Explore every episode of the podcast Unplugged and Unlocked - The Educational Podcast for Kids

Can a screen really make you see a fire-breathing dragon using nothing but millions of tiny glowing dots? (Spoiler alert: Glitches is currently trying to paint a computer monitor with a bucket of blue acrylic paint!)

In this fourth digital adventure, the Digital Storyteller and Glitches investigate a brilliant question about the mysterious pictures hiding inside our screens: How Do Flashlights Trick You Into Seeing Dragons?

In this episode, we explore:

• The Pixel Puzzle: Discover what a pixel actually is and how millions of tiny pixels work together to create the pictures we see on phones, tablets, computers and TVs.

• The Three Tiny Flashlights: Meet the three key colours hiding inside our screens: Red, Green and Blue. Find out how changing the brightness of these three colours can create millions of different colours, including yellow, purple and bright white.

• The Baby Photo That Changed Everything: Travel back to 1957 and meet Russell Kirsch, whose team used an early digital scanner to turn a photograph of his baby son Walden into a grid of just 176 × 176 pixels.

• Your Glitch Hunter Mission: Once the podcast has finished and the music fades, take a close look at a screen around you. Can you find evidence of the tiny coloured components working together to create the pictures you see every day?

Written, Recorded, Edited, and Produced by Sethi De Clercq

Can a super-advanced robot with a built-in Artificial Intelligence wizard chip survive an accidental appointment with a giant magnet? (Spoiler alert: Glitches is currently stuck flat against a metal filing cabinet like a giant refrigerator magnet!)

In our third digital adventure, the Digital Storyteller and Glitches tackle a brilliant question about the mysterious machinery inside our devices: Are There Smart Rocks Inside Your Laptop?

In this episode, we explore:

• The Hardware Blueprint: Discover why your computer's CPU acts like a hyperactive Master Builder, how RAM functions as a chaotic scrap-paper notepad, and why permanent Storage is like a massive supply closet.

• The AI Specialist Wizard: Meet the NPU (Neural Processing Unit) the brand-new hardware addition built specifically to handle massive Artificial Intelligence tasks!

• The 30-Ton Elephant Trap: Travel back to 1945 to see the massive ENIAC computer which pulled so much electricity it actually dimmed the streetlights in the nearby town when it booted up!

• Your Glitch Hunter Mission: Once the podcast has finished and the music fades, look at your family's laptop or tablet. Remember that underneath the smooth screen, thousands of tiny commands are sprinting through circuits at lightning speed, kept cool by miniature fans so your device doesn't turn into a toaster!

Written, Recorded, Edited, and Produced by Sethi De Clercq

Can a super-advanced robot with 16 gigabytes of computing power survive a trip to the ocean floor? (Spoiler alert: Glitches is wearing swimming fins and a snorkel in a completely dry recording studio!)

In our second digital adventure, the Digital Storyteller and Glitches tackle a brilliant question sent in by Glitch Hunter Chris: How does the internet travel across the world? Is it floating in the clouds, or is it swimming with sharks?

In this episode, we explore:

• The Shocking Truth: Why 99% of all international internet data actually travels through physical glass cables lining the dark, freezing floor of the sea.

• The Shark Attack Bug: Why hungry sharks kept biting the cables in the 1980s, and how engineers successfully debugged the system with heavy steel armor.

• Tech History Superstars: Travel back to August 16, 1858, to hear about Queen Victoria's historic 98-word "text message" to the US President that took 16 hours to arrive!

• Your Glitch Hunter Mission: Once the podcast has finished and the music fades, go look for your WiFi router, find the wires plugging into the back, and remember that those lines trace all the way back to a cable swimming with sharks at the bottom of the deep blue sea!

Written, Recorded, Edited, and Produced by Sethi De Clercq

Can a robot with gigabytes of computing power make a simple peanut butter sandwich without destroying the kitchen? (Spoiler alert: Glitches tries to fire rocket thrusters on step one!)

In our very first digital adventure, the Digital Storyteller and Glitches tackle a brilliant question sent in by Glitch Hunter Adriel: How do computers know how to do anything at all?

In this episode, we explore:

• The Secret Weapon: What the fancy coding word Algorithm actually means.

• The Sandwich Experiment: Why robots take instructions completely literally (and what happens when you forget to tell them every step!).

• Tech History Superstars: Travel back 150 years to meet Ada Lovelace, the brilliant mathematician who became the world's very first computer programmer.

Your Glitch Hunter Mission: Once the podcast has finished and the music fades, see if you can spot an algorithm in your own house or classroom today.

Written, Recorded, Edited, and Produced by Sethi De Clercq