker kit from hardware firm littleBits is for your children to rule ‘their’ room, not yours. Thankfully!
The Rule Your Room Kit follows in the footsteps of the company’s other electronics kits for children, with the theme this time being inventions for their bedroom.
“Create touch-activated inventions to control your stuff,” is the way the company describes the kit on its website. “Build science, engineering, art and math skills as you problem-solve and invent.”
The kit is accompanied by a 76-page “invention guidebook” to help children get up and running with the kit, if they need some ideas about what to build. There is also a littleBits Invent app for Android and iOS to give children more inspiration.
I love the open-ended nature of this kit: littleBits even suggests it can be used to add “superpowers” to other toys like Lego, while stressing that everything kids build can be deconstructed into its component parts ready for a new invention.
Some of the ideas on its website look really fun too, from a burglar buzzer and carrot control pad for a laptop through to a programmable pop-up puppet and a miniature safe.
There’s a lot of talk in the tech world about “the internet of things” – the fact that a growing number of devices around our home will be connected both to the internet and to one another.
For now, this isn’t quite mainstream, even if the hardware is making their way into more of our homes. But our children will be living in a world surrounded by dozens of networked devices, and something like this Rule Your Room kit is a stepping stone towards understanding that environment. With puppets!
It also appeals to me as an off-screen activity: actually building physical objects, to complement the digital play my children are getting on tablets and games consoles.
The Rule Your Room Kit costs £99.99, which may make it more of a birthday or Christmas present idea than a casual purchase for parents. Still, if you’ve tried it – or something similar – let us know what you think by posting a comment.