4 Imagine you want to say Happy Birthday to a friend who lives far away You might call them on your phone send a text message or Skype Now imagine that phones and computers do not exist Suddenly saying Happy Birthday becomes a big problem Luckily people throughout history have solved these and other communication challenges Communication Changes Before phones and computers sending a message to a friend could take days weeks or even longer Today messages can be sent instantly Inventors and innovators solve a problem or meet a need They have made our lives easier by finding different ways to help us communicate with each other Today we can send instant messages all over the world In the future even more ideas will change the way we communicate Just think It could be your chance to invent the next BIG thing
Inventors create products or processes no one has ever thought of before such as the first computer An innovation is an improvement or change to an invention that already exists When computers were first invented they were large and had to be used by many people at the same time Through innovation the company IBM created personal computers that could be used by one person at a time Engineers can also be inventors and innovators when they make new solutions or improve on existing ones An engineer’s job is to use science and math to solve problems or meet needs Inventors innovators and engineers all share the same traits such as curiosity and creativity Inventions and Innovations The first personal computers were similar to the ones you use today 5
6 You’ve seen shelves of books in your local library school and for sale in stores But it wasn’t always this easy for people to get a book to read There was a time when books were very rare People called scribes had to write and copy books by hand This took a long time and made books very expensive Read All About It Gutenberg’s wooden printing press used ink and raised letters called type to print its pages
The Printing Press Around 1450 CE Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press a machine that printed one page every three minutes That’s a lot faster than writing by hand Imagine what Gutenberg would think of the speedy printing presses we have now Today’s printers can make thousands of books newspapers magazines and more in no time at all In 1971 Martin Hart came up with the idea of e-books Inspired by Gutenberg he named his digital library of e-books Project Gutenberg Today people read e-books on computers tablets or other devices 7
