I am Bob Nordling, founder of the Curiosity Shoppe @ Glasgow Middle School. The 'Shoppe' has emerged from a multi-decade fascination with the learning potential of the entire spectrum of playful inquiry. This journey began with 'abstract' and 'strategy' board games beginning in the 1970's, adding 'digital' games (computer, game console, MMOs - massive multi-player online) in the 1980's & 90's , and returning to a hybrid of 'analog' & 'digital' inquiry in the form of hands-on multi-disciplinary exploration of science, technology, and engineering (Hacker culture, Maker culture, Citizen Science). Most recently this journey has come full circle in a return to 'recreational math', an exploration of the 'analog' mechanical puzzles & abstract games of the past 5000 years -- this time around focused on the math & logic embedded within them.

This journey presented itself while pursuing careers & community service as a non-profit leader, software publisher, network engineer, high school teacher, IT industry certification trainer, and most recently a K-12 instructional technology specialist. Along the way I have benefitted from the insights of learned & innovative fellow travelers (see Learning Communities and Bibliographies).

The "Curiosity Advanced Research Projects Agenda" (CARPA) is an attempt to gather the discoveries from this four-decade journey (of learning from & about playful inquiry) to provide specialized yet interconnected pathways (puzzles, games, tinkering) for lifelong human development. CARPA will be under perennial revision, however, the foundation will be laid throughout the Spring & Summer of 2019, connecting to an ever growing collection of resources appearing on the Curiosity Shoppe public website. If you cannot quite yet see the 'method behind the eccentricity', please check back in a few months.

In summary, a claim is being made that education is lifelong, starting with evolutionary instinct and 'trial & error', developing through critical thinking that is founded upon emerging executive functions, and culminating in the expert use of design cycles of the age-old professions to advance knowledge & create things. Inquiry-based learning in all its forms and throughout life is therapeutic, providing 'natural supplements' to promote growth & prevent decline of the mental faculties. This is ever so important in the lives of K-12 age children since opportunities for reality-driven inquiry-based learning have been crowded out of everyday life by artificially-driven 'compliance-based' schooling as well as by repetitive, effortless dopamine-rewarded, screen-addictive behaviors (social media, gaming, viral media) of digital culture.

Bob Nordling, March 2019, Alexandria VA (USA)

CARPA also serves as a model of 'blended' and 'personalized' learning. This means that learning can take place in both physical & virtual locations, face-to-face & online, during specific days/times or anytime throughout the day/week/year. In the case of the Curiosity Shoppe, students & teachers can further their learning in a physical room during and after the school day. However, visiting students, teachers, parents, academics, collectors, and designers can further their learning any time and from any place through videos, podcasts, online interactive puzzles & games, e-books & articles, etc. Inquirers can pursue the path that most interests them and at a pace and a depth they themselves set. I have included some links below for teachers & parents wishing to explore the topics of 'blended' and 'personalized' learning more fully.

THE BARRIERS for introducing inquiry-based learning into the contemporary US public school classroom or at home are numerous and sometimes intimidating. The entire pedagogical industrial complex (online testing & textbook companies, school boards, administrators, and teachers) adopt by default the technologies, routines, and habits that most efficiently, reliably, and economically 'achieve' federal compliance metrics . These compliance metrics which are political/ideological in nature and which address the well being of groups rather than individuals always conflict (more or less) with reality-based best practices for human development discovered by academic research and the design-based practice of the age-old professions.

Those working for compliance-based educational systems put their own and their students' success within such a system 'at risk' if they do not adopt the series of lesson plans, the pacing, and the series of standardized computer-scored assessments that will allow the greatest number of students (especially students within profiled demographic groups) to recognize or arrive at answers matching a computer algorithm. So like hedge fund managers, end of fiscal (academic) year gains are the bottom line and take precedence over longer term strategies to promote the human development of a student. Therefore inquiry-based learning in all its variations is more or less risky for compliance-centered institutions since developing student self-regulation & resilience through maturation of self-reflection, understanding, and application are outside the scope (in most cases) of state/federal compliance assessment. Also inquiry-based learning cannot be uniformly paced when a wide variety of disparities are found within a school's student population (prior academic preparedness, prior effort-attained habits, language fluency, economic advantages, individual & cultural interest, natural developmental differences).

The entire spectrum of inquiry-base learning strategies address the 'cognitive divide' (maturation in executive functions, critical thinking, and design/expertise skills) that is frequently widened within K-12 public education by political/ideological EQUITY metrics. This is why parents, educators, academics, inventors, and designers, have a stake in promoting inquiry-based learning wherever and whenever (elective courses, after-school programs, community Makerspaces, home-based activities) and from as early an age as possible.

Many claims are made by vendors selling to K-12 institutions, teachers, and parents that their product promote executive functions, critical thinking, a growth mindset, multiple intelligences, and a legion of other benefits for human development. Such vendors are usually not ‘snake oil’ salesmen and there is some basis for their claims. However it would be useful to have some guiding questions & criteria with which to interrogate a product or activity to provide greater clarity of which human potentials are being targeted for growth and to what degree a product or activity sustains the pursuit of greater complexity.

Below is a first draft of a framework/rubric to support those associated with the Curiosity Shoppe @Glasgow Middle School (student curators, teachers) when collaborating on written/video reviews of K-12 inquiry-based learning resources (puzzles, games, gadgets, books, lesson plans).

Hopefully, as the document progresses in comprehensiveness & clarity, it will become useful for teachers & product designers alike to create engaging growth experiences for lifelong learners.

Metagrobology is the study & solving of the mechanical puzzles that ingenious humans have developed over many centuries. The beginner will find it helpful to become familiar with at least the outline of the Slocum Classification system early in their journey. The Slocum system is a taxonomy used by researchers, collectors, and solvers to organize & discuss in a systematic fashion past, present, and future puzzles. Perhaps the best way to gain familiarity with this system is by exploring Rob's Puzzle Page , a private annotated museum/collection maintained by Rob Stegmann. The vast majority of mechanical puzzles fit in Slocum's first five puzzle classes: 1. Put-Together, 2. Take-Apart, 3. Interlocking Solid, 4. Disentanglement, 5. Sequential Movement. Many students & adults have at least tried to solve a puzzle in each of these categories, likely not realizing that articles & books have been written about their underlying mathematics & logic.

A wealth of information can also be gathered from several excellent 'mechanical puzzle' reference books which Rob Stegmann refers to as the 'Core Curriculum'. Here is an index to for those 'Core Curriculum' books. Some of these books may be out of print but they can still be obtained from 'used book' sellers like Amazon.com at reasonable prices.

Some 'bucket list' experiences for those traveling the 'mechanical puzzle' path of inquiry:

attending an International Puzzle Party

attending a Gathering4Gardner Conference

owning a "Stickman" puzzle box

owning some Karakuri Creation Group puzzle boxes and/or joining their Karakuri Club (Christmas present subscription)

Coming Soon

Coming Soon