Entertainment technology has greatly transformed due to the development of new software and inventions throughout the years. Today, many children grow up playing with iPhones and iPads instead of Nintendos or Game Boys. I thought it would be interesting to introduce some ‘90s technology items to my friends’ younger siblings to see if they knew what they were. Here’s how it went:

Pager: a device that receives messages and signals by beeping or vibrating

Brian Li, age 9: “I think it’s a phone to call people? I don’t know what it's called. Maybe a pocket phone? I’m not really sure what the numbers do.”

Jessie Zhou, age 12: “Is it a stopwatch? I have no idea what this is, and it is my first time seeing this.”

Walkman: a portable audio cassette player

Kevin Sze, age 13: “Wait, I know! That’s a tape recorder and you can put those tapes inside and listen to it. No clue what it’s called, but I doubt anyone hardly uses it.”

Timothy Liu, age 3: “It's a phone! You use it to listen to music.”

Floppy Disks: a type of disk storage

Prosper Chiu, age 13: “I’ve seen them before but I don’t know what they’re called… You like put disks onto the square and then push it into the computer. Is it called a disk drive?”

Timothy Liu: “It’s a book… for people to read!”

Tiger Handheld Games: handheld devices used to play games on

Divya Sarkar, age 11: “They’re like little devices you can play games on, but I’m not sure what they’re called. I remember getting those in my happy meals when I was little from Mcdonalds or Burger King.”

Nintendo DS: a dual-screen handheld game console

Timothy Liu: “It looks like a small computer!”