It’s another exciting installment of Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? except in this episode we’re going to get schooled by 12-year old Elizabeth Rintels on techniques for going green. The By Kids For Kids “Going Green Challenge” is a contest that enables the youth to showcase their concerns and awareness of our dieing planet. It also shows how not every eco-friendly idea has to be transportation related.

And Elizabeth did just that, displaying her idea of the “Water Watcher,” a device that you hook onto your shower faucet which signals a red light and sounds a beep every time a half-gallon of water is used. Want to play with water? Get the Waterboard. Other than that, be wary of the water you waste every time you flush. Elizabeth ended up winning the $10,000 dollar cash prize and quite possibly saved the planet from turning into a barren wasteland. Or at least prolonged the inevitable.

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A group of young minds at the Saint Thomas Academy in Mendota Heights, MN have constructed from scratch a lithium phosphate ion-powered motorcycle that can travel at speeds of 60 MPH for 50+ miles before needing to be recharged. Safer than any Vespa you’ve taken for a ride, this electric bike has been built with the driver’s safety in mind.  Implemented in its design are “crush zones” formed by compressible materials to protect the driver by keeping him/her inside the vehicle during the event of a collision.

The bike is going to be shown at MIT next week and the team plans on inventing a solar-charging station to make the electric bike truly carbon free. It seems like eco-friendly motor bikes are the way of transportation in our greener future.
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After taking a good look at Johan De Broyer’s Soda Seal, I have to say I’m impressed. Time after time, soda cans are usually littered about the house, sometimes half-full. Rather than let them sit around and become flat, the Soda Seal would cut back on wasted soda and that’s always a good thing.

The device isn’t intended to be added to cans by users but rather is supposed to be included on the can from the manufacturer. You crack a can, drink some soda and when you want to reseal it, you just twist the tab around and on slides the seal. De Broyer even points out that you could advertise on the seal. What do you think? Useful application or utter crap?

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After all those brain and IQ training games on DS, Nintendo thinks that the next thing to train would be our eyes! So they announced this all new Eye Power Training game in Japan that works your eyes in 5 ways:

1. Motion vision: the ability of picking up and seeing moving objects clearly

2. Powerful glances: the ability to catch as much information within a very short period of time

3. Eyeball motion: the ability to trace objects with responsive eyeball movements

4. Effective visual field: the ability of making use of the information you see at the rim of your visual field

5. Hand-eye coordination

Nintendo recommends training everyday, with all these polygon flying over the screen, and these oddly artificial “sports-mode” which should resemble real life situation more. Towards the end of the training, the DS will tell you how old your eyes are based on what they can do, you can save your record and see how your eyes improve (or deteriorate) as time goes by. The Eye Power Training program will be available on May31 at $33. –Sam Chan

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We know it’s hard to keep awake in painstakingly boring meetings, but wouldn’t it be great to have somebody next to you to wake you up when you fall asleep? The Japanese came out with various solutions for that, and one of them is the Nap Alarm. The Nap Alarm looks pretty much like just another headset for your mobile phone that hangs on your ear. The motion/balance sensor would be activated should your head rock forward, presumably losing consciousness, then a loud buzz will be set off directly into your ears and your ears only, so next time when your Japanese colleague suddenly jumps up in the middle of a meeting you’d know why.

If your ears are already pretty deaf from listening to iPod day and night, you can try the vibrating alarm instead, your ears should be sensitive enough. Wink wink. These Nap Alarms are only selling for $12 in Japan now, and since its release a few weeks ago, they have already been featured on a lot of Japanese TV shows. –Sam Chan

Official site [Takanoha]