After much consideration, I decided this year that instead of buying my daughter yet another truck load of toys, which will eventually end up decorating the floor of my apartment, I was going to invest in something a little more interesting. I had been following the "One Laptop, One Child" program for some time now. For those of you unfamiliar, the mission of this organization and project is to empower the children of developing countries to learn by providing one connected laptop to every school-age child.

The Buy One Give One program allows you to purchase a laptop for a child in your life while donating an identical laptop to a child in a developing nation. The XO laptop runs on Linux, has WiFi, built in social sharing capabilities and has applications that do everything from painting and drawing to musical composition, taking pictures and learning programming. It also has built in video and voice recording capabilities. Designed to withstand harsh weather conditions and the daily use by children, the XO laptop features a sealed, rubberized keyboard that is resilient to water, dust, and dirt. It’s also scaled to accommodate child-sized hands and has a lighter touch than normal keyboards. Since many children in developing nations do not have access to electricity, the XO laptop is designed to be extremely power efficient. The batteries operate for up to 2,000 recharge cycles (four times the lifetime of a typical laptop battery). They are extremely efficient, contain no toxic heavy metals, and can be hand charged via a crank, pedal or pull-cord—or recharged by a directly connected solar panel.

I think the project is amazing and so I decided to buy a laptop for my daughter and lend the little support that I could afford. Plus, I am dying to check this thing out for myself. The joke is that I may end up playing with it more than her. But in either case, I think it is quite a responsible Christmas gift and I hope that others looking for a gift for a child will consider it.