Microsoft has launched a prototype of a new physical toy, which looks to engage young people who have visual impairments and sight loss in learning the principles of code. The American Printing House (APH) Code Jumper is a series of physical pods of different shapes, sizes, colors and textures, which each represent a line of code. They can be joined together with wires to make different sequences, which in turn results in different sound effects—anything from music, poetry and various instrument sounds, to noises such as a cat’s meow or an ambulance siren, to audio stories that the children have recorded themselves. Starting with basic principles at age seven, the kit has 15 pods and 15 connecting plugs that can be joined in different ways to create increasingly complex sequences and coding loops. A range of textures, shapes and colours aims to help those with visual impairment distinguish between the different blocks, and therefore lines of code, said Cecily Morrison, a computer scientist and researcher at Microsoft Research, the team which has led on this project. Click here to read the full story from Design Week.