Alexa, Who is Aariv Modi? : “An Eleven year oldAlexa Programmer building Cool Skills”

Kids start finding it difficult to count using their fingers when the number is higher than 10. But themoment they understand & learn the trick of counting continuously without any ‘support system’ ,they will keep going.

So when Aariv turned 11 in October 2018, it was his turn to get up and start running. Aariv Modiwho has recently moved to Austin, TX from Sea�le, WA is curious to know about things happeningaround him.

It was three years ago, one day when Aariv returned back from school, there was a new addition inhis house. His parents had bought an Amazon Echo device. Though for many kids a talking devicewould be just another toy, it was different for Aariv. “I thought that Alexa was amazing because it has somany capabilities” says Aariv. He was even more impressed when he found out that it was possible tomake this Smart Alexa work as per his instructions and can add a variety of skills ranging fromgames to music to news.

Implementing Localization in Your Alexa Skill.Implementing Localization in Your Alexa Skill.

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VJ CV

“When I was 5 or 6, I was using basic functions like Paint, and also educational games. Then, my dadintroduced me to Scratch, which is an online block-based programming tool. I started out creatingbasic programs using Scratch and Khan Academy and then later moved to Codecademy to learn morecomplex coding.” Aariv replied when asked about his interests in programming.

All Work and No Play makes Jack a dull boy!

I wanted to understand if Aariv was only in to Programming or if he had other hobbies as well.

“I like to play chess and went to my first chess tournament when I was in kindergarten. I learnedhow to solve a Rubik’s Cube recently, and now I can solve one in about a minute. I also like to playBasketball and Video Games“ says Aariv with a smiling face.

Alexa Skills (h�ps://developer.amazon.com/en-US/alexa/alexa-skills-kit)are similar to the Apps weuse in mobile phones. You can talk to Alexa to activate a particular Skill. Aariv has till now developed4 ‘Skills’ on Alexa & the 5th one will be available for use in couple of weeks time.

Aariv started making simple Skills and slowly increased the complexity of them. “I read the blogposts about Alexa Programming and learned the basics in few hours”. It took him less than 2 hours tocomplete the first Skill – ‘Kids Advice (h�ps://www.amazon.com/Aariv-Modi-Kids-Advice/dp/B07N6GMYDK)‘ : listen to this if you want to get some hilarious advice from Kids.

Now since he had tamed Alexa with this first Skill, he wanted to Gift his parents with an Alexa Skill.His parents were having slight concern in the way Aariv’s younger brother was consuming his food.This is similar to the trouble lot of parents go through in making their kids eat their meal. Aarivdeveloped ‘Meal Buddy (h�ps://www.amazon.com/Aariv-Modi-Meal-Buddy/dp/B07NRY321H)‘ :which will help entertain the kids while having their food, entertaining with jokes, music and funfacts.

‘Wheel of Fun (h�ps://www.amazon.com/Aariv-Modi-Wheel-of-Fun/dp/B07NVM37J2)‘ was the 3rdSkill by Aariv. This included random tidbits to amazing facts. So if you want to just pick your brainthen try playing the WoF.

Each Skill was helping Aariv to learn more about Alexa Programming. He is of the opinion that youshould not waste your time on things which are readily available. ” I reuse an Alexa skill template if itsolves my purpose. I create new templates only if there are additional features to be added to the new skill. “.This is actually the way everyone should be doing it, rather than trying to do things different eachtime. This, as per Aariv, gives more time in focusing on designing the new template for that specificpurpose. The Chess skills also help him to plan his moves well in advance.

It took less than 3 weeks for this young programmer to come out with the 4th Skill – ‘STEM Party(h�ps://www.amazon.com/Aariv-Modi-Stem-Party/dp/B07T8TJ3G5)‘. He is excited when he talksabout this Skill. “My most recent skill, STEM Party, is my favorite. Today, no one would deny the importanceof an education in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) for students. STEM Party is a math andscience quiz game where kids can increase their knowledge. I really like this skill because it is the first skill that Iadded APL too! Since it has bu�ons on certain screens, the user can respond using touch or voice. It also savesthe user’s total score and highest streak to DynamoDB so the user can a�empt to beat it each time they comeback.” You can try this by saying ‘Alexa Begin Stem Party” & you will be welcomed to play the gameat different levels as per your wish.

While talking to me , Aariv has submi�ed and is waiting for the 5th Skill to be reviewed by theAmazon team. This new skill is called ‘Water Tracker’. Its purpose is to help people keep track of howmuch water they drink during the day and remind them about their water intake. I feel this is a ‘Cool’ Skilland will help many who find it difficult to keep the hydration level as per the requirements. He wasready to listen to my thoughts about this skill and quickly acknowledged the points & replied thatthere are few updates also planned for this Water Tracker.

Aariv is happy about the fact that ‘Alexa’ is now available in Hindi as well. Amazon’s ‘VoiceAssistant’ is localising it’s applications & in turn tapping in to larger audience. Aariv is yet to thinkabout a ‘Dream Project’. But for his age when most of the kids are still coming out of their dreamworld, he has already moved ahead of the pack and is enjoying writing codes on Javascript. He hasa�ended Hackathons & Alexa Dev Meetups as well. There are already other interviews and podcasttalks of Aariv doing rounds in the internet.

His parents have helped him understand the nuances of Technology and guided in the rightdirection. Aariv’s dad mentioned “The voice community has been very kind to Aariv. The interviewsand knowledge sharing sessions help him introspect & learn more. However, I want him to continue

to focus more on learning.”

The World around us is changing at a brisk pace. Things which kids learned in the 90s or 2000s arenot much relevant in the current age. We can see that lot of schools have started improvising theircurriculum to match the current required skill sets. No one is absolutely sure about the technologieswhich will make the difference in the next 5-10 year time period. But it is be�er for kids to keepthemselves updated about the things happening around them in regard with technology. I personallyfeel that kids can learn and understand things faster, without much apprehensions, in the early partof their education. It can be any genre of learning – Sports, Music, Art, Commerce, Science,Technology. The earlier kids get the right exposure, higher are the chances of excelling it. Hope to seemany like Aariv spearheading this tech revolution among the kids. One good old behaviour that istaught in schools and homes is actually key in making this happen:- “Sharing is Caring“.

Aariv is already sharing his learnings through blogs (h�ps://www.awesomeaariv.com/), LinkedIn(h�ps://www.linkedin.com/in/awesome-aariv/) & YouTube(h�ps://www.youtube.com/c/AwesomeAariv) videos (his LinkedIn videos has crossed 1 lakh+views). In my opinion, this will even help the elder generation who want to understand the basics of“Alexa Programming”.

In addition to this, he is planning to schedule ‘offline’ knowledge sharing sessions in libraries. Greattraits of a tech geek in the making – Aariv Modi.

You can connect with Aariv to understand the basics of Alexa Programming or if you want to learnon your own then visit Alexa (h�ps://developer.amazon.com/en-US/alexa/alexa-skills-kit/start)page.

Aariv Modi – The youngest to be featured in ‘PAC Talks with VJCV’.

People or rather in this case the young kid who has shown the world that ‘Passion A�itudeCuriosity’ can take you to places.

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