PRESS ADVISORY 

WHEN:  SATURDAY, MAY 18^TH, 10 AM – 5 PM

WHERE:  Play-Well Northwest LEGO Activity Center, 11743 124th Avenue NE, Kirkland, WA 98034

A student excited to build his world out of LEGO at Play-Well Northwest.

The former U.S. Secretary of Education, Richard Riley, recently said, “the top 10 in-demand jobs in the future don’t exist today. We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.”  In the northwest region of the country, where constant innovation is the key to a strong economy, a center called Play-Well Northwest is opening.  Its main purpose is to help build the problem solvers and innovators of the future through play.  The creator of Play-Well Northwest, Play-Well TEKnologies, has been teaching engineering to kids using LEGO across the country for the past 16 years.  Play-Well now teaches over 80,000 kids a year, but where some of the most creative endeavors happen are at their centers.  Play-Well Northwest will serve as an incubator of ideas, where kids get to help create, test, and play with new, innovative programs, from LEGO architectural workshops to LEGO engineering summer camps.

Center Manager, Brandon Jones, organizing all 200,000 pieces of LEGO in preparation for the grand opening.

The World Economic Forum recently ranked the United States 52nd in the quality of mathematics and science education and 27th in developed nations in the proportion of college students receiving undergraduate degrees in science or engineering.  Even with the big push for STEM education in the past decade, initial results have not shown a major increase in college graduates from STEM related fields.  What is missing is the innovative play that encourages children to explore these fields.  Here is what Brandon Jones, Play-Well Northwest Center Manager, recently said about Play-Well’s philosophy towards teaching: “we believe kids learn best through play.  Play-Well Northwest was created as a space for children to explore, problem solve, and create through the world of LEGO.”  Play-Well Northwest attempts to cultivate that level of interest in these fields through play, challenging kids to see the world as problem solvers and explorers.  The grand opening serves as a launching pad to show how the center hopes to inspire the innovators that will solve the problems of tomorrow by simply playing today.

Play-Well Northwest will be having its grand opening celebration on Saturday, May 18^th from 10 AM – 5 PM.   Play-Well TEKnologies believes that kids learn best through play. So, Play-Well Northwest was created as a space for children to explore, problem solve, and create through the world of LEGO.  At the event, kids and parents will be able to test out new projects and curriculum, participate in engineering challenges, express themselves through building, and celebrate the opening with cake.

For more information, please contact Brandon Jones at (425) 244-9361 or brandon@play-well.org. Play-Well TEKnologies programs are not authorized, sponsored or endorsed by the LEGO® Group.

http://bit.ly/Play-WellNWRedTricycleArticle

The best part of the event is that it is free to come! If you are in the neighborhood, come by. If you know any families in the Seattle area, pass this along to them.

If you’d like more information about our Play-Well Northwest Grand Opening, visit http://play-well.org/pwnw_grand.shtml.

Play Well!

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

Happy Mother’s Day!  We wanted to tell all the awesome moms we know, thank you for what you do.  To celebrate the day, we decided to have a Play-Well Mother’s Day LEGO Raffle.  Your family could win a Play-Well LEGO Engineering Birthday Party, a LEGO Iron Man Set, or a LEGO Bow Tie.  Click the link below to participate in this free raffle:

Play-Well End of The School Year Rafflecopter Giveaway

We hope you can join us this summer!

Click HERE to find a Play-Well LEGO Engineering Camp Near You!

Residents of The Tamalpais retirement community and students from Jennifer Sterling’s fourth grade class at Kentfield’s Bacich Elementary School used LEGOS® to build their own version of the Great Wall of China on January 30 during their regular visit arranged through LITA’s Bridging Generations program.  Led by guest Tim Bowen, Founder and President of Play-Well TEKnologies, the activity involved small groups of seniors and students building segments of the wall that were then all connected.  Bowen volunteered his time and brought the supplies to facilitate this activity.

Tim Bowen, Founder and President of Play-Well TEKnologies helps Bacich 4th grader and The Tamalpais resident complete their final LEGO wall project Credit Jessie Nicely

“We are so glad that Tim approached us to conduct this engaging activity since it enabled the students to teach something new to the seniors,  most of whom had never played with LEGOS® before,” said Dena Selix, LITA’s Intergenerational Coordinator and a  credentialed teacher. “Our goal with Bridging Generations is to bring seniors and students together through meaningful lessons and activities that foster ongoing relationships throughout the school year. Ironically, by building a wall together today, the seniors and students built upon their relationships with each other.”

Bacich fourth grader Ella Hyman shows longtime Bridging Generations participant Tamiko Flannery, a resident of The Tamalpais, how to build with LEGOS. Credit Dena Selix

In its fifth year, LITA’s Bridging Generations program matches elementary school students from schools around Marin to visit regularly with residents of long-term care facilities throughout the county.  This school year, there are a total of eight classes from schools around the county visiting nearby assisted living communities in their towns, including Greenbrae, Corte Madera, Mill Valley, San Rafael and Novato.

The Tamalpais resident and longtime Bridging Generations participant, Marilyn Davis, helps fourth grader Jake Klompus build the base of their wall. Credit Dena Selix

Founded in 1975, LITA is a nonprofit organization that strives to improve the quality of life for residents of Marin’s skilled nursing, assisted living and board and care facilities by matching volunteers for regular visits.  The organization’s four other programs are One-to-One Friends, The Pet Connection, LITA Families, and Holiday Gifts for the Elderly.

Based in San Anselmo, Play-Well TEKnologies offers classes, workshops, and summer camps at over 200 public school, private school, home school, and summer camp sites. Its project-based programs are designed to teach principles and methods of engineering, to encourage students to work through design challenges using what they have learned, and to allow students to work at their optimal pace.

Bacich Teacher Jennifer Sterling assists with her fourth graders’ wall built with The Tamalpais resident Edith Hana. Credit Dena Selix

Myrna Pepper, resident of The Tamalpais and longtime Bridging Generations participant, works with her Bacich fourth grade buddies, Dexter Lama and Christopher Pontius, to complete their parapet. Credit Dena Selix

The entire article can be found here.

Just finished our Superhero training with our staff in Washington DC. They are now ready to train kids on how to save the world using LEGO as Superheroes. Find out more about our superhero with LEGO programs here.

Kids rebuilding their city out of LEGO.

We talked about the importance of the community, our engineers, construction workers, our leaders, and even how kids can help with the relief effort.  Parents even joined in on the fun once we got started. We split the engineers into 3 groups, and kids chose what part of the Rockaway they wanted to build.  It was rewarding to see the kids learning the importance of teamwork and being united, just as their families and community have learned during this time of need.

At the end of the day, all the kids combined their sections of the city to rebuild Rockaway, NY.

The  families, who in some cases are still homeless, carried a level of resilience that is inspiring.  Long after the storm, there are many families still working to rebuild their homes in Rockaway, and this gave the kids an opportunity to also contribute.  If you’d like to help support the work being done to rebuild in Rockaway and surrounding communities after Hurricane Sandy, you can donate to these organizations:

Rockaway Help

Americares

Here is a video of the devastation that hit Rockaway:

When I say this out loud, I always think of my Gramma or Mother or another female family member saying it in a way that they would say it had I just broken/stained/fucked something up as a young child.

Catholic guilt, anyone?

Really, what have I done?  

I don’t even know where to start here.  What got me thinking about this in the first place is that the majority of my friends are graduated with college degrees (and a lot of debt muahahaha)  and are moving on to work at real jobs.  Like real jobs with insurance and a 401k and social security.  Jobs with normal work hours and dress codes and HR departments.  Jobs that they are somehow now qualified for because they spent hours and dollar$ on for four plus years.

About two thirds of them have moved out, one third of them live at home, a handful have gone abroad to study, some live in their hometowns, some have moved away, some have real jobs, some work blehhhh jobs, yadda yadda.

Sometimes this leads me to have an “oh shit” moment where I feel like I must have missed out on something or that I am “falling behind” or that I won’t ever make it back to school or be able to get my dream job (which is one of twenty three things at the moment including but not limited to:  airport design, urban design, pediatric surgeon, lego engineer, architect, industrial design, wildlife biologist, CIA agent, production designer, and many many more) andddd then I will just be whatever.

meh.

I didn’t even go to a university right out of high school, and now that both my brother and sister are graduating this year, it’s rather hard to give them advice on what to do.

What I want to say to them is:  take your time, explore the world, work where you want, make friends, lose friends, have fun.

Most things I do (with exceptions of flights/really important things like Comic Con) are sporadic.  I suck at planning.  I’m constantly forgetting what I need to do and where I need to be.  I am more of a doer than a planner.  And when I think of it that way (and get all philosophical and shit about destiny and fate) , I have faith in myself and the uncertain future that I will totally end up where I am meant to be.

There have been few occasions and moments where I just feel blissful and awesome and all “Wow, this is the exact moment where the universe fucking wants me and I can feel it and I can realize it and it’s brilliant!!!!!!!!!!!”

And then I do things like facebook stalk myself and become aware of the fact that I have done a lot.  There have been numerous adventures and travels and friends and games and books and talks and strangers and moments and life.

I didn’t go to college four years straight.  At all ever.  And never will.  I spent a freshman year in Philadelphia, and then another year off and then two years at SMCC and now I am doing my own thing.  And my own thing, it turns out, hasn’t been too shabby…

omfgg the order got all messed up when I was uploading, so fuckitimnotfixingit.

I started playing rugby

I know you can’t really tell in this picture, but I got pretty jacked pretty fast.

Joined business club, bc I am a badass entrepreneur 

business club bebidas anyone?

Cruised in style

showing off my jacked-ness. *note, my brother and I are even more jacked now, while Abi is still just really short.

Spent time with ALL of my siblings 

Road tripped (again) down the east coast!

I am clearly Hayden’s favorite cousin, he just looks grumpy because we spent all day riding the waves and building castles.

Made a day trip out of the Harry Potter Exhibition in NYC

Met Voldemort at the midnight premier of HPDHP2 because we are always at the front of the line for these things.

no forbidden curses here.

Woke up at 3:00 a.m. to change this sign

only two cute badass lesbians could have pulled this off.

Road tripped to Philadelphia to see my super awesome lovely roommate

Sold my car for scrap metal because the transmission blew in west amish town Pennsylavania

this story deserves it’s own post at some point.

Went to prom with my sister and our friends!

Went to PTown for the first time with all of these lovely ladies

dressed like a bro, YOLO.

Made the best open relationship fun best friend ever!!

Dressed in this epic Lady Gaga costume

and as Juno with my g’bffl

Waited in line for 14 hours for the Grand Opening of HARRY POTTER WORLD

Met Jesus.

& Sharon and Hannah because they are fucking great.

Made epic music videos

just got paiddd, let’s get laiddd

Joined this amazing rugby team in Boston

Beantown Women’s Rugby, YEAH!!!

Made these SuperZero best friends

Let it be known that we came in 10th out of 108 teams during this URBAN IDITAROD

And so, so , SO MUCH MORE.

My life is great, really.  I am also on a super fucking happy high right now.  As in the last few weeks/months/this year has been more than wonderful and fun and everything.

Lili pointed out today that it is because this IS my year – the year of THE SNAKE.

watch out motherfuckers, I’m on the prowl.

*Side note: Chinese calendar rules!

I think everyone should do what they want, when they want, and how they want..within limitations of course.  And that siesta should really be introduced into American culture.

Also I won third place at our Beanpong Tournament last night!

Cleopatra and Billy Ray Cyrus as team “In it to Wig it”

I am on such a happy high.

Such.  A.  Happy.  High.

Y.  Y.  Y.  TENGO MARIPOSAS  >_<

We are no doubt a Lego family, through and through. My son decided 2 years ago he wants to be a Lego engineer when he grows up and he hasn’t changed his mind, one time. He tells every one he meets, “I’m going to be Lego engineer when I grow up” (I’m glad he is good at math, that’s essential for Lego engineers, so I hear).

So, “why the Lego advertisement, Nanci? I thought this was a blog about parenting”. It is, and here is where I’m going to lay it all out on the line. I really do not like disorganization in my home and this is what our Lego table looks like 95% of the time

(Please, don’t judge me)

This is what I want it to look like 100% of the time

Now you can judge me;-)

It occurred to me that this is what my parenting looks like a lot. I want it to be one way but it often looks another. I want it to be organized and perfect and “put together” but that isn’t possible all the time. Sometimes I have to stop and figure out how to put it back together. To put the pieces in their place and then it’s beautiful again. Until tomorrow, when the pieces are taken out again and placed all over the table to create something new. Every time I attempt something it’s new, it’s never the same twice. That’s why it is so wonderful. If I mess it up, I can fix it. All hope is not lost. There is always another way or approach I can take. I can even invite my friends over to help me put things together and we can have a great time building things.

Sometimes everything is a mess and I don’t want them to see how jumbled up things are and the fact that I may have lost a few pieces. If they are good friends, they will help me find the pieces I lost and help me put it back together. That, too, is part of the fun, building together, building each other up. I am so thankful for friends that help me build!

I never knew Legos could teach me so much. They have also taught me that I need to wear shoes when I stumble out of bed in the middle of the night, but that’s another story….

Being intentional until then….

]]> http://anotherstateofmymind.wordpress.com/2009/10/06/new-moodlego-engineer/ Tue, 06 Oct 2009 21:32:44 +0000 tankgirl http://anotherstateofmymind.wordpress.com/2009/10/06/new-moodlego-engineer/

totalmente mio . 326 dlls, pero es mio!!!![envidiame]

por cierto 5 hrs armandolo pero mi bebe reconoce colores