New Alternatives for Children 02/02/16

For my first event as Director of Ink Well at New Alternatives for Children, we started off with a brief conversation about shapes – which shape is strongest? Then we drew structures – strong structures! Like forts and castles – that used a chosen shape. Then I projected a Science Ninjas comic on the wall that featured an engineering challenge where our heroes needed to build a sturdy bridge with limited resources.

This led directly to our next activity – we gave the kids toothpicks and gumdrops and had them build their own structures. They had some really creative ideas!

Then I passed out some free games and we played a few rounds of Valence! As is typical, they picked it up real fast. One young man liked the game so much he had me sign his copy. It was a great event, and I’m looking forward to doing more of them! -Nathan Schreiber, IWF Director at NAC.