CERN Accelerating Science

· 1 min read
CERN Accelerating Science

On Sunday 26 February, CERN hosted the newest edition of Devoxx4kids, a collection of computing, robotics and electronics workshops for youths.  Getspout  was organised within the context of the VoxxedDays CERN developers convention, held at CERN the earlier day.


Varied workshops - “Minis” for the 4-6 year-olds, “Kids” for the 7-10 year-olds and “Teens” for the 11-15 12 months-olds - gave the kids an perception into programming and electronics by means of robots and games. About 70 children came along and had been in a position to showcase to their dad and mom how they'd managed to programme a NAO robotic to have a converstation with them or a Thymio robotic to observe a path on a map, or how they'd altered the famous Minecraft game or developed an interactive quiz on a computer utilizing Scratch.


Devoxx4Kids was established in Antwerp, Belgium, on the fringes of the nicely-established Devoxx conference for Java programmers. Since its establishment, Devoxx4kids has introduced smiles to 1000's of children’s faces in 22 nations. Run by a group of volunteers headed by Xavier Bourguignon, the Swiss version of the conference is now into its eighth year. “Bringing Devoxx4kids to CERN and having it in the Globe is a dream come true!” says Xavier. Organising workshops in one of the high temples of science, the place the net was born, sends out a robust sign to the kids (and their parents). I hope Devoxx4kids will often come back to CERN sooner or later.”


Joao Silva, organiser of Voxxed Days CERN and CERN coordinator of Devoxx4kids provides: “The intention of the workshops is to stimulate curiosity and the imagination, and to point out what will be performed with science and technology. These workshops lead the youngsters to discover that, by means of games, they can be the creators of tomorrow. Education is considered one of CERN’s core missions, so hosting an event like Devoxx4kids here is completely consistent with our work.