Never be late for school again! Thanks to the Bed & Bam you are —bam— awake! This Dream Machine was invented by children from the 5th grade of the urban primary school Kuringen. Students from PXL made a concept of it, and it was built by students from the technical secondary school Campus Hast in...
Helping young people build creative confidence. Letting them understand what it takes to bring ideas to life. It’s quite a challenge. It’s a tremendous adventure. It’s incredibly important. Wherever life takes them, it all starts with knowing that your own ideas matter and are worth exploring their potential to make a difference. That is how...
The MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) Final Exhibition 2024 was again a great success this year! On May 23 and 24 it was slightly quieter in the Design Museum in Brussels than on other days. Students from primary schools throughout the country travelled to the capital to test out their Dream Machines of their own...
While lots of precious impact is often unmeasurable, we still regularly involve our stakeholders in surveys. MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium), has recently conducted a survey with the participating university students. 100% of the university students participated, coming from different faculties like Digital Arts & Entertainment, Industrial Product Design, Mechanical Engineering, Teacher Training, Communication Sciences,...
From the start of MyMachine until today, we have always found it important to have a good, strong relationship with the industry and the public. MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) has been picked up by two magazines lately, each of them writing a multi-page article on the impact created by MyMachine. SAI is a Belgian...
“At our elementary school, we try to give our students every opportunity to grow academically and socially-emotionally. Children with autism spectrum disorder and behavioural problems need a safe learning environment to grow and break through the resistance to school work. Learning to work together with different age groups, discovering their talents and coming into contact...
Collaboration in real-life. Not in textbooks. A lot happens when you co-create: creativity sparks at the beginning, and perseverance gets you through the most challenging moments of going from idea to concept to working prototype. That’s how it looks when hundreds of students and educators in primary, secondary and higher education co-create Dream Machines. In...
“MyMachine gave me the vision that entrepreneurship should be about improving the life of others”, says Ferdinand de Meeûs d’Argenteuil on stage at the annual Donors Assembly of Pulse Foundation. This event in Brussels, Belgium, annually gathers the donors of the Pulse Foundation to exchange insights on the importance of entrepreneurship. We were honoured to...
Young people’s dreams are hitting the news in Belgium! Different regional television broadcast companies have been covering the big reveals of several Dream Machines. These reveals take place at the primary school that invented them. The child inventors have been involved in the whole process from inception to the making of these working prototypes. But...
Celebrating your birthday at school will never be the same again! The Fantandem makes it even more fun! Ride the bike, and the sweets are thrown around for your friends to catch! This Dream Machine was invented by 2nd graders in Sint-Truiden, Belgium. Regional television TV Limburg joined us to document this big reveal: Next...
Turning all days of the week into Happy Days! That was the dream of Vicky’s class in primary school Spoor 9 & De Sassepoort in Gent (Belgium). Today was the big reveal of this Make-Me/Us-Happy machine. It’s a magical fitting room that allows two children to engage in interactive games to make them happy. The...
While Belgium is engulfed in a heatwave these days, playing in rainy weather sounds like a wonderful idea! But what should we do with those filthy, muddy, shoes when entering school? Primary school children at Groeicampus Lager in Genk came up with this clever solution: the ShoeWash. This Interactive-Shoe-Washing-Machine works on human power. It was...
We were so busy last year that we forgot to celebrate reaching a 7 figure milestone: 💪🏼1 Million student-hours of building creative confidence! We’re now at 1.3M, which is like going to school* for 738 years. * Not just any school, but probably the most creative Dream Machine School on the planet. The MyMachine Co-Founders Filip Meuris,...
Two days in a row, we went in low-stimulus mode at Howest University in Belgium. This time around, we didn’t host hundreds and hundreds of young creative minds all at the same time. Instead, we organised consecutive tailor-made workshops developed by Occupational Therapy students at Howest University to host small groups of primary school children...
PXL university in Belgium opens the doors for the MyMachine participants! Using functional models, the interdisciplinary student teams of the university presented the final concepts of the Dream Machines to primary school students with whom they have been working since the beginning of October 2022. Which STEM principles are incorporated in the Shoe-Wash, the automatic...
What happens when university students at the world’s best game design university take on your Dream Machine idea? That is what the primary school students of the 2nd grade of Leefschool De Vlieger in Ostend (Belgium) were eager to find out! They went on a trip to the School of Digital Arts & Entertainment (DAE)...
More than 300 students in primary classes in Flanders & Brussels (Belgium, Europe) were given a mission: to awaken the creative power in themselves and create something no one has shown them: the machine of their dreams! As university students were entering these primary classes to invite the young students to be creative, hundreds of...
A couple of weeks after the new school year has started in schools in Belgium, is the perfect time for the new MyMachine Flandres & Brussels cycle to kick off. Here are some pictures of the first primary school this year to host university students in their class. These Digital Arts & Entertainment students from...
On June 23 and 24, nine dream machines were on display in Technopolis, Mechelen. From the lubricating machine to the mental aid machine: each one sprung from the imagination of primary school students and was brought to life by college students and technical/vocational secondary students. By joining forces, they created the MyMachine Expo 2021-2022. Some...
Yesterday evening was the grand opening of Design Fest Gent. MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) is proud to be part of the exhibition “Be Wild, Act & Change”! Design Fest Gent, a new biennial 10-day international festival that offers designers space to present their ground-breaking ideas. The festival demonstrates what design can (and indeed should)...
myBOO continues to travel to Business-to-Business events. This week our lovely Evil-Ghost-Hunter proudly showed its powers to potential buyers at Maison & Objet in Paris. Maison & Objet is a decoration, design and lifestyle B2B community. It nurtures the relationship between 6,000 brands & designers, some 300,000 international buyers, 1,500 journalists and over 2...
Creative overload in Kortrijk (Belgium)! MyMachine Flanders & Brussels organised their 2nd Work-In-Progress Event this year: this time around for the participating schools in the Central and West part of Flanders. 150 students at the School of Industrial Product Design at Howest University of Applied Sciences elaborated concepts of Dream Machines invented by the...
In this year’s run of MyMachine Flanders&Brussels (Belgium, Europe), different participating university faculties have incorporated the MyMachine assignment at other moments in their curriculum. The students at the faculty of Industrial Product Design at Howest University of Applied Sciences are delivering a design sprint this week. One hundred fifty students are turning Dream Machines into...
A Always-Together-Machine, a Music-Wall-On-The-School’s-Playground, a Comfort-Robot, and so many more ideas. We are always amazed by the inventor’s brain of children. University students joined the primary classes to get acquainted with their “customers” and with their customers’ desires. All Primary School Students start from a blank sheet of paper. We believe that creativity arises when...
8 minutes of tremendous creativity and collaboration. This year’s grand exhibition of MyMachine Flanders&Brussels (Belgium) was divided into separate events for each of the elaborated dream machines. These inauguration events were done at the premises of the respective primary schools. They united all participating students: primary, secondary and university level, all celebrating the result of...
The first 2 Dream Machines of MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) are delivered to the primary schools. This video reveals the inauguration of the Flying Sleeping Bag 😃 or better known as The-making-going-to-sleep-so-much-fun-machine! Amazing feedback in the interviews with primary, secondary, and university students as well as educators and business people; all explaining what MyMachine...
University students Ruben and Charles presenting the status of their work within the framework of MyMachine Flanders and Brussels (Belgium). They made this short video to be shown to the child-inventors in the primary classroom. In this video Ruben and Charles explain the status of the concept they are working on, based upon the invention...
Last week, creativity was booming again in Belgium. University students went into the primary classrooms to connect with their ‘customers’. And to find out what dream machines they invent and why they specifically invent this one. This time round, more than 100 primary schools across the Flanders and Brussels region of Belgium, participated with their...
Every year the King Baudouin Foundation organises a fundraiser for its Community Foundation West-Flanders (home to MyMachine co-founder Jan Despiegelaere). As has been the case in one of the previous editions a couple of years back, MyMachine Flanders & Brussels was highlighted as an example of how an education approach can add to the community...
Walking to school while sowing flowers! This fabulous dream machine idea was invented by second grade primary school students at the Broebelschool in Oudenaarde (Belgium). The sowing machine is attached to your leg and is spreading the seeds while you walk. The design was done by Lorien Duchamps, Industrial Product Design student at Howest University and the...
The 5th grade primary school students at the Stedelijke Basisschool Zuid in Harelbeke (Belgium) invented a machine to create their own teddy bears. That is because they can’t find the ones they love in existing shops and moreover they dreamed of unique ones. Tijn Veraghert Industrial Product Design student at Howest University (Kortrijk, Belgium) created in collaboration...
The “Zoekinator” (“Searchinator”): a marvel invented by children with autism at the primary school BuBaO Sint-Idesbald (Belgium). University College students Ine Cappon, Ellen Knockaert and Lotte Vaernewyck, third year occupational therapy students at Howest made the design and made the machine in collaboration with the observation year of Secondary School Sint-Idesbald. The child-inventors received and...
From now on, the children at the primary school De Boomhut in Sint-Andries (Belgium) have become “Plastic Eaters”. They welcomed their real working dream machine to school today. The Plastic Eater includes a luminous backpack and all necessary tools to collect litter. With the counter and app, they can keep track of how much waste...
The final occasion for the primary school inventors to discuss the proof-of-concepts designed by the university students: yesterday primary school children, secondary school students and higher education students from the east of Belgium joined the MyMachine Work-in-Progress at PXL University of Applied Sciences in the city of Hasselt. Next to exploring the final proof-of-concepts, the...
The Dream Machines were invented early October ’19. The higher education students have had several interactions with their clients so far; cumulating to this Work-In-Progress event today. Participating Primary School Students and Technical/Vocational Secondary Level Students from the West side of the country, visited the Industrial Design Center at Howest University of Applied Sciences in...
In MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) special education primary schools are yet again involved. This is a great opportunity to work together with Occupational Therapy students at Howest University of Applied Sciences. Last week the university students started working as designers with primary school students with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and/or with behavioural and emotional...
Yes! New Dream Machine Ideas have been created in MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium)! From the city of Bruges (West) to the city of Maaseik (East) primary schools have been exposed to an extreme high dose of creativity. Thanks to the expert guiding of higher education students from Howest University of Applied Sciences and PXL...
MyMachine kick-off for educators from primary and secondary education and the higher education students: it’s all about planning, to-do lists, getting to know each other. But most of all: learning to see MyMachine through the eyes of the primary school children. Which means: starting from a blank sheet of paper: doing something that no-one has done...
Wednesday June 26th 2019 at 18:30h something beautiful came to be: An Evening With MyMachine. A seated-dinner event that marked 3 world premieres: the launch of the book What Is Your Dream Machine? How Children Change Education Worldwide the announcement of myBOO: the very first real-life MyMachine product to be launched soon the launch of...
Tuesday June 25th was MyMachine Flanders and Brussels VIP day: all participating students from elementary schools and university students from Howest University of Applied Sciences and PXL University of Applied Sciences gathered at Belvue Museum downtown Brussels, for a whole day of discovering the working prototypes. Here’s already a short video giving an impression on...
On Tuesday June 25th, all participating schools from Flanders and Brussels will show up at 10:30am in downtown Brussels. All working prototypes will be on display to be admired and tested! The MyMachine Flanders & Brussels 2019 Exhibition will take place at Belvue Museum, next to the royal palace. At the occasion of their visit...
In this year’s MyMachine Belgium edition, the Work-In-Progress event was a double event: one in the city of Hasselt (at PXL University of Applied Sciences) and one in the city of Kortrijk (at HOWEST University of Applied Sciences) (located 200km from each other). The event delivers the Primary School children their last opportunity to give...
Just like last week in the city of Hasselt, MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) has organised a second work-in-progress event, this time in Kortrijk. More then 200 students from primary and secondary and higher education came together to experiment, learn from each other and to inspire each other. The higher education students from Howest University...
Young inventors explore the scientific principles behind their dream machines: producing electricity with fruit from the ‘dream tree’ so they can activate lights in the tree. Or making fake wounds with bioplastics, which brings the perfect excuse the bring on the ‘nursing machine’. All of this was made possible by the students from PXL University in...
MyMachine Belgium is impressed to see how this student team from the School of Digital Arts & Entertainment at Howest University, succeeded to engage the primary students from GO! Basisschool Kroonloon in Ostend, in their game developing platform. Not only by developing a game based on their ideas but by involving them in the development phases,...
Maja is the annual magazine published by The Young Academy. The most recent edition (number 5) runs an article on MyMachine, expressing the need for nurturing creativity and a ‘we can do that’ approach with the youth in Belgium. The Young Academy, part of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences & Arts, is...
The international ProtoTyping trade fair is designed for everyone in the field of product development. The focus is on the whole design process, from the original idea through to setting up a business model and actual production in a pilot run or small series. You will find companies and research centres here with the technologies, materials, tools &...
What would you think of a machine to invent new animal species? Or a machine that enables you to talk to your cuddles? Or would you prefer the me-doubler that would go to school in stead of you? Lot’s of brilliant ideas, yes every idea is brilliant, from the elementary school children in this classroom...
Here are some of the teachers who will guide their inventors and makers through the MyMachine process, starting next week. During the bootcamps in Howest University (Kortrijk) and PXL University (Hasselt) the teams from higher, lower and secondary got to know each other. The higher education students took all of them on a tour guide...
Belgian media company ZIGO interviewed one of our three co-founders at MyMachine. ZIGO is not just another media company. Its baseline is “Makes Optimism Easy” and brings the story of people (they call them pioneers) who do not accept the status quo and take positive action to better our society. It is therefore a great...
Very proud to be called “Rebel With A Cause” in this article by by leading voice in education Tom Vander Ark (Getting Smart). The article explains that “Rebels are people who break rules that should be broken. They break rules that hold them and others back, and their way of rule breaking is constructive rather than destructive....
The Belgian company Vanhalst, 2 Give & Enjoy, was founded in 1968 and celebrates 50 years of entrepreneurship. Vanhalst has grown from a pastry shop to a wholesale company and in more recent years the creation of the designlabel Atelier Pierre. Since 2002 Sophie and Frank, sister and brother, are leading the company and its...
This is what happened last Tuesday at the Opening Event of MyMachine Belgium 2018 Exhibition. With over a thousand participants: children-inventors, students, teachers, professors, leading voices in industry, education, government and with the keynote by Mr. Tom Vander Ark, leading voice of education in the USA. Enjoy the video:
Tuesday June 25th. 11AM. At Technopolis in Mechelen, Belgium. 1000 visitors anxious to go inside and start discovering the results of one full school year’s work of co-created creativity by 650 students from all educational levels and 26 different schools throughout the country. This year, the MyMachine Belgium 2018 Exhibition Opening Event was co-hosted by...
There’s 3 extraordinary reasons to be at the MyMachine Flanders (Belgium) 2018 Exhibition Opening Event on June 26th in Technopolis Mechelen (Belgium): 1. Some 650 child-inventors and students from all over the country will be there to visit the exhibition. As they have been co-creating their own dream machine with their classroom in the current school...
We have now (and only now, which is, in hindsight, remarkable) decided to create a mailing list. We will send news about all MyMachine chapters from around the world, but we will only do that when there is something to tell. So it will not be a fixed-scheduled-newsletter every week or every month. It will...
This week was a remarkable one for MyMachine. It marked the very first gathering of (almost) all MyMachine coordinators from around the globe. The 2-day meeting was crucial in the further development of our global strategy. And, as always, we were not afraid to challenge ourselves. This time round with the same central assignment we give...
At the Future Factories 2018 Award Gala (organised by Agoria, Sirris, Fevia, Fedustria, Centexbel and Flanders’ Food), the manufacturing industry in Belgium chose to support MyMachine financially and give us the opportunity to present what we are doing to support this very important manufacturing industry. The manufacturing industry in Belgium is facing some of the greatest...
The February edition of the magazine “Ondernemers” (Entrepreneurs) of the Belgian Chamber of Commerce (VOKA) features an interview with MyMachine Flanders & Brussels coordinator Aagje Beirens and MyMachine Co-Founder Piet Grymonprez. The article focusses on the Global Reimagine Education Presence Learning Gold Winner 2018 award MyMachine received in Philadelphia last December and how exactly MyMachine...
Ever since the day the elementary school children (Kortrijk, Belgium) got a suprise visit from the Digital Arts & Entertainment (HOWEST Univerity of Applied Sciences) students, they knew their invention was going to become a computer game. The university students decided to incorporate every single invention of every child into the computer game. Since that...
For the last couple of years, December is marked to be a very special month in Belgium. It’s the almost-end-of-part-2 of MyMachine. Since the day the university students have been to the elementary school classroom, a lot has happened. The university student knew what dream machine they needed to design. They had to deliver different...
We’re already up and running for quite some years now in Flanders and Brussels (Belgium), and still this moment remains magic. The very moment children start to invent their own dream machine(s). Some 800 children throughout the country have been inventing the past 2 weeks. We can’t wait to hear about their dream machines soon....
Monday 26th, Tuesday 27th and Wednesday 28th mark the 3-day MyMachine Flanders & Brussels exhibition 2017 at Brussels’ Library Muntpunt. Some 700 children from elementary schools came, view, concerned and approved their very own inventions turned into 12 working prototypes. This time round, not just business people and other different stakeholders were at this Brussels...
These proud inventors and builders from MyMachine Vlaanderen(Belgium) present their dream machines at their MyMachine Inauguration Party they organised themselves for their schools and parents. And by the third week of June, all dream machines will be on display at the MyMachine Belgium Exhibition in Brussels!
It’s that time of the year again, where MyMachine Flanders & Brussels (Belgium) is multi-tasking big time. Not only are the technical secondary students working hard to finish the building of the working prototypes, and MyMachine is preparing the final exhibition for June in Brussels, they are also launching the yearly Call for Participation to...
What happens if you bring in 450 child-inventors into one room at HOWEST University of Applied Sciences in Kortrijk? The answer is: they become loud and enthusiastic feedback machines to the university students that are designing their inventions. Each year again, it’s so wonderful to see the university students getting hands-on honest feedback from the...
Brussels, Belgium (Europe). 23 June 2016. 11AM. 450 Children discover and test the elaborated dream machines.
Some rain. But for most, a lot of sun and very hot temperatures in downtown Brussels. 4 dream machines are on display outside of The Bronks (Youth Theatre), 6 dream machines inside. With a direct impact of 65, this means that more than 700 people collaborated in creating these dream machines. The participating elementary school...
Yesterday was a great day for MyMachine Belgium. Hundreds of children visited the “inventor-school” (Howest University of Applied Sciences – Industrial Design Center) to assess the works of the product and game design students. At this Work-In-Progress event all children inventors give honest feedback about the elaboration of the concepts of their dream machine. This...
The ZOMBIE machine is the idea that the children in Slovenia and Belgium want to see realized as a working prototype. This machine can make real zombies that protect you and help you doing things at home (if you ask them friendly). Has this anything do to with the Halloween period? One thing’s for sure: they...
MyMachine Global is proud to announce a new and unique international collaboration between MyMachine Flanders (Belgium) and MyMachine Slovenia. During this academic year the 3 educational levels in Belgium (Kortrijk) and Slovenia (Ljubljana and Nova Gorica) will cooperate both offline and online as one international team with one goal: the making of a working prototype...
The MyMachine Belgium (Flanders) Exhibition on national television in a dedicated news show targeting youth (Dutch): http://www.ketnet.be/karrewiet/23-juni-2015-my-machine. This news item focusses on the visit to the exhibition of the elementary school that invented the game that has been developed in this MyMachine cycle.
We’re very happy to share some of the great media coverage both exhibitions benefitted from both in Slovenia as in Belgium. Here’s 2 examples from both countries: In Slovenia the MyMachine Exhibition got almost a complete page in the Delo (one of, if not the most important newspaper in Slovenia). You can see the picture...
Today was a magnificent day for MyMachine. MyMachine Belgium (Flanders) just celebrated their Grand Opening in Kortrijk. The expo tails the 2014-15 edition of MyMachine Belgium (Flanders). 450 Children from the participating schools in Belgium, arrived at 10 o’clock. They could discover all of the elaborated working prototypes and test them out ! The higher education students were there...
Click here for the Dutch Documentary by Regional Television TV OOST: children/inventors from the Belgian elementary school discovering, at the technical high school, their working prototype: the Disease-Vacuum-Cleaner. This is one of the dream machines that will be on display at the Grand MyMachine Flanders Exhibition, opening June 18th in the City of Kortrijk. Join us...
The MyMachine Flanders (Belgium) Grand Exhibition will take place 18-28 June 2015 at the Buda Arts Center in the City of Kortrijk. This Grand Exhibition is the final chapter of the MyMachine Flanders (Belgium) cycle 2014-2015. In this cycle more than 600 pupils and students from 21 different schools in Flanders participated. 18 June is...
MyMachine Flanders in Belgium, just launched their new call for participants 2015-2016. This call for participants aims at schools in Flanders and Brussels to participate at the MyMachine cycle 2015-2016 in Belgium. This new MyMachine cycle will start end of September 2015. If your school wants to apply, follow this link: http://mymachine.be/nieuws/gezocht-enthousiaste-scholen-voor-deelname-aan-mymachine-vlaanderen-2015-2016 We’re ready to...
In 6 weeks time, 6 MyMachine inventors from the past were in the national tv-show, in which the guests could vote if the invention was brilliant or not. Guess what? MyMachine got 6 times brilliant! Here’s a stop motion were you see Brecht presenting his Ball-Cather/Fetcher machine: StopMotion_Brecht And here are some behind-the-scenes-pictures: ...
Last week, MyMachine Belgium was on national television (VRT). MyMachine was a guest in the late night talk show called Bart & Siska. Here’s the link where you can watch MyMachine on the show (Dutch).
Tonight in the brand new late night talkshow Bart & Siska on VRT (National Television), Charlotte will present her very own dream machine. Charlotte participated in MyMachine Belgium 6 years ago. Now she’s 12 years old and she will look back at the machine she invented when she was in de first grade of the...
Today, the children of the Ten Bunderen school visited the Howest – Digital Arts & Entertainment campus in Kortrijk. They discovered their own invented game, developed by Digital Arts & Entertainment students. Oh, no surprise there, they loved it!
MyMachine Belgium was having its Work-in-Progress Event yesterday. It made it to the National Television News in Belgium (Dutch) and the Regional Television News (Dutch). Take a look at this short documentary to capture the vibe NATIONAL VRT JOURNAAL: REGIONAL WTV-FOCUS:
Today, more than 400 children visited the Howest Campus in the city of Kortrijk, to discover and discuss the progress made by the Howest Industrial Product Design Students. It was fabulous.
Tuesday 16 december Howest University of Applied Sciences is hosting the MyMachine Work-In-Progress again. 400 children will visit the Howest Industrial Product Design Students to discuss the progress they made, developing a product concept out of the drawings of their dream machines. The Howest students are working hard to finish the last preparations.
