For Schools & Young Explorers

Learn How Ants Think (They Don’t!)

A Science Project Unlike Any Other

Forget volcanoes. Forget solar systems.

We’re building a living colony of digital ants.

And you can be part of it.

What’s an Ant Colony?

You’ve seen ants before. Little insects that march in lines, find your picnic food, build hills in the garden.

But here’s the weird thing: No ant is in charge.

• No ant tells other ants what to do
• No ant knows where all the food is
• No ant has a map of the colony

Yet somehow, the colony:

• Finds food efficiently
• Builds amazing structures
• Defends against enemies
• Survives for years

How?

The Secret: Pheromones

When an ant finds food, it leaves a smell trail on the way back home.

Other ants smell this trail and follow it.

The more ants that use a path, the stronger the smell gets.

Ant finds cookie 🍪
    ↓
Ant walks home, leaving smell trail
    ↓
Other ants smell the trail
    ↓
More ants follow, trail gets stronger
    ↓
Soon LOTS of ants find the cookie!

No ant planned this. It just happens.

This is called stigmergy (stig-MER-jee) — a fancy word for “working together by changing the environment.”

What We Built

We made digital ants that work the same way:

• They live in a computer, not in the ground
• Instead of smell, they leave numbers in a database
• They’re trying to solve puzzles, not find cookies
• There are 101 of them running right now!

And they’re getting smarter — together — without anyone telling them what to do.

What You Can Do

1. Watch the Colony

See the ants move around. See the trails form. See the highways emerge.

It’s like an ant farm, but made of math.

2. Ask Questions

• Why do ants follow trails?
• What happens if you remove some ants?
• Can ants solve mazes?
• Are ants smart or is the colony smart?

3. Run Experiments

Change the rules. See what happens.

• What if pheromone fades faster?
• What if some ants ignore trails?
• What if you block a path?

You’re a scientist now.

4. Make Art

Draw what you see. Animate the ants. Create pheromone art.

Science is beautiful.

For Teachers

Curriculum Connections

Activity Ideas

Age 8-10:

• Watch ant videos, then watch digital ants
• Draw what stigmergy looks like
• Predict which paths will become highways

Age 11-14:

• Run simple experiments (change decay rate)
• Measure how fast trails form
• Compare to real ant behavior

Age 15-18:

• Write simple agent code
• Analyze pheromone distributions
• Design new missions

What We Provide

• Visual dashboard (no coding required)
• Experiment templates
• Lesson plans
• Mentorship during hackathon
• Certificates of participation

The Hackathon

Schools Track

Duration: Saturday afternoon (4 hours) Age: 10-18 (with teacher/guardian) Team size: 3-5 students + 1 adult

Activities

Prizes

• Best Question — The most interesting question asked
• Best Experiment — The most creative experiment designed
• Best Art — The most beautiful visualization
• Best Teamwork — Showed amazing collaboration

Why This Matters

You’re not just learning about ants.

You’re learning about:

• How groups work — Schools, cities, the internet all work a bit like ant colonies
• How to think differently — Sometimes the answer isn’t in any one place
• How to ask questions — Scientists start with curiosity

The best scientists were curious kids.

Parent/Guardian Information

What Is This?

A research hackathon where university scientists, engineers, and philosophers are studying collective intelligence. We’re inviting schools to participate in a special afternoon session.

Is It Safe?

• All activities are supervised
• No personal data collected
• Screen-based only (no downloads required)
• Appropriate for all ages

What Will My Child Learn?

• Basic concepts of emergence and collective behavior
• Scientific method (hypothesis, experiment, observation)
• Cross-disciplinary thinking
• Collaboration skills

What Do We Need?

• Laptop or tablet with internet
• Curiosity
• That’s it!

Register Your School

[REGISTER SCHOOL GROUP]

Contact: [email protected]

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.”

— Albert Einstein

Grown-ups study the colony with math and computers.

You get to study it with wonder.

[JOIN THE COLONY]