Meet the four NSW finalists in the Origin Little Big Idea competition
They’re young, smart, and full of big ideas. Meet the four NSW finalists in the Origin Little Big Idea competition and read about their environment-saving, life-changing inventions.
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They are little inventors with big ideas — and all four NSW finalists in an Australia-wide competition to win a $10,000 education and innovation grant are girls.
Their bright ideas range from an eco-friendly bread clip to a kid-friendly hearing aid.
Claire Hinchliffe, 10, has big plans to help save our environment by introducing the bread-saver, an improved bread-bag clip made from biodegradable recycled cardboard.
“My little big idea will prevent over 500 million plastic bread clips going to waste each year,” Claire, from Holy Cross Catholic School at Kincumber, said.
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“And even though they’re really small, almost every single household in the world has bread and uses bread clips. I have a bread roll for lunch every day.
“This bread clip will be made out of 100 per cent recycled cardboard and you can also recycle the clip.”
Hannah Sistrom, 11, has invented the emoti-watch, a way to help autistic children communicate emotional distress using emoticons.
“Whether you are in the higher or lower end of the spectrum, it can be hard to communicate how you are feeling sometimes,” Hannah, from Ermington West Public School, said.
“If I was to win the competition I would definitely use some of the money to start working on prototypes of the emoti-watch.”
Caitlyn Whitbread, 13, from Kirrawee High School, was inspired by her sister to invent a hearing aid for kids that can be paired with tech devices.
“My little sister has a hearing aid and I tried to think of ways I can help her because I know it’s really uncomfortable for her to wear headphones with her hearing aid,” Caitlyn said.
“I want to be a special education teacher when I’m older so I think I would put the prizemoney towards university.”
Indi Maguire, 10, is also trying to improve life in the classroom for hearing-impaired students with the read function, a microphone that transcribes a teacher’s speech into text.
“I came up with this idea from my own experience with impaired hearing and sometimes struggling to understand discussions in class,” Indi, from St Andrews Primary School, Malabar, said.
“I hope I can help other kids with impaired hearing too.”
The four NSW students, among 12 finalists chosen from more than 2000 entries from across Australia, are now one step closer to winning the $10,000 prize in the Origin Little Big Idea competition.
Three national winners, one from each age category, will be announced in mid-November.