The Youth New Media Literacy Jam is approaching its conclusion at the TIFF Nexus New Media Literacies Conference.

As they busily prepare their projects for presentation on April 20th, during the TIFF Kids Film Festival, the TIFF Nexus blog would like to represent some of their experiences together – specifically the off-site field trips that saw the jammers visit cool spaces in Toronto.

For their first official meeting as Youth New Media Literacy Jammers, the participants assembled at ThingTank, a self-described “open, community based collaborative ideation lab: a place where the exploration, experimentation, and exchange of ideas are developed towards the building of internet enabled “things”. Opposite a room full of 3D printers, maker-bots, laser cutters and remote yurt heaters, and sitting around desks covered in paper for sketching, the participants soon found themselves divided into their respective groups.

After introducing themselves to each other, the jammers were then asked to present an example of an experience in the area of their profession or interest that they found cutting edge, clever, emotional or otherwise fascinating. These could be almost anything, and by the end of the meeting a sizable list of really cool videos, products and people were showcased. To watch and read about what and who were discussed, check out the bevy of links below:

• Jonathan Harris, Balloons of Bhutan project
  Jonathan Harris collects stories video on TED, more images from Balloons of Bhutan plus his other work
• Raghava KK: Shake up your story. Perspective changing iPad stories
• 
  AND THEN
  
• Teater Refleksion: Boxy George, Dutch theatre’s puppet show for children in an adult style
• September 12th, game where the more you accomplish the objectives, the more you lose
• Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education – video on TED, engaging children to learn where there are no teachers or schools
• The magic of 3D printing