How to Be an Inventor
- tumblepodcast
- Mar 14
- 2 min read
Updated: Mar 20
Have you ever had a brilliant idea and thought, Hey, why doesn’t this exist yet? Well, congratulations—you might be an inventor in the making!
In our latest episode of Tumble Science Podcast for Kids, we explore the fascinating world of invention with real-life scientist and inventor Josh Miele. Josh is blind, and that’s what makes him such a natural problem-solver. He’s spent his life inventing things that make the world more accessible, from audio descriptions for YouTube to braille chord charts for musicians. But one of his biggest ideas? Making maps that blind people can read!
Josh takes us through the five key steps to inventing something new. And spoiler: It’s not just about having a cool idea—you’ve got to test, tweak, and make sure people actually want to use it (something Marshall may have forgotten with his bird jacket prototype 🦜🧥).
About Our Expert
Meet Josh Miele! He's a MacArthur Genius fellow who has invented all sorts of technologies to help blind people navigate the world. In our episode, he shared the tactile maps that he created in order to allow blind people to explore places they've never been to before. You can learn more about Josh by visiting his website, where you can read about his inventions and buy a copy of his book, Connecting the Dots - A Blind Life.
TMAP - Tactile Maps Automated Production
As you heard in the episode, tactile maps solved a major problem for blind people. You can probably imagine that figuring out what a neighborhood or city looks like on Google Maps would be pretty hard if you can't see! That's where TMAP comes in.
TMAP is a platform that automatically creates tactile maps from any address in the world, and gives you a free, easily downloadable file that you can print out at home or at the library. You can go try it out yourself (if you set up a username and password).
Josh is a MacArthur Fellow!
Every year, the MacArthur Foundation selects a number of extraordinary individuals to give a fellowship to. Josh's incredible inventions that help blind people earned him one. Maybe if you invent something amazing, you'll get one too someday!
Bird Jackets - They're Apparently a Real Thing
As you can see from this listing on Amazon, apparently someone beat Marshall to the punch on bird jackets. But this avian attire is clearly just for show, and not for the very practical purpose that Marshall envisioned on the podcast. And they're also for domestic birds, not wild ones, so the problem of wild birds getting cold still hasn't been solved.
