Often referred to as the Dr. Seuss bike, pictured to the left, is one of my personal tinkering projects.
It has been featured in the Sonoma County Bicycle Expo, was used as a fundraiser for the 500 mile California aids awareness bicycle race to L.A., and has been demonstrated at high schools such as Cloverdale High as a useful academic tool. One of my goals is to introduce tinkering into the United States schooling system as a useful method of promoting Howard Gardner's multiple-intelligences as a way to successfully reach more students than the traditional classroom. The main idea is to make connections between academic studies and the entirely different life situations outside of the institutionalized schooling system. Students need to be able to make connections of how academic study applies to life outside of school. I argue that tinkering is a means to this end.
My ideas of tinkering follow Henry Jenkins' theories of Participatory Culture and I therefore argue that it will be successful in creating an environment in which students will be engaged and successful both in learning and creating or what Jenkins refers to as being Prosumers (combination of consumer and producer).
One goal is to introduce the ideas that Gever Tulley demonstrates in the following video into public settings, such as public schools, that allow all children access regardless of financial limitations.
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