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EASY, LOW COST ACTIVITIES WITH UNIVERSAL ACCESS
This omnibus styled web site is created, written and published, monthly, by:
Robin A Cartledge ABN 19 924 273 138 PO Box 991 Port Macquarie NSW Australia 2444
The site has been designed to allow all readers easy access regardless of the quality of their connection or system.
Comments or suggestions can easily be forwarded to me via the Click Here to the right.
The menu on the right offers easy access to the almost 1500 pages in Dear Grandpa Pencil. My pages have been written to provide the most fun and information with the smallest possible file size and with heaps of off line activities.
Families, schools and organisations with just one computer can achieve maximum value without the dramas of many other sites as a result.
I believe that 'Outback Australia', along with such reemerging communities as East Timor, should have the same opportunities as our major cities.
Robin Cartledge (aka Grandpa Pencil )
New technology but old-fashioned games
David Smith for the Port Macquarie News, January, 2002
Port Macquaries' Robin Cartledge has created a website designed to encourage kids to move away from computer games, watching television and web surfing and enjoy more traditional pastimes.
Mr. Cartledge admits to being aware of the irony of using modern IT methods to instill hands on creativity in children, but said the Internet was a great tool in reaching children. "If you can't reach kids you can't teach them," he said.
Mr. Cartledge, a.k.a. Grandpa Pencil, has been entertaining children of all ages in Port Macquarie for many years with a number of his alter-egos such as Catweasel D. Clown, Ozzie Eagle and Neville News.
Mr. Cartledge's website, (www.grandpapencil.net), is far from high tech but it gives children hundreds of hours of family fun.
"Children can download many things from colour-in templates to plans for hanky parachutes and wooden cut-outs for toys," Mr. Cartledge said.
Mr. Cartledge's website doesn't subscribe to the techno-kid concept. There are no pulsating coloured blobs, just fun family activity that is easy and quick to download.
He believes there is always a place for real hands-on creativity and a good belly laugh.
"Give children a shoot 'em up and they will be happy for five minutes," he said.
"Give them the recipe for fun and they will be happy for the rest of their lives."
In the few months Mr. Cartledge has had his site up and running it has had hits from the United States, Canada and Japan. Not bad for a man who wasn't even sure how to turn on the computer five months ago.
"Just learning how to use the computer was a challenge and web design was an even bigger learning curve,'" he said.
Mr. Cartledge is hoping for feedback from families that use his site.
Reproduced with the kind permission of the Port Macquarie News |
