The Need for Play

Mark Greiner, senior vice president and leader of Steelcase's WorkSpace Futures team, understands the value of bringing more opportunities for play to the workplace. He says, "I suggest the magic occurs because play moves people to an emotional level of involvement with others, a much deeper bond than an intellectual understanding gets you. And the result is a group commitment, that every individual takes personally." He cites the LEGO Serious Play program -- a teambuilding exercise available to corporations to add depth and cretivity to their work and employee development program -- as a great example of how play at work can deliver great results. Read more here.

Form Follows Function

That’s the premise behind yet another summer camp I wish I had when I was young….this one’s in Northwest Illinois.

Sauk Community College’s Lego Camp offers kids an opportunity to learn about tension, compression and symmetry. A camp instructor quoted in the article below mentions that “the classes aren’t all about fun.” With kids building roller conveyors, cars, catapults and submarines, uh, I beg to differ.

Read about it here.

The LEGO RULE

This is an oldie but goodie…As the hype around video games continues to grow, a new generation of video-game playing parents are faced with the dilemma of whether or not their own children should play these games. Chris Anderson – editor-in-chief of Wired magazine and lead editor of Geekdad.com follows the “LEGO Rule” when it comes to decisions like this. “The Lego Company, it seems, has a policy of not producing toys that replicate 20th century weapons. “You can have swords, and you can have laser guns in space, but no actual 20th century guns,” Anderson says. So his four children can play games like Halo, since it contains only futuristic, fantasy war, where you're killing only green- or blue-blooded aliens. The same goes for Roman swordplay titles. "But it clearly walls off Grand Theft Auto.” This article goes on to explain that parents should limit game-time and I agree…I’d much rather challenge my kids to a LEGO brick building contest than even attempt to shoot the most aliens.

Newly discovered dinosaur preserved in Lego form

The newly discovered dinosaur, the Albertaceratops, has now been preserved in Lego brick form at the Telus World of Science! Lego brick-master Robin Sather has captured every detail using Duplo bricks. How many you ask? He can't reveal that, but estimates 10s of 1000s of bricks. The really cool part - the model is on display until September, at which point kids are invited in to help dismantle the creation! Read all about it here!

Not just for kids...

260 LEGO fans gathered outside of Chicago this past weekend at BrickWorld to show off their creations. Showcased were everything from mosaics to life size Darth Vaders to an architectural study of a medieval English cathedral. And all of these models were built by AFOLs - Adult Fans of LEGO.

This isn't abnormal - right now there is a community of over 30,000 AFOLs and that number is growing. Architects, engineers, teachers - it's a broad and talented group that isn't afraid to showcase their inner child.

Check out more about the event!

A LEGO Fantasy Land

Adam Reed Tucker, once a LEGO kid, now a Chicago area architect has created “a LEGO extravaganza” for fans of all ages - Brickworld! Featuring thousands of LEGO creations, Brickworld took place this weekend and was a huge success! Check out this Chicago Tribune article to read about Tucker’s inspiration to organize this event for LEGO fans of all ages.

BrickWorld Links Lovers of LEGO

Inspired fans will be gathering this weekend to celebrate their love of LEGO and showcase their amazing creations. Adam Tucker, organizer of the BrickWorld event was not only a LEGO kid, but turned into a LEGO adult. "When I was young Lego had something called a World Showcase Tour ... a traveling exhibit in the early '70s to promote this new toy from Denmark called Lego," Tucker remembered. "I was touched by this and wanted to pay tribute to that event I experienced when I was young, which eventually aided in me becoming an architect today." Read about it here.

Inspiring the Builders of Tomorrow

Some companies work to make it fun for their employees to be at work. Others are creating programs for students that helps them see the fun side of their future career choices. IBM is hoping to activate girls’ interest in fields like science and technology when they’re younger, more open to new ideas and bringing a creative, fun attitude to the game. Check out this this story about how they created a camp for girls to spark their interest in technology, and they’re using…you guessed it, LEGO robots as part of the camp program. Quoting an IBM corporate community relations employee and camp coordinator: "[The girls] are just so excited and are like, 'I can do anything. I can be an engineer. I can work in pharmaceuticals. I can do anything in math and science. It's not boring. It's fun.’ That, to me, is extremely important."

The power of the minifigure... through sign language

Minifigures may be silent, but their stories speak out to American Sign Language (ASL) students….

American Sign Language (ASL) Professor Carl Schroeder of Haiku, Hawaii uses LEGO storytelling to inspire students to develop their ASL skills. “I believe rather firmly that learning ASL through LEGO stories empowers students to replace the unrealistic folk tales with simple realistic stories taken from the world of reality and from nature.”

Indy is back and Harrison Ford is my idol!

He is THE only person to be represented TWO times (at the same time) in LEGO minifigure form. Just announced and covered over at the MTV Movies blog, check it out and “Gawk below to see the 4-centimeter version of our idol-hunting, whip-toting adventurer in action.”

Lawyer to LEGO

Some people know the key to corporate happiness isn’t always in the paycheck. One corporate lawyer in Manhattan left his day job to follow his inner creator…building with LEGO bricks for a living. He now has a traveling LEGO art exhibit and goes to corporate campuses to do building events to inspire fun and creativity among employees. Check out his website here and check out a recent glimpse into his “office” from CNN.

LEGO Photo Brings Couple Together

LEGO Matchmaking alert!! "A PHOTO of a Lego dinosaur eating a little girl has led to a woman leaving her home in the US to marry a Scotsman living in London."

Read all about it...
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,21937383-5005962,00.html?from=public_rss

What a camp!

Talk about a cool summer camp! Play-Well TEKnologies provides classes, workshops, summer camps and even parties to foster creativity in children. One summer camp class asks kids to design and build machines powered by alternate energy sources. “Race solar cars, build a wind-powered electrical generation facility, enter the human powered vehicle competition, and invent a machine powered by stored elastic strain energy.” Now that’s what I call creative! Where was this camp when I was a kid?

Googlians at work…or play?

Check out this peek into Googletopia. Consummate LEGO fans who use it all over their campuses to spur creativity, Google corners the market on fresh, different and FUN corporate culture. Given their success, they must know the way to an employee’s heart – and creative spirit – is through appealing to their inner children.

Favorite "Geek" movies recreated with true Geekdad flavor

Inspired by an awesome LEGO Alien interpretation, a blogger on Wired Magazine’s Geekdad blog has challenged “all the Geekdads and Geekkids with LEGO skills” to “craft and submit pictures of constructs that recreate an item, character, or scene from favorite geek movies.” The comments to this blog entry are awesome and I have to give props to my fellow Geekmom that wants to participate! Read more here.

Brad Pitt Builds the Tower of Babel out of Bricks!

Even devoted dad Brad Pitt spends time with his adopted son Maddox by building LEGO creations! He hopes that one day Maddox will become an engineer or an architect. See it here.

LEGO Star Wars Memories....

With the 30th Anniversary of the first Star Wars movie upon us, this über fan reminisces about the first time his father took him to see a Star Wars movie. Like so many other fans he quickly became obsessed. He writes: "I feel sorry for my dad: he had to deal with a mini-Luke for the next ten years." And, like so many of us, LEGO bricks consumed his childhood so he was creative and built his very own spaceships to have space battles. Once LEGO came out with its LEGO Star Wars line he wondered, “why, oh why didn’t they have them when I was a kid? It was the ultimate marriage of my two childhood favorites... Alas, I was an adult, so I didn’t buy such toys anymore. So I bought a Lego Podracer from Episode I. It’s still in my closet. Shh, don’t tell anyone.”

LEGO Mos Eisley

Really, I think that there isn’t anything more to say than to DIGG this! “I’ve loved LEGOs ever since I was a child. I still have my collection of spaceships, including my own Star Wars creations that I made before ever getting the official sets. But whoever built this set is my hero.” http://www.slashgear.com/lego-mos-eisley-someone-has-too-much-time-285463.php