[HN Gopher] Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling ... ___________________________________________________________________ Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity It's the start of the holidays. My daughter is 11 y/o and I'm currently unemployed. I would like to do some projects with her that may interest her/us while enjoying the time together. Any suggestions/ ideas would be great! Author : mquarks Score : 307 points Date : 2022-07-03 06:38 UTC (1 days ago) | Barrera wrote: | You didn't mention anything she's interested in currently. | | Whatever it is follow it, no matter how frivolous or irrelevant | to future success these may seem. Participate. Really jump into | it in an unreasonable way. | | Things your children get really interested in have a way of | becoming interesting to an open-minded parent. Note that these | interest can come and go at the drop of a hat. That's part of the | fun! | memcg wrote: | I was unemployed for 10 months in 1998, so my kids were both | under 10. My now nearly 30 year old asked me yesterday to go to | the zoo like we did back then. Washington DC area had (has?) lots | of free things to do. They both remember fishing, hiking, biking, | exploring public transportation and just spending time together. | sq1020 wrote: | That's amazing! I have two under the age of five and I hope | they will still want to hang out with me when they're adults. | Sounds like you're a great parent . | guidoiaquinti wrote: | I've just found this | https://twitter.com/TansuYegen/status/1543534003520770052 in my | Twitter feed. I hope it can be useful. | nickysielicki wrote: | If she's into science and physics, I think that's a great age to | get her interested in radio. | | I recommend starting with an RTLSDR ($30 on Amazon) and a | homemade dipole. You can use an open source program called GQRX | to listen to it. This will be fun to just listen to local FM | radio, air traffic controllers, EMS/Police in your area if it's | not encrypted. | | If she seems interested and you want to go a bit further, buy a | block frequency upconverter (there's one on Amazon called "ham it | up" for ~$30) and make a large antenna for the 20M ham band. | You'll be able to pick up people from all over the country, and | if you do a good job on the antenna, all over the world. | | Most importantly, it's fun and you get to work with your hands. | You get to have fun trying to get ropes over trees in your yard | to hang the antenna high enough. You get to deal with the problem | of measuring out 60 feet of wire and cutting it. You have to | figure out what trees to hang the antenna on so that it's | pointing where you want to listen (not directly East, but | northeast due to the curvature of the earth, Google maps "measure | distance" can help give a vector). This is all done with a cheap | run of coax and speaker wire, no more than $40 in materials. | | If she's into it, you can get your ham radio technician license | for a $15 fee, and you can get two way radios on Amazon for the | VHF/UHF bands for $20 (baofeng UV5R). Fun to study for. | informisfun wrote: | When my daughter was a little younger than yours we took turns | writing and playing interactive fiction adventures. My first | story began with a neighborhood walk. You find what appears to be | a lost dog. You want to return it to its owner. Something is | written on its collar but it's frightened of you and retreats | when you try to get close to read it. How will you earn its | trust? | | http://inform7.com | walrus01 wrote: | a video game like Cities Skylines might not be the worst idea | ever. I remember being a 10/11 year old and playing the original | Simcity for PC... | Pakdef wrote: | bobobob420 wrote: | Fiction books | wryip wrote: | I started building one of these small wooden boats with my son | (9) in our garden: https://duckworks.com/mouse-plans/. He's very | engaged in the project, and receives lots of cheers from friends | and family. The book "Ultra simple boat building" explains all | the steps in detail. | otikik wrote: | Start making a list of things. It doesn't have to be definitive, | just a way to start the conversation. | | Once you have a long enough list, pull up a calendar and pick | dates for doing these things. Keep options open (e.g. don't buy | tickets to that concert too early) because you will have to | adjust the plan. | | Then hang the list and the calendar and review/revisit maybe once | per week. Add/remove activities from the list, plan them on the | calendar. Encourage her to decorate or personalise the plan. | | This serves multiple purposes. It involves her in the decision | making. Teaches how to organise time and how to plan. | Anticipation should build up naturally. She will like a plan that | she has done personally (IKEA effect) | | Have fun together! This opportunity to spend time with her will | be increasingly rare, treasure it | jeroenvlek wrote: | You are unemployed, so I cannot judge your financial means, but I | keep seeing this pop up in my feeds and it might be cool for you | and your daughter to build together: https://www.kiwico.com/ | tyrrvk wrote: | If you are in the US - public libraries are a wonderful resource | for kids to visit. | known wrote: | Guide her to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HowStuffWorks | Metacelsus wrote: | Kerbal Space Program! | | https://xkcd.com/1356/ | bjornlouser wrote: | If she has any interest in music then show her MuseScore | FerretFred wrote: | Maybe look at building up manual skills if possible. When my | daughter was 11 y/o I as doing a lot of DIY plumbing in the house | and I taught her to cut and bend (copper) pipes, and solder pipe | joints. We used a gas torch, much to the horror of my S.O, but it | was a useful skill learned and she got really good at it. | analog31 wrote: | I think learning to "think with your hands" is not a recognized | academic skill, but yet there's something real about it. | | If at all possible, teach her to ride a bike and to actually be | able to get around on one if your locale is suitable for it. | mikepurvis wrote: | My kids (11, 8, 5) all ride bikes, and are competent enough | to ride on the road on quieter streets. I've found it to be a | wonderful bonding experience, and also a growth opportunity | since they're learning to get around, read signs, navigate, | plus it's laying the groundwork for later independence. | MengerSponge wrote: | One of my professors (a Distinguished University Professor | and fellow of the American Physical Society) selects for | "ability to think with your hands". Successful | experimentalists know that building things that work is | _hard_ , and having experience with plumbing, soldering, etc. | really helps. | Spooky23 wrote: | Go fishing. There's something about hanging out by the water and | having a good time that is just special. Catching fish doesn't | really matter. | | Also, play cards. My kid and cousins are running a rummy | "tournament" as I type. | Gatsky wrote: | I've heard this from a couple of people - get her to dictate a | story to you while you type it up (assuming you can type faster | than she can). If it is long enough then you can send it off to a | book printing service and get 5 copies or something. It costs a | bit but the kids really get a kick out of it. You can design the | cover art with her as well if she is into that. | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | If you have any pets, make them the main characters in the | story. Anthropomorphize then. | rickspencer3 wrote: | I had great luck with Sparkfun Inventor's Kit. It came with an | Arduino, a bunch of sensors and effectors and a manual of | projects today went step by step to learn electronics and the | Arduino system. | wahnfrieden wrote: | Swift Playgrounds | throwawayffffas wrote: | Make a board game or pen and paper RPG. There's lot of stuff to | do, art, rules, making up lore. | rawbot wrote: | Maybe the rest of HN has a similar, better option, but I could | recommend LEGO Mindstorms. Eleven would be a good age to start | getting curious about robots and automation. You should of | course, help her with it, as it may be too complex for her to | handle alone at the start. | | It is pricey new, but you could get an older version used for | cheaper. | | There's also Nintendo Labo, for a similar, less expensive | version. | ArnoVW wrote: | LEGO Mindstorms is great, but it's amazingly expensive. | | They recently released LEGO Boost, which has some limitations | wrt Mindstorms, but you won't notice it unless you're doing | advanced stuff. Moreover, it has a great app. And it's one | third of the price of Mindstorms. | n4bz0r wrote: | Not quite the same thing, but, speaking of expensive parts. | This post seems like the place to share the findings. | | As a kid, I would absolutely love to have some of the | Lego(-compatible) motors [0] that are now available on the | Chinese market for a few bucks a piece. | | Some of the 'regular' sets [1] look quite tempting, too. In the | bang for the buck department, at least. | | [0] https://aliexpress.com/item/1005004221490793.html | | [1] https://aliexpress.com/item/1005003548518388.html | paulcole wrote: | Give her a can of beans! | InfiniteRand wrote: | 11 years is a good age for projects, like building a toy city | from cardboard boxes, writing a long story, building a puppet | theatre etc. When I was 11, I half-started a lot of projects like | that, but usually lost attention pretty quick. I think things | would be different if my dad was working on it with me. | | Or to take something I did actually do with my father and | enjoyed, going for long walks together. | ericol wrote: | I don't think what to do is as important as to how to do it. As | you are unemployed, you probably have a lot of free time, while | at the same time having to do house chores. | | What I would do, is establish a more or less organized schedule, | but letting her know that you will set apart a certain amount of | time daily to play with her. What to do with then, is up to her. | | Also, try to get her involved with the house chores. As long as | it doesn't feel like work - obviously don't make her work - | she'll also enjoy those tasks, while at the same time learning, | getting used to it, and enjoying her time with you. | Wowfunhappy wrote: | I don't know if you're looking for something less technology | focused, but--have you ever seen Scratch? I teach classes in | Scratch to kids professionally, and I happen to think it's a | really excellent tool. Kids enjoy it a lot, and it teaches a mode | of thinking that I consider essential for the modern world. | | https://scratch.mit.edu/ | | My company's curriculum is all public. I frankly don't love all | of the projects, but some are pretty darn good. A few of my | favorites: | | Ghostbusters (Level 1): | https://coding.space/launchpad/GqrsER3FnGgSZwyTYgkkDdyyty92-... | | Apple Catcher (Level 2): | https://coding.space/launchpad/703c1a8d-0c55-4bcb-b3ef-832ee... | | Flappy Bird (Level 3): | https://coding.space/launchpad/703c1a8d-0c55-4bcb-b3ef-832ee... | | This isn't necessarily the be-all end-all way to teach Scratch | (there are also official tutorials you can check out), but | especially if you as the parent have some coding knowledge, they | might be a fun way to learn together. Our philosophy is to | provide a goal and some direction (for students who need it) | without ever saying exactly what to do. This forces students to | learn how to figure things out on their own. | | Tiny note, notwithstanding my earlier praise of Scratch, it has | one very frustrating design quirk that you might want to be aware | of: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31932147 | vivegi wrote: | Play. | | I remember playing with my father who passed away a few years ago | simple word games. We called that Word-building, a game where one | player says a word and the next one has to say to word starting | with the last letter of the previous word eg: Apple, Egg, Goose, | Elephant and so on. Occasionally my father would say an uncommon | word and when I asked him what it was, he casually pointed me to | the dictionary, asked me to bring it and taught me how to use it. | | Another game we played then is what we called Name-Place-Animal- | Thing where we pick a letter and then have to say a proper name, | a place name, an animal and a thing that starts with that letter. | For eg: V -> Victor, Virginia, Viper and Vase. | | Kids that age love to learn new words and concepts. | | Paper-folding and origami are also great to spend time together. | faster wrote: | My daughter was a little younger than that when we bought a pile | of dead DVD drives and disassembled them. Then we build a little | driver circuit and hooked a laser diode to it. She was so excited | to come home and take those drives apart after school. She | learned about how things come apart, the importance of eye | protection, how to use basic hand tools, and a little bit about | electronics (I am self-taught and my knowledge is super uneven so | I'm not the best teacher for that). | nrjames wrote: | I did the Mark Rober Creative Engineering class with my daughters | and we all had a blast. We made a apple slicing guillotine, a | s'more assembly machine, and a robotic arduino-controlled bird. | We finished the class 18 months ago and they still talk about it. | They were 7 and 9 yrs old at the time. The key is to not do it | all at once but to pace out the videos and exercises and truly do | when he teaches, from brainstorming, to prototyping, etc. | | https://studio.com/mark-rober-engineering | noisy_boy wrote: | Just that day I was showing Arduino to my daughter - I know | very little about hardware so we would be both learning if we | went with the starter kit (that fact made her happy). Thanks | for sharing this. | nrjames wrote: | Sure! I ended up getting the official arduino starter kit and | the Elagoo (?) kit Rober mentions in the class list. The | Elagoo one is more versatile, but they complemented each | other. A lot of learning, for us, came from finding the | Elagoo and official projects and tutorials and completing | them. There are many good guides and examples, but you may | have to dig a bit on the Elagoo and official sites to find | them. We had a lot of fun! It's similar to legos, in a sense, | with a little more thinking required and some cool | interactive results. | mhb wrote: | Use sticks to make fire, then other Primitive Technology | activities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9n9rqb-lvY | | Carve a spoon: https://www.leevalley.com/en- | us/shop/tools/sets/111261-spoon... | ChuckMcM wrote: | Let her guide you? I somehow managed to raise three daughters to | adulthood with their curiosity and love of learning intact, there | is a luck component of course. | | An easy, not much equipment needed, activity is drawing. What I | like about it is that it incentivizes visualizing things (not | everyone can, and that is okay, drawing what you are looking at | can be fun too!) and since I generally was not great at drawing | nobody felt they were too "bad" at it to participate. | | A program the girls took advantage of was Reikes Nature studies. | One of the things they do is catalog as many things they can see | at a nearby wooded park. When I read Feynman's discussion of how | the ants became a source of fascination for him I realized that | there are zillions of questions right in front in our eyes if we | think about it. Or perhaps more accurately wonder why things are | the way they are. | | David Macaulay has a great book called "The Way Things Work." | (and it has funny illustrations of mammoths figuring things out) | Reading it together and talking about how things work led to | interesting questions which led to interesting projects to see if | we could answer those questions. | | And generally "active reading" where you read together and talk | about the characters in the story, what they might be feeling, | why they might be acting the way they are, and how things might | be different if something happened in a different way than it | does in the book. | | Perhaps the best idea to be genuinely interested in what they are | interested in, rather than trying to get them interested in | something you are interested in. That may seem obvious but it | wasn't to me at first. | | My eldest and I started doing piano lessons at that age, in part | because the music was interesting and in part because I always | wanted something "safe" we could talk about (and music was always | a good topic of conversation). | [deleted] | matthew16550 wrote: | You both might enjoy an Australian TV series called "Curiosity | Show". | | It is science / technology focused and aimed at kids around your | daughters age. | | They explain a lot of fun sciencey things, puzzles and magic | tricks that can be made at home from very easy to find parts. | | The YT channel has over 1000 short videos : | https://youtube.com/c/CuriosityShow | | It was made in the 70s and 80s yet much is still totally relevant | today. Even the occasional thing that is out of date might be a | fun history discussion. | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | Just watched two of them, very cool. I had no idea that animas | and birds that eat fish whole always always always eat the fish | head-first. | alfor wrote: | Mine just installed planet zoo (20$ on steam) and she is having a | blast. | | I am not for video games in general, but I am surprise at the | amount of planning, learning involved in this. | | We also bought a used cricut and she made some cute stuff with | it, but there is a computer drawing side to those projects. | | You can build stuff together, learn to draw, etc. | stevekemp wrote: | Being unemployed probably means you don't have a huge budget, but | some for our child I've tried to do a little bit of "everything" | to see what he enjoys. | | When I ask him what he wants to do he says "I don't know", so I | say "We're going swimming in the sea", "Lets plant some seeds", | "Today we're cooking / sewing", "Lets pick a spot on the map and | go visit it by bus/tram", or "Lets draw pokemon evolving". | | (maps are kinda fascinating to him. I often ask him what he | thinks he can see if he were stood on top of a particular local | landmark - he has a good sense of direction, but no idea of | scale/distance.) | | Over time I've learned a bit about what he likes, but he's young | and fickle enough that some ideas are good one day and terrible | the next. (For example he loves swimming and playing football, | but when I put him in age-appropriate classes he refused to take | part - "I don't like doing what the teacher says, why can't I | just have fun and play about?") | | Electronics is interesting to him, as is listening to "Daddy | music". (Goth/Rock/Metal.) "Mommy music" doesn't appeal as much | which I find a little fascinating. Does he genuinely prefer my | music, or is it something about me? I know that he behaves and | plays differently depending on who he's spending time with .. | mlyle wrote: | > Electronics is interesting to him, as is listening to "Daddy | music". (Goth/Rock/Metal.) "Mommy music" doesn't appeal as much | which I find a little fascinating. Does he genuinely prefer my | music, or is it something about me? I know that he behaves and | plays differently depending on who he's spending time with .. | | There's not an A or B answer to this kind of question. Parents | are influential, and the response to parents' recommendations | and preferences are inseparable from the actual relationship. | | My oldest son is now 13. Most of what I played for him isn't so | interesting anymore. But we spent a couple years earlier in his | life where we went to my workshop and I'd play Kraftwerk and | he'd get one on one time and we'd do "serious" things. | Kraftwerk is still treasured to him, and I doubt that it's | because Kraftwerk was more intrinsically appealing to him than | those other things... | | Or, conversely, my dad always listened to music from rat pack | performers. It was a subject of curiosity when i was 6-11... | awful when I was 12-17 and had a terrible relationship with my | dad, and now it's evolved to a mild appreciation tinged with | nostalgia. If I was still mad at my dad I think it would be | hard to like it. | noisy_boy wrote: | > When I ask him what he wants to do he says "I don't know" | | I had to reach the age of 22 and get the chance to use | computers for the first time in my life to figure that out ... | he will be ok :) | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | > Does he genuinely prefer my music, or is it something about | me? | | This is a very insightful question. Although I can't answer for | your child, I know mine takes an interest in almost anything | that i show love or curiosity for. If I express love for a song | (not with words but by singing it, dancing to it, etc), he will | ask to hear it again and again. | | Does his mother show a love for music and specific songs? | stevekemp wrote: | I see the same thing in other areas, definitely. | | He got his first watch, way before he could tell the time, | because he was so interested in my watch collection and kept | pleading to wear one "just like daddy does". | | But yes I think we both enjoy music, and I think we both sing | (badly) to our favourite tracks now and again - usually he | tells us to stop! | unixhero wrote: | Hey I will use these tactics in my wife, thanks :) | mabbo wrote: | > When I ask him what he wants to do he says "I don't know" | | A blogger I read a while ago (I completely forget who) wrote | something about this that stuck with me: if you ask a kid if | they want pancakes or cereal for breakfast, they'll pick one | and be delighted. If you ask them what they'd like to have | without presenting options, this can lead to a complete | meltdown. Picking from infinite options, forcing them to think | all of them up and then turn down n-1 of them... It can be too | much for a kid. | | Give kids a small number of diverse options where you also | approve of all of them. Everyone is pretty happy with the | decision. (This system maybe also works really well with | adults.) | circlefavshape wrote: | Sounds plausible, but IME doesn't actually work with real | kids | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | Works well with mine. He's got 3 choices most mornings. | mcv wrote: | It doesn't with mine, I'm afraid. I frequently give them | 1-3 options and they shoot them all down (even | pancakes?!). Eventually I give up and ask them what they | want, and they still don't know, or just want to eat | nothing. | splintercell wrote: | > Eventually I give up and ask them what they want, and | they still don't know, or just want to eat nothing. | | I force a choice on mine, and she immediately 'strongly' | choose the other one, which I reject, which makes her | want it even more. | svnt wrote: | It's because they've learned that they can say no and | you'll keep coming up with more options. They've exited | the game because you created the exit by failing to | enforce the boundary. | sfrigon wrote: | Yeah I've experienced this when I was young. My mom was | running a daycare at home, and I would sometimes try to | help at lunchtime. | | Me: <Kid's name>, do you want apple juice? No. Do you | want orange juice? No. Do you want grape juice? No. Well | that's all we've got, which one do you prefer? None, I | want something else. ... and obviously whatever we had | would not do. My mom who saw I was not efficient enough: | Okay <kid's name> do you want apple or orange juice? | Orange. | | My first reaction was "but I already suggested it", but I | got better after a while. | mlyle wrote: | OK, sure, offering a choice of what to eat when they're | not excited about the idea of eating isn't going to | generate a response. I almost never ate breakfast as a | kid... unless there was leftover cake or something I | could sneak... | mlyle wrote: | Eh. I'm a teacher these days, and it works with real kids. | With my _own_ kids, who know the range of possibility and | aren 't quite so believing in my authority as that of a | real teacher, it's still effective but less so. | | [It works to get class buy-in, even if you are offering meh | choice A and awful choice B. A class that has chosen "A" | will be more engaged doing it than if you just told them to | do A... | | but you'd better be ready to do 'B' if the class decides to | be contrarian. Once, they really wanted to do the quiz to | show that they really -do- know what we've been doing, and | if I hadn't had the quiz prepped and ready I'd have been in | trouble...] | anonu wrote: | "being unemployed" could also be a euphemism for "i sold my | startup for $100s of millions" | bluescrn wrote: | Then the answer is easy. Go to the nearest Lego store and buy | everything! | sidpatil wrote: | > "Mommy music" doesn't appeal as much which I find a little | fascinating. | | What genres does "Mommy music" consist of? | noobermin wrote: | dad was a metalhead and mom was a punk | stevekemp wrote: | I'd choose goth/rock/techno/industrial-metal and stuff from | the 80s. She'd choose goth/rock/techno/90s music. | | So a reasonably high amount of overlap, which is why it's a | bit fascinating. | | (I guess I learned early on that he liked loud drums, loud | rhythms, and repetition. Things like Rammstein - Fier Fier, | Prodigy - Firestarter, so I tend to bias myself in that | direction if he's nearby or listening with me. Maybe that's | all it is, but it's fun to observe.) | prionassembly wrote: | Baby had a starting preference for things we put with | headphones over the mom's belly. This might sound insane, but I | was in the OR for the C-section and once the baby was put on | the mother's arm I started to play one of these music tracks | and the baby stopped crying, appearing to recognize stuff from | the older situation. | | That said, the pregnancy music selection was mostly daddy's | music because daddy has a music education, mommy's pretty much | deaf to intervals between notes and stuck on music from her | youth. But the things that were there, baby still loves. | | Since then I've made an effort to expand on his repertory from | daddy's music. Mom's attempts to do so are met with less | enthusiasm. | | ---- | | Thaaat said: parenting so far has confirmed the story about the | Oedipus complex. In plain words, it's like this: mom can't give | him her full attention; the world and society and large steal | her from him. Luckily, the baby learns to personify all this | stuff into dad -- it's dad who steals mommy. This is lucky | because he can _aspire to be me_ , while "society at large" is | enough to drive anyone insane. This is very very clear in this | family: kid wants to be _with_ his mom, often _alone_ with her; | but also: kid wants to be _like_ me. He attentively watches me | as I dress, and enjoys enormously the homologies (hey, let 's | all put on socks!). Even when it comes to daddy's "no" -- this | is understandable, the overarching ways of the world are not. | (Jacques Lacan has this pun where "le _non_ du pere " becomes | "le _nom_ du pere " -- baby will have _my name_ , this is the | heart of fathering.) | stevekemp wrote: | I think our child seems to like us both "equally" these days, | though it is clear some days that nothing Daddy does is | correct, and mommy would do it better/properly. | | I can also see that when she works overnight he tries to | outright punish her, by ignoring her, when she returns. | | But those kinda things aside I don't see anything like your | story there. I guess it goes to show that kids, and | personalities, are so varied. | dotancohen wrote: | I have had much fun with my daughters at that age (and younger, | and older) with Arduino kits from Ali Express. Just a few | dollars' worth of parts were some of the best spent money I've | ever spent. | | I would do the programming, and the girls would help assemble the | parts. But they would be with me and see the programming process. | Soldering lead free is difficult, in the end some things I | soldered myself with lead. And one of the girls is interested in | the programming in the end. | prionassembly wrote: | What was the child like when younger? I have no idea what his | interests are. | | I have a one-and-a-halfer and I keep him busy when I want to kick | back at the end of the day by putting some really challenging | music on the TV (initially jazz and prog rock, but by now we're | watching flamenco and _some_ lieder by Webern and Schoenberg). | Kid is really into music; Camel 's "Rhayader/Rhayader goes into | town" (rock music but instrumental and an almost-suite kind of | structure) is his _jam_ , no Backyardigans or Peppa Pig in this | home. | | He's also very curious about books, physically. I can't tell if | he's going to be a reader (of course he likes baby books with the | tactile colorful elements) but he likes to touch them on the | shelves and had to be taught not to remove them. He might just | like rectangular (parallelepipedal?) things. | | Anyway, when I imagine keeping my son busy at age _3_ I imagine | sending him to piano lessons, going to concerts, maybe trying to | do two-part harmonies. Also maybe reading him books or just | making piles of rectangular bricks -- give him initial ideas and | leaving him to it. What will he be like at age 11, I don 't know. | But I will by then. | patchorang wrote: | Make a stop motion video - there are cheap/free apps that make it | really easy to do | | Not sure if you have any instruments around the house, but make a | song with her | | Like another poster said, make magazine. They have tooons of good | projects. | _Microft wrote: | Stop Motion Studio by Cateater is a good app iirc. It's | available for at least iOs, Android and Windows. | contingencies wrote: | Walks in nature + iNaturalist. Gardening. Pottery. Vermiculture. | Microscopy. Creative writing. Watercolour. Robotics. | actfrench wrote: | If it's helpful, we built a site during the pandemic where we | sourced ideas from parents on how to keep kids engaged while | working from home. It was #2 on Product Hunt. | | Enrichmentactivities.org | | My favorite activity is quality time outdoors . If there is any | hike you could do, a beach or a park, that's always a winner. | Spending time in nature being physically active is a great way to | keep both of you engaged and spending time together. You could | also plan a picnic and make recipes together. | | Is there something she'd like to make ? Go on YouTube and figure | out how to make a boomerang, tie dye shirts, learn to knit, do | origami or sew. | | Maybe your daughter could even help you with your job search. | Kids, especially 11 year olds are whip smart and love to engage | in grownup stuff | user_7832 wrote: | Lots of good suggestions in this thread here, I'd just like to | add - see what _she 's interested in_, from a topic point of | view. A lot of the suggested things here are science based. Is | that what she likes? Maybe history? Museums and exhibits may be | much more appreciated and exiting than science kits. Or perhaps | biology? Bug collecting? A basic microscope kit might be better. | | It need not be educational in the traditional sense at all | either. You could go on hikes, teach about camping/wilderness | survival, knot tying/scouts activity stuff. It could even be | handyman things if those are of interest to her (I know they | would have been of interest to 11yo me) - basics of tools and | tool safety (assuming you know it yourself, or perhaps a local | course for kids if available). There are more | "practical"/lifesaving options too like knowing how to change a | tire, or how do perform CPR/Heimlich maneuver. | | Additional on a tangential note there are lots of excellent | books, but in particular I highly recommend the x Book series by | DK (not just for kids but also for adults) | (https://www.dk.com/ca/promotion/big-ideas-series/). | Encyclopedias are also great, the more pictures the funner they | are for some. | dan-robertson wrote: | Modern USB microscopes are extremely good. Not in the sense | that the quality is somehow superb but in the sense that they | can be had reasonably cheaply and give you a sufficiently | magnified view to see lots of details that would not be visible | to the naked eye. Importantly, they don't require lots of the | faff that a 'proper' microscope does, e.g. no messing around | with dirty objectives or eyepieces or light sources or slides | or covering slips or stains or preparing samples or two | different focusing wheels or oils or whatever. And it can be a | further pain if you want to get an image onto a computer | whereas with a USB scope it's already there. The point is that | the lower barrier of entry can build interest and the low cost | means you don't feel so bad if you only use it once or twice. | zoomablemind wrote: | > ...My daughter is 11 | | At this age, I rather try to get in tune with the initiative that | comes from the kid. She may already have some projects that may | benefit from your [measured] participation. | | Alternatively, I'd try to find something fun for myself, and then | would try to see if there's a room in it for the kid's effort. | | All in all, the pre-teen/teens want to know that their choices | are respected (no matter how self-contradicting these may be). | sandreas wrote: | Build a phoniebox with her (see | https://pilabor.com/projects/labelmaker/) | | - Some crafting | | - Some electronics | | - If you wish some programming | | - A lot of fun afterwards... | leetrout wrote: | Saving the next person some immediate confusion an extra cliks | :) :) | | http://phoniebox.de/index-en.html | | https://github.com/MiczFlor/RPi-Jukebox-RFID | sandreas wrote: | Thanks... I did not think about the confusion, but you are | right. My article contains the hint, that I build an RFID | based music box for / with my daughter... and of course my | programming effort to print labels for the RFID stickers ;) | | She is SO happy with this thing, it is a pleasure to look at | her still using her wooden RFID tags to play "The Bare | Necessities" from The Jungle Book and dancing in her room | nearly every day - she is 3 now. | leetrout wrote: | Very cool idea, indeed! | patrickdavey wrote: | Oh that looks amazing! I just ordered a yoto [1] but that looks | a lot more fun! | | [1] https://us.yotoplay.com/ | bartvk wrote: | Recently, me and my daughter got some scrap wood from a shop that | specializes in laser cutting. We used paper and wood glue to make | beds for her dolls. She really liked it. It requires creativity | because the scrap wood has all sorts of weird shapes. And | patience, because the glue requires drying. | tokamak-teapot wrote: | Try lots of things and see what she gets into. Do some gardening. | Make stuff with your hands. Cook. Play lots of different musical | instruments. If you don't have any, play rhythms with your hands. | Listen to some music. Ask her what she likes or doesn't like | about it. Sing along to it. Read lots of books to her. Take her | to visit woods, hills (with good views), rock formations, | streams, lakes, old buildings open the public. Go to museums. | Borrow a dog. Bring a friend and their parent along so she can | play with the other child while you chat to the parent about | grown up stuff, but you can still get involved in what the kids | are doing. | mrcartmeneses wrote: | My youngest and I love gardening together. She's got so much | gusto! Sunflowers grow really fast. Get loads of random seeds | and a plastic tray to grow the seedlings in. Then once they've | sprouted you can plant them in the beds or in bigger pots of | you don't have a garden. More steps more fun | gonzo41 wrote: | Do outdoorsy stuff. Hiking is costs just food and water and it | doesn't need to be extreme to be fun. There's a whole interesting | world of stuff just outside that's free. | bradhe wrote: | Why are you asking Hacker News about this and not your daughter? | Hacker News doesn't know your daughter. | onelovetwo wrote: | Thats how you grow a kid whos addicted to netflix and frozen | chicken nuggets. | brainzap wrote: | ask her | DoreenMichele wrote: | Some things I enjoyed as a girl: | | Target practice, berry picking, helping my father do woodworking | projects, learning to shoot a bow, playing assistant in the | kitchen to my sister's baking, collecting vegetables from the | garden for dinner, trips to the library with my mother and sister | where I would lay on the floor and read Dr. Seuss while my sister | worked on stuff for her high school newspaper, putting together | imaginary travel wardrobes for my dolls, trying every 'girly' | craft I was aware of -- sewing, crochet, etc -- though none of | that ever resulted in a finished project otlr really stuck. | | As an adult, my sons have helped widen my horizons by telling me | stuff like "This 4x game (Master of Magic) is just like your | favorite, SimCity" and walking me through how to play it | primarily as a city/civilization building game. | | If you can find some sweet spot of that sort, I think it would be | wonderful. I have read that one of the strongest predictors of | career success in women is a good relationship to her father. | | Enjoy. | mxuribe wrote: | Wow, that sounds like quite the variety of fun when you were | younger; kudos! My dad was very much into sports, so my | siblings and i - as you can imagine - played lots of sports in | our youth; somewhat on teams but more so just with each other. | And honestly, as fun as team sports were, i enjoyed my time | tons more with just our little family unit when i was a kid. | Kudos again to you for your fun youth! :-) | a-saleh wrote: | I would probably get them into cooking and helping me cook. | brudgers wrote: | Ask her what she wants to do. | [deleted] | rr808 wrote: | If its like my daughter its watch tiktok 16 hours a day. | brudgers wrote: | So install TikTok and sit together on your phones doom | scrolling and see what happens. | | Good faith means living with answers you don't want to hear. | | I mean if you ask and then say "I don't want to do that" to | her answer, what do you expect when you ask how about a hike | instead? | | You can choose which routes are available for a child to | express their personhood, but you can't prevent its | expression. | | Holding their expression of autonomy in contempt has | consequences that you probably don't want. | | Learning from your child, on the other hand, will probably | pay off for the rest of your lives. | | TikTok is more interesting than most people. | broeng wrote: | "I don't know" | Broken_Hippo wrote: | Honestly, that is understandable. Part of being 11 is getting | to do more and more things that you just couldn't do before. | But part of being 11 is having an insulated view of the world | and the things available in it. Not knowing is perfectly | natural. | | But still ask because she might know have an idea. Still ask, | and encourage her to speak up and that you'll give it a try | if it is affordable (or whatever qualifiers you have). Still | ask, and provide some varied suggestions or categories of | things to do. Still ask and try to get preferences of what | the kid is currently interested in. At minimum, you can | probably be left with some dislikes and a few things that | _might_ be interesting. | _benj wrote: | This, but I think it could be more nuanced. Notice her interest | and explore further what she wants to do. | | All she might want to do is watch some cartoons, notice the | content and after some time propose to record your own little | video with a similar content, or to model and 3D print one of | the characters, or to use scratch to program one of the | characters to do something. | | Alternatively, give her options, not only verbal but take her | places (the mall, local market, county fair) and observe what | calls her attention and dig deeper into that! | | Browsing books at a local library about whatever topic she | might like could also be interesting! | | Good luck and hope you have tons of fun! | brudgers wrote: | _take her places_ | | Road trips were great bonding experiences for me as a parent. | | Sure their headphones were on a lot when they weren't | sleeping. | | But it was all happening someplace they hadn't been. | | And they saw me out of my comfort zone dealing with the | unknown laughing at fart jokes on the XM comedy station. | oblib wrote: | I became a single parent when my daughter turned 1 year old. When | she got old enough we'd go fishing, bicycling, swimming, and | hiking a lot. We'd also go to a used book store twice a month (on | pay day) so she could pick out a few books to read. She loved | doing that. | | She had no interest at all in learning how to code or gaming but | she loved helping in the garden and in the kitchen prepping and | cooking meals. | | When she got to Jr. High she wanted to join the "Cheerleader" | squad so there were a lot early morning rides to school I had to | make, and lot's of Basketball games I attended until she | graduated, but I had a lot fun cheering along with them. | | During those years I setup a campsite on our property so her and | her friends could go hang out there. I'm sure they had more fun | than most parents would approve of but they never got into any | real trouble, the police were never called, and no one got hurt | bad enough for the parents to call me. For the most part all | those parents knew exactly where their kids were and what they | were doing. And that I was close enough to deal with anything | that came up. But there were never any serious issues. | | She's 37 years old now, still loves to hike, backpack, swim, | fish, garden, and cook, and most important, she still likes to | hang out with me! | marconey wrote: | Thanks for sharing, hoping I can follow suit and raise an | independent free-range daughter who likes me! | andruby wrote: | Thank you for posting this. | hpcjoe wrote: | This should go on twitter as "Dudes posting their massive W's" | :D | | Mine is 22, about to start grad school for a Ph.D. in applied | math (I'm Ph.D. in theoretical physics, but am a secret math | nerd ... wife is also a math nerd and an M.S. Physics). | | Early on we discovered how much she loved reading. So, we read | to her, every night. For a while, I could quote whole sections | of "The Sleep Book" (Dr. Seuss) from memory. As she grew older, | she read. Voraciously. Throughout high school, she insisted she | wanted to be an artist, which we completely supported. Said she | hated math. | | She liked some physical activity, though I could never convince | her to work out with me or my wife at the gym. | | Went through an IB program in high school. Told us at the end, | after getting into a competitive art school, that she was happy | she never had to take math, ever again. Fast forward a year, | and she was aching to change majors. | | She graduated with a double major (one being math), and a | minor. Got into a bunch of grad schools for Ph.D. | | Now, the girl who hated math at the end of high school, is | about to move on to be a woman in a math Ph.D. program. | | There's a point to this. | | Your kid will find some things interesting, and others less so. | Don't worry about that, and enjoy discovering what she likes | with her. If you do the dad thing right, you will wind up with | a kid who can adapt to new situations, and find joy in what | they do. | | My daughter still does (absolutely amazing) art on her own. Not | just a dad saying this, she really is tremendously talented. | And we encourage her to continue to pursue what she | likes/loves. | uranium wrote: | "I'm Ph.D. in theoretical physics, but am a secret math nerd" | | Uh...you know that secret got out some time before your | doctorate, right? =^>. | brnt wrote: | Physics grad here. We used to say theoretical physicists | were people just not good enough for actual math. "Regular" | phycisists like myself simply admitted they are too lazy. | strobe999 wrote: | as a young father. your piece elegantly summarizes what im | hoping to be to my child. i wish you two many years of | curiosity! | andrepd wrote: | As a 27 year old physics grad turned maths PhD with a physics | MSc wife... I'm taking notes :) | Simon_O_Rourke wrote: | Good for you, and good for her. What you guys have done is | the most inspiring thing I've read today! | nickysielicki wrote: | We have such a weird culture around how we treat teenagers in | this country. We all remember drinking and smoking as teens, | but parents tends to rule with an iron fist and convince | themselves that they have more control than their parents did, | which means we force healthy normal curious kids to go out to a | secluded area (probably by car) to get high or drunk or explore | in other ways, away from an adult that could help if something | goes wrong, and at a much greater chance of involving the | police and putting their future in jeopardy. I respect you for | giving your daughter and her friends a safe place to just be | normal teenagers. I'm not saying parents should buy their teens | a bottle of vodka but everyone should start from a place of | being realistic and reducing harm. | svnt wrote: | Like you imply I think being punitive may be viewed as | healthy because the opposite stance (of encouraging or | enabling, or even participating) is boundary-blurring. In | this case the temporally removed hypocrisy is better than | joining in, which is the other extreme. | | Culturally we don't have a lot of nuance in America yet. | OJFord wrote: | I wonder how teenage alcohol abuse compares across countries, | France in particular comes to mind since it's common to | introduce wine relatively early (in moderation, and perhaps | diluted, of course). I thought there was quite a young | supervised with-meal drinking age too, but having searched | for it perhaps that's changed (or I was wrong). If it's not | some forbidden fruit maybe the run off with a bottle of vodka | thing doesn't happen so much. | linschn wrote: | In France, diluting your wine will get you the guillotine | ;-) | | The legal drinking age is 16 for low alcohol content | beverages (wine, beer, etc) ; 18 for all alcohols and | tobacco. | | At a family gathering or on a special occasion you may get | a glass of wine starting around 14 or later I'd say, for | most middle class families. | | Binge drinking is not as much of a problem as in more | northern countries, but binge alcohol consumption is a | problem that is being felt at the University level. | lern_too_spel wrote: | Speak to your kids like adults, explaining why some choices | lead to worse outcomes, and they will make choices like | adults. Speak to kids like they're slaves, and they will make | rebellious choices like slaves. Don't speak to your kids at | all about decisions, and they will make poor decisions and | wonder why their lives are so difficult. | dgb23 wrote: | One thing I'm very grateful for is that I never had to worry | about going home as a kid. Never. Later I realized how much | of a privilege that was. | HideousKojima wrote: | >We all remember drinking and smoking as teens | | Speak for yourself, worst thing I did in high school was play | too many video games. | steve_adams_86 wrote: | Hell yeah. My parents would have been very stern with me if | they knew just how many hours I spent gaming. | | I also taught myself programming into the wee hours of the | night. | | It was a wild time alright | nickysielicki wrote: | https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle | /... | Buge wrote: | >By late adolescence, 78.2% of US adolescents had | consumed alcohol | | I guess I fall into that group, since I had a few sips, | given to my by my parents. | | > 47.1% had reached regular drinking levels defined by at | least 12 drinks within a given year | | So less than half. | | > drug use by 42.5% | | Also less than half. I wonder how many tried it just | once. | | > drug abuse by 16.4% | kwatsonafter wrote: | memcg wrote: | Nice. The library, used book stores and Blockbuster video were | some of our favorites, especially when the weather was bad. | tmaly wrote: | I can think of three great options for age 11. | | First option get a makeymakey and work through the free project | videos on their site. | | Second option get a microbit and work through the free tutorials | on makecode. If you have two microbits, they can talk via onboard | radio. They also have Bluetooth so you can connect to a phone. | | Third get a copy of the Getting Started in Electronics RadioShak | book and build some of the science and circuit projects. | carimura wrote: | Since some people are talking about games, I thought I'd share my | short list. My kids are a bit younger, and it's important to me | that we don't introduce fast-moving games. We don't have a TV for | this reason, stuff is just too intense now. I'm trying to | recreate the modern experience that I went through, learning the | joy of adventure from games like Sierra Online's series (Police | Quest, Kings Quest, etc.) | | All I've found so far are Lumino City, Old Man's Journey, and | Machinarium. So far all 3 have been huge hits and exactly the | pace I've been going for. We've played each one probably 10 | times. | chimen wrote: | having a blast doing carting with mine, 11 as well | chongli wrote: | Try taking her to a local library and asking the librarian in the | children's section. Libraries often have fun and educational | activities for children and families to enjoy. If they don't, at | the very least the librarian should be able to help you find | books of projects for kids to do. | ankaAr wrote: | I don't know where you lives, but do hicking with her if you have | time. | | Try to do some theater of mind games (d&d or whatever she or both | likes). Maybe you can't afford going somewhere but nothings tie | you there. | | Talking about that if you lives in a city big enough, there must | to be hidden places with a story to tell, grab a map a visit that | with her. Think about a story you can tell with that. I learnt | more about buenos aires (the city where I live) and Chicago (the | city where I'm moving soon) because Dresden Files books and | roleplaying, than from school. And I learned how to love every | city secret because of that. | | Why I'm talking about roleplaying and walking time together? | Because both will be spending time together and will be knowing | (a looot) each other, and over that, you will be feeding her | imagination and curiosity. | | And it is free. | TedDoesntTalk wrote: | Great suggestions and you inspired me. What is Dresden Files? | ankaAr wrote: | A book series about a wizard/private investigator working in | Chicago. It is funny, short (each book, they are like 20..) | and they feed on arthurian lore plus urban legends (that is | pushed even more by the roleplay books). | | Jim Butcher is the author and the audiobooks are narrated by | James Masters (spike in buffy tv show) | teddyh wrote: | Books: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dresden_Files | krisoft wrote: | > What is Dresden Files? | | It is a fantasy/mystery novel series written by Jim Butcher. | | The sorries follow the titular Harry Dresden, who is a | wizard-for-hire investigating supernatural disturbances in | modern day Chicago. It can be described as a hard-boiled | detective novel with fantasy elements. | dukeofdoom wrote: | Go Kayaking with her. A camera and lenses and you could do | wildlife or macro photography or fishing on your trips. Great | Exercise and connection with nature. If you get something like a | DJI Mini drone you can capture something people rarely see. Maybe | you could even start a youtube channel with all the unique | footage. Which would require video editing and photoshop skills. | Not even that expensive: | | Mirrorless camera $500 | | Drone $400 | | Two kayaks ~$1000 | stefanos82 wrote: | Ask her what she finds interesting and based on her answer(s), | find the most appealing to you and start designing a logic based | on it, a prototype if you will. | | Tell her that for this project she will be your project manager | that would lead to the fruition of the end product; that would be | enough to keep her engaged with the whole process. | | Good luck! | jraph wrote: | > Tell her that for this project she will be your project | manager | | > end product | | That does not sound fun. I don't think I was envisioning things | as management and products when I was a child. | | The first line of your comment does sound fun, however. | arethuza wrote: | Our son was very fond of acting as a "project manager" when | he was young - like 3 or 4 years old. | | His idea of playing with a (age appropriate) train set was to | get his mother to set everything up under his direction, | similarly going to the beach he'd direct me to build a dam... | (which I was happy to do). | jraph wrote: | Good to know. I'll remember this as a tool for potential | future use then. | FollowingTheDao wrote: | Oh, do not keep her busy. Let her wallow in the discomfort of | having nothing to do, but do not give her the modern things which | are an easy escape from that discomfort (TV, Computers, etc). You | will see her natural interests reveal themselves and when they | do, give them all the interest like they weer your own as well. | | Do your own thing and she will see how it looks to be engaged in | something you like. | | All the other props and gimmicks will only implant your interests | on her, which might be the the same and that is ok, but most | likely they will not be. | | However, she should be with friends around her age as well. | Parents are important, but negotiating friendships is invaluable. | cesaref wrote: | It sounds like an amazing opportunity that you should grab. You | both have the freedom to do something that normally would be | closed to you due to constraints on both of your time (school and | work). | | Assuming you can afford it, how about hiring a camper van and | taking off for a month, and see where you end up? There's bound | to be places you both would love to see which otherwise would be | difficult, and by being away from the trappings of home and email | etc, you'll get some amazing quality time together which may not | happen again. | | 11 is a great age, but you are at the start of some difficult | years where there's lots of pressure on kids, both from society | and from family (go well at school, know what you want to do etc | etc). So take advantage of some care free time together! | RyanOD wrote: | Here are a few ideas... | | - Build a free little library | | - Learn to skateboard | | - Collaborate on a short-story | | - Build a treehouse | | - Learn to bake bread | | - Plant a garden | | - Go on hikes together | | - Learn to safely fire a .22 or BB gun | | (Edited for layout) | DIARRHEA_xd wrote: | TikTok and Netflix are great places to start. | pvaldes wrote: | Spider eggs, spider eggs, | | Can do all that an egg can. | | Does nothing?, what surpraise! | | Here comes the mayonaise... | | https://aleteia.org/blogs/simchafisher/whats-for-supper-vol-... | AutomatedChaos wrote: | https://makezine.com/ https://www.adafruit.com If looking for | mini tech projects :) | abirch wrote: | Check out Roblox.com/create | Siecje wrote: | Make a pinhole camera, or a small functioning water lock system | for boats. | kwatsonafter wrote: | In training academic Pedagogist here: It may be worthwhile to | take a two or day three reading of Rousseau's classic, "Emile; or | On Education." It gives tremendous insight into how it is that | adults can have positive relationships with the children that | they might be governing. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emile%2C_or_On_Education | | Rousseau recommends: Night games, obstacle courses, Natural | Method (Parkour), but in short the idea is to let the child be | self-directing in their activities. In Rousseau's words, "to gain | time by losing it." ie. don't try to direct their activities. Do | what is necessary and dutiful in your own regard and teach | through example and necessity; never through imposition unless | absolutely necessary. | svnt wrote: | If you're going this route there is a whole field of early | childhood development; don't read one archaic text and declare | "this is the way" or you risk coming off like the new grad | student in Good Will Hunting. [0] | | Montessori (the person) and Steiner are other interesting | originating sources in Western culture but reading about how | the e.g. Aka parent might be a shorter path. [1] | | [ 0 | https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/specialengage... | ] | | [ 1 Review Barry and Bonnie Hewlett's research particularly] | kwatsonafter wrote: | Fuck off dude. I'll come off however I like. | shaprack wrote: | You can spend time with her and help her discover her interests | by asking her what she enjoys doing. Additionally, you can engage | in outdoor activities with her, and most significantly, you can | accompany her to museums, parks, or zoos. If she enjoys playing | games or watching cartoons, she can play educational interactive | games where she will learn also. | | https://gadgetlite.in/2022/01/math-playground-games/ | Jistern wrote: | bradhe wrote: | Wow, this is easily t he creepiest comment in HN history. | zwilliamson wrote: | Include some of her friends when possible. Make up for lost | social time over the past couple years. | [deleted] | squiggy22 wrote: | Write / draw a book, show her how to sell it on Etsy / Gumroad. | deberon wrote: | Lots of good suggestions in here. In the end, none of us know | your daughter. If you are out of ideas on things to do with her, | take her with you to something you enjoy doing. If you're | enthusiastic about it, she might be too. Also, there's nothing | wrong with uneducational fun either. Watch a movie or find shapes | in the clouds. Be silly and teach her how to laugh on a budget. | social_quotient wrote: | Might be off topic but a nugget from having two girls (5 and 11). | Kids don't care about budget or how much things cost. We have | toys we've spent hundreds of dollars on only to have the near | free to free one be a hit. I say this to make sure you know your | employment status likely only effects your kids if it effects | you. Or said differently, to the extent it effects you it will | effect them. | | Kids will generally have fun with anything you show a degree of | interest in. The copper pipe plumbing example in this thread is a | perfect example. A simple Task became a life long activity for | the kid. They will remember it forever and tell someone in the | future "this time I welded with my dad"... they won't remember | that time my dad didn't hire a plumber. | | Things off the top of my head that have been a hit - Planting | plants Fashion design Basic coding activities or contests | Shooting Anything that requires safety procedures Lawn work (but | make it fun or set a timer) Writing a story where they write some | of it, you add in silly bits, they write more , repeat till | laughing out loud. Both my girls super in to etiquette | | Best of luck buddy and squeeze these years for as much as you | can. | sircastor wrote: | My wife frequently says to me "this is why I don't buy my kid | toys" as we watch our Son playing with some random bucket or | cardboard box around the house. | aldebran wrote: | I laugh my ass off so many times I see this. The toy is on | the side and the box that the toy came in is apparently more | fun. That or Costco boxes. They're sturdy and can fit kids | inside them. Lol | andrepd wrote: | > I say this to make sure you know your employment status | likely only effects your kids if it effects you | | That's partially true but there are also things for some | hobbies/activities which are really expensive. I'm thinking | musical instruments (+lessons), or robotics (okay, those were | very expensive when I was a kid but maybe they're cheaper now | :p). | dan-robertson wrote: | When I was a kid I tried to do some robotics thing with my | dad which was not terribly expensive (it failed due to the | servos not being sufficiently powerful despite matching the | spec from the book). But probably had the advantage that he | knew about electronics a bit and could deal with the | chemicals for etching a circuit board (and could borrow a uv | lamp thing or oscilloscope or eprom writer from his | employer). But these days you can have circuit boards printed | for cheap and often there are 'maker spaces' which may have | better equipment available (or just skip the PIC and use a | raspberry pi). | | For an expensive hobby I'd guess anything equestrian rather | than music lessons though I don't really know. | | Also the OP doesn't say they're actively looking for work so | they may be using 'unemployed' in the tongue-in-cheek sense | of 'I don't have a job but I have enough money to live | without one for a while and want to spend time with my kid' | rather than one of the more technical senses of 'not employed | and currently actively seeking/wanting/open to employment', | which even still may or may not imply tight financial | constraints. | aldebran wrote: | 100% | | My kids (boys) have probably a couple thousand dollars worth of | toys in the house. You know what they enjoy playing with? | "Toys" that we've made together. Planes, boats etc. the one | exception probably is Legos. Legos are cool! | | Get legos from garage sales or something and open the doors to | endless fun! | landemva wrote: | Yes, time with dad. Get outside and walk or hike. Play in dirt. | Explore plants and flowers. Splash in a creek. My daughter | really enjoyed the affordable bow&arrow with foam target. | protonbob wrote: | All this is making me want to have kids sooner. | Bayko wrote: | You need to get off of Hackernews first sir | dymk wrote: | Says you. Enough karma and I'll unlock the HN Dating | page. | sunshinerag wrote: | Whaaat ... there is an HN dating page :) | Flankk wrote: | Yes but the market is kind of poor right now. You'll need | to have good numbers to attract any kind of attention. | protonbob wrote: | I'm already married so no worries. | sharkweek wrote: | There is nothing my oldest (4.5 years old) enjoys more than | going down to the creek by our house and exploring. | | We've learned pretty quick with both kids that spending a lot | of money on toys etc resulted in a lot of one-and-done play | sessions before they'd quickly lose interest. | | As with all things and especially kids... YMMV! | hpcjoe wrote: | > Best of luck buddy and squeeze these years for as much as you | can. | | This ... so much ... Just be there. Discover together. | xattt wrote: | My spouse and I know this with our 5- and 1-year-old. | | We have a song that we play to remind ourselves of this: | https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=w8_HsMQ_AQw | leobg wrote: | Very true. And very counter-intuitive. A cardboard box I turned | into a playhouse in like three minutes is still one of my | daughter's favorite play things. The LEGO I bought her, on the | other hand, is pretty much collecting dust. | eloeffler wrote: | Haven't tried this with kids yet, but "coloring computers" might | be a cool thing. | | You can find it here: Coloring computers: non-electronic | computers that work when you color them | https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmYz7DPRWypGQcbAHr7Mi8EKB6ntSPsEnUsCXbA... | | And the recent HN discussion: | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31393501 | credit_guy wrote: | My son is 12 y/o, and he's into Minecraft. | | Yesterday he discovered the server mc.openredstone.org. He spent | all day yesterday and about one hour today, and he ended up | building a 4-bit adder. | | On this server players learn how to build logic gates, and mix | them so they eventually build CPUs. It's fully gamified, so | beginners are called "students" and more advanced players are | called "builders". To become a "builder" you need to pass some | trials. The "builders" probably have their own challenges (not | sure, my son is still a student), in any case, they behave like | teachers. So a student will find a builder who will give them | instructions, and guide them through more and more complex | designs. | | So, yesterday my son had no idea what XOR or NAND is, and today | he already built a 4-bit adder, and has dreams of building an | ALU. | | I'm quite excited to be honest. By the way, I'm not in any way | connected with whomever put together this Minecraft server. I | don't even think it's a for-profit thing, as far as I can tell, | it's fully non-profit. | brailsafe wrote: | I've been programming for 15 years and had to google what NAND | was. Had a sense of XOR | bergenty wrote: | All the Ns are just the opposites. | groffee wrote: | That's not something you should be so quick to tell people. | brailsafe wrote: | Heh, roasted. I know you're being a bit facetious, but it's | not like I haven't used them, but in terms of the acronyms | and maybe actually using them as bitwise operations, it's | something I've rarely needed in JS programming. If you | aren't being facetious, then you might need to work on | humility | ch4s3 wrote: | Oh come on! There are a lot of types of programming and | most of them exist pretty far from logic gates. The | previous poster probably understands the concepts from | their work but doesn't relate them to logic gates. | brailsafe wrote: | Ya that's basically what I meant. The concepts are | arguably unavoidable if you've done enough. | thendrill wrote: | You would be surprised how much more relevant info | programmers miss... | | Example, most programmers I know have no idea when a variable | gets allocated on the stack and when it's on the heap. | | Let's not talk about how many dont even know what a (stack ov | erflow)[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack_buffer_overflow | ] is... | dhosek wrote: | I remember being shocked to discover that a recent CS grad | could not implement a factorial function using recursion. I | can understand why you wouldn't want to do that, but to not | be able to do it? | lumost wrote: | _a lot_ of CS undergrads compress out recursion | knowledge. They learn that most recursion is best skipped | in favor of iteration /dp, and they learn that they | should implement things efficiently. | | It's possible the undergrad assumed you were referring to | an efficient recursive algorithm or simply forgot most | recursion. | brailsafe wrote: | Heh, I just did the DS+A section of a Faang interview, | and got the time and space complexity of an optimal | solution more or less correct, as well as most of a | recursive binary search implementation, but not quite | there. I stumble with recursion because syntactically | it's something you either have to use a lot or | deliberately practice to have a keen sense of return | values imo. | | Probably won't get an offer because of that. Do I feel | like as a frontend engineer I really need that knowledge? | Not really. I could work it out for work purposes if I | needed to tho. I'd be practicing it just to pass | interviews. | [deleted] | wongarsu wrote: | To be fair, AND, OR and NOT are enough to compute any | function, and you can make all the other operators out of a | combination of those three. For example A XOR B is just (A OR | B) AND (NOT (A AND B)). Knowing things beyond AND, OR or NOT | is useful, but not strictly necessary. XOR has useful | properties though: with random inputs you get TRUE 50% of the | time, allowing you to chain it without trending to 0 or 1; | also it's the opposite of bitwise equality. | | The others aren't that interesting if you aren't dealing with | hardware, and their function is obvious if you know the | naming convention. | OJFord wrote: | You only need one of {AND, OR} too. | | ((a or b) is (not ((not a) and (not b))), and vice versa.) | dhosek wrote: | Nah, all you need are nand gates. Everything else can be | implemented from those. | dan-robertson wrote: | Yeah, similarly in mathematics they often like to build | everything up from 'implies' where the rule is | implies(a,b) = or(not(a), b) = nand(a,nand(b, b)). | [deleted] | dpz wrote: | anon84873628 wrote: | The truth is that you can be a successful computer software | developer and not need to know much at all about how | computers work. Or even how things like compilers work. | | Some of us never even studied in a CS program - gasp! | SmellTheGlove wrote: | It's all layers of abstraction, right? While it's good to | have a basic understanding of how the whole stack works, | it's also a feature and a goal of those building the | lower levels to enable others to operate at higher levels | independent of that knowledge. | | Taking this away from software for a second, I know a | hell of a lot of people skilled in their professions that | have no idea exactly how their cars work but they drive | them just fine. | abrax3141 wrote: | Redstone is fun, and some people do amazing builds with it, but | it gets tedious fast; like building your own computer from | transistors - fun ... once! :-) But Minecraft has an incredible | amount of richness once you get into modding and command blocks | (although it's a shame that they don't have a proper lua built | in.) Speaking of which, there's powder toy, which DOES have | built in Lua. | None4U wrote: | AeroNotix wrote: | Immediately jumping to this kind of thinking completely ruins | the will for people to get involved with these kinds of | initiatives. | | OP didn't even hint that they thought this could be an issue | but you did and now any discussion of people involved is | tainted under the potential that they may be a pedophile. | credit_guy wrote: | A little bit. I keep an eye on what he's doing there, which | is quite easy, as he just won't stop talking about it. It's | also an opportunity for me to teach him, but in a way that he | finds exciting. If one day I had decided to teach him XOR or | NAND, he would've found it very boring. This way, he comes to | me with questions, and I can pick up a piece of paper and | show him what a truth table is, and he soaks it up. He feels | like he's cheating a bit at the game, because he has a Dad | who helps him on the side, but no one knows, so he progresses | very quickly and everyone thinks he's very smart. | mlyle wrote: | IMO, much better to progressively teach your kids about | safety (online and off) and to do your best to monitor/keep | track of what's going on, and ensure you have good lines of | communication open with your kids and have them know that | they can come to you without reprisal... | | than to try and keep them in a bubble and eliminate all | possibility they could meet someone predatory. | dopamean wrote: | What? | 0xedd wrote: | earlyriser wrote: | My kid has been into Minecraft for years, even before he had | permission to play videogames. This year (he's 9) he started | making 3d models and textures with Blockbench, and added them | into his MCreator mod. It's a great gateway to learn stuff. | beckman466 wrote: | i wish DIY.org (specifically Zack Klein -and team's earlier | versions) was available as free/open source software libraries | (and not just available for kids). a decommoditized, advertising- | free and networked maker space everywhere | cnees wrote: | 11 is around the age I got into coding petpages on Neopets. They | don't support JavaScriptor CSS3, and certain classes have to be | inclined, but the contraints are what make it fun. | solardev wrote: | If she likes electronics at all, I thought these were super | cool... wish they made those when I was a kid! | | Snap-in educational and fully functional circuits: | https://www.elenco.com/snap-circuits-2/ | | Science & crafts toys: | https://www.johncoproductions.com/collections/4m | | Green & renewable energy toys: | https://www.johncoproductions.com/collections/green-science | | (Edit: For the second two links, apparently that is a non-US | vendor. Sorry about that. But those toys are also commonly | available in the US, at toy stores and often, museum gift stores) ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-07-04 23:00 UTC)