042 – Gotta Do It with Tom Friedhof
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[In This Episode][Guest Bio][Additional Notes][Text Transcript] |
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In This EpisodeDoes being a drummer really correlate to strong logical skills? How important is reading books to success? How important is application in the learning process? Listen in for answers in today’s podcast! Hey there, Innovation Nation! If you don’t know what LoL is, I bet your kids do. Our guest today has helped companies like Riot Games, the XPrize Foundation, and Hollywood’s “The Wrap” craft great looking websites. In our interview, Tom referenced a great quote by the late Stephen Covey from his book “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.” “Remember, to learn and not to do is really not to learn. To know and not to do is really not to know.” I am the poster child for this quote. Every time I learn something, I want to go find out if it really works. My problem is that I read and learn so much! Yet the wisdom is backed by some of the best educational theory. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of papers on the subject of applying knowledge and the value of application. There is no substitute for trying an idea if we want it to stick. We see the value of this idea every year in our Inventor’s Bootcamp summer program for teens. Just a couple weeks ago we had our first Inventor’s Bootcamp of 2015, and I remember vividly a girl named Claire. She was trying to understand how to wire up and use her team’s Impact sensor which measures the change of pressure with time. I could tell my words were quickly making her eyes roll back in her head, so I encouraged her to try the computer code to see what would happen. She tinkered with it for 5 or 10 minutes, and then I heard my favorite sound: “Ohhhhhhh!!” and a second later, “I get it. That is sooooo cool!” This experience gets played out dozens of times every week during Inventor’s Bootcamp because we let kids use technology and get their hands on it. If you’d like to find out more about Inventor’s Bootcamp, visit And now let’s introduce Tom Friedhof. Tom’s company ActiveLamp creates beautiful, intuitive websites for some very well known brands. Yet he didn’t get his start in the coding world in the normal fashion. Let’s get the story from Tom. |
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About TomTom has been designing and developing for the web since 2002 and got involved with Drupal in 2006. Previously he worked as a systems administrator for a large mortgage bank, managing servers and workstations, which is where he discovered his passion for automation and scripting. On his free time he enjoys camping with his wife and three kids. |
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What is the Purpose of an Education?
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Tom’s Favorite Quote
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Additional NotesConnect:
Links:
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Full Text Transcript – Coming Soon!“With technology being so vast, you have to be very selective about the tech you want to learn. The tech that I learn is the tech that I’m going to use.” —Tom Friedhof |
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