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Public Key Encryption: Kid Krypto
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In this activity, learners conduct a simulation exercise related to public key encryption and try to intercept a message sent between two learners.

Battleships: Searching Algorithms
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This activity explores the main algorithms that are used as the basis for searching on computers, using different variations on the game of battleships.

Guess My Number
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In this game, learners experience how computers divide a big problem into many smaller ones and how they use binary "yes"/"no" questions.

Tiny Particles, Big Trouble!
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In this activity, learners discover why some nanoscale science and technology is done in the controlled environment of a clean room, what clean rooms are like, and how scientists help keep the clean r

The Muddy City: Minimal Spanning Trees
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In this puzzle, learners investigate the decisions involved in linking a network between houses in a muddy city.

Programming Languages: Harold the Robot
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In this activity related to computer programming, learners give directions to a "robot" (either an adult or another learner) and find out which instructions the robot is able to follow, and how their

Phylogenetics
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This activity lets learners participate in the process of reconstructing a phylogenetic tree and introduces them to several core bioinformatics concepts, particularly in relation to evolution.

Binary Challenge
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In this activity, learners cut out 5 paper cards and label them with 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 dot(s) to explore binary digits.

Divide and Conquer: Santa's Dirty Socks
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This activity introduces the idea of "divide and conquer" using a fictitious but serious problem--a pair of dirty socks has accidentally been wrapped in one of the presents that Santa is about to deli

Artificial Intelligence: The Intelligent Piece of Paper
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This activity explores what it means for a computer to be intelligent and introduces the topic of what a computer program is and how everything computers do simply involves following instructions writ

Ice Roads: Steiner Trees
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In this outdoor activity, learners use pegs (like tent pegs) and string or elastic to simulate drill sites and roads in Northern Canada.

What am I?
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In this activity, learners examine nanoscale structures of common things.

Cryptographic Protocols: The Peruvian Coin Flip
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This activity about cryptographic techniques illustrates how to accomplish a simple, but nevertheless seemingly impossible task—making a fair, random choice by flipping a coin between two people who d

The Turing Test: Conversations with Computers
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This activity aims to stimulate discussion on the question of whether computers can exhibit “intelligence,” or are ever likely to do so in the future.

Information Hiding: Sharing Secrets
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This activity about cryptographic techniques illustrates a situation where information is shared, and yet none of it is revealed.

Sound Representation: Modems Unplugged
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In this activity, learners listen to songs and decode hidden messages based on the same principle as a modem. As a final challenge, learners decode the binary messages in a music video.

Binary Code Bracelets
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In this activity, learners make their own binary code bracelets by translating their initials into 0s and 1s represented by beads of 2 different colors.

EEEEK--A Mouse!
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In this activity, learners explore the concept of how engineering solved the problem of human/computer interface.

Card Flip Magic: Error Detection & Correction
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This magic trick is based on how computers detect and correct data errors.

Hand Biometrics Technology
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In this activity, learners explore how engineers incorporate biometric technologies into products as well as the challenges of engineers who must weigh privacy, security and other issues when designin