Technology Elective

There are some days where it just seems that everything falls into place. I have 15 students in the tech elective this term which is a dramatic increase over the typical 5 or less. I only have 8 Arduino kits, 3 Raspberry Pi kits and 18 computers. I thought that it might be best if I had students choose what they wanted to work on. I figured that the Pi's are too hard to set up and I didn't think I could manage them along with the Arduinos so I told the students they could choose Arduino or Codeacademy. Fortunately exactly 8 wanted to work on the Arduinos and the rest chose Codeacademy.

I wanted to do a better job teaching the students about the circuits than I did last term. I spent one period explaining how to connect to the breadboard and about short circuits which was a bit dry but it did the trick. The next few days they tinkered using the links I gave them on the Google doc. I decided that the next class I would force them to choose a project and direction.

This is the point of todays Blog. They chose a project (either solo or in a team) and moved forward. They were far more focused and each person had a goal. I guess this seems obvious but it just worked out better that I expected. One group decided that they would make an air powered car/boat using the arduino to control motor speed and print the propeller with the 3D printer. Awesome, except the printer needs to be fixed - oh well that will happen soon. The group of 3 quickly set out using cardboard, tape , scissors and some other random items I happened to have in a box that I think the art department was throwing away. The creativity was amazing and I have to think that I was beginning to figure out what a maker space might look like. We will see how things turn out but it is a good start. Below are a few pictures of the work.

The Bridge Project

The Bridge Project  is the brainchild of our Head of School Dr. Dan Greenwood. It is an amazing STEAM project incorporating 3D design, modeling, engineering and scientific process. The students are challenged to design a bridge using Sketchup, print it on the 3D printer, weigh it, then we will test it to see how much weight it can hold.

We put together the Google Doc for the project (you can find it here) and built several bridges for testing. We decided that the students needed something to start with so we made the basic "road" that they are to build the bridge on and included all needed information in the Google Doc. Dr. Greenwood 3D printed his bridge and we weighed and testing its strength. This was done at an assembly where we projected the test onto the screen so that the students could see it. The students loved the destructive test! We found that the bridge could support 43 pounds. The challenge is open to the entire school with no deadline. There will be a reigning champion posted and as soon as someone creates a stronger bridge that person will be the champion.

This challenge has certainly sparked the interest of many of the students. I have had 5th graders in the lab working on Sketchup during their lung recess every day for the last week. One of the difficulties is that the students don't really know sketchup that well yet and building and printing a bridge requires slightly more familiarity with Sketchup.

The first students came to me excitedly proclaiming that they "for sure" had the best bridge and asked whether I could print it right away! We pulled up their design and found that they had lines representing the wires (like the Golden Gate Bridge) and a plane above to hold the wires. It lead to the dimension discussion and I explained that it would not print. They were not happy with this discovery but I encouraged them not to give up. Further I showed them a few basic principles with Sketchup and directed them to the videos to learn. They keep coming back and working on their bridge and are getting closer to something build-able. I am hoping that Sketchup does not become too much of a constraint and am looking for some alternatives.

In the meantime - the kids are excited and so am I.

Scratch and Grading Projects

I just realized that once in a while I am actually able to create something that takes less time to do than if I did it by paper. Normally I spend 5 hours making something easier that would normally take 1 hour by hand. The hope is of course that I am able to use it again or teach others to use it.

Recently I spent a few weeks working with the students on Scratch (the programming tool/language). Their project was to design, make and test a game using Scratch (The assignment is here). While they were allowed to design any game I decided to introduce them to Pong and Space Invaders - two classics. The students just loved it and some spent significant amounts of time outside the classroom working on the projects.

I am just now grading them and because I went through a few iterations of the process I though it might be interesting to share.

Students turn in their Scratch game by sharing it in a Scratch "Studio" that I create -here's how

1. The students set up a scratch account either with their parents or on their own - 
2. I set up a scratch account for me 
3. I create Scratch "Studios", one for each class - in my case 7X, 7Y, 7Z
4. I then check the box marked "allow anyone to add projects" and copy the URL
5. The students log into their scratch account 
6. I share the URL through our website which they click on. Scratch recognizes that they are logged in and allows them to upload their game to my studio

Grading - Using Google form

1. I create a google survey as a rubric for the grading.
2. I another window I log into my Scratch account and, well, play the games (I never thought my job would involve playing video games!)
3.  For each student I fill out the survey as I play his/her game

The spreadsheet then add up the scores and I enter them into my grading program.

Here is a screenshot

Arduino

I was pleased with the success of the Raspberry Pi elective and thought that the Arduino might be another device that would engage the students. I had not worked with one before and was slightly concerned that I would only be a day or two ahead of the students. I decided to move forward with the program anyway.

I ordered eight of them as well as 8 kits to support their use. Pictured below are the two pieces

 I placed each kit in a container so that the small parts would not be lost. As with the Raspberry Pi  I also created a Google document to share with the students so that they could get started. The setup was much different than the Pi in that the Pi itself was a computer and once setup could be programmed with Python, a language the students already knew. The Arduino is controlled by the computer and requires the Arduino software to be loaded on the computer before use. Once the software has been downloaded you need to connect the Arduino via USB and define the port to use. That done you can write the program once you learn how to program in the language.

Scratch

Scratch  - For the last couple of weeks the 7th grade students have been learning to program in Scratch. This is a wonderful tool developed to ease the entry into the world of programming (http://scratch.mit.edu/). While we are using it in the 7th grade it can easily be used in the lower grades as well.

The goal was to create a simple video game - I explained that they could make any game they would like but started the instruction by working with them to create the classic game of Pong. It has been one of those times when I know it has just worked for the kids. Many of them have stayed after class to finish or worked at home to solve a problem. Once most had the basics down I introduced another classic "Space Invaders". At this point the assignment was to create a game (I had a few rules to follow) and test it. Once they had completed the game I created a Scratch studio so that they could share them. Once shared they all could play each others games. It was at this point that I mentioned to them that they were playing video games in class BUT ALSO they had created them themselves. How amazing!

Some of the games are located here

http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/320911/
http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/304327/
http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/323279/

More about 3D

School is back in session and the one thing that almost everyone is coming by to look at are the 3D printers. There have been a myriad of questions

1. How does it print?
2. Where is the plastic coming from?
3. What are you going to use it for?

All of the questions and comments have been positive but I have found the most intersting one to be "What are you going to use it for?" or "What will you print with it?" Hmm  - I had the same question when we were first approached. As you think through it the question becomes "What can you not use it for?" As things come up during the day we begin to realize that a solution would be to design our own part for it. An example is the Raspberry Pi - we have been working on powering LED's and controlling them with it but now we can Print our own small houses, parts, letters and create holes to hold the LED's to make them light up. We can add parts to our LEGO robotics designs, we can build anything! 

So now on the third day back at school I already have students who come in and say that they have downloaded something from Sketchup Warehouse and would like to print it. We are accommodating this for now because we want to make mistakes and have some things print well and others not. This is happening. Below is a picture of a Star Wars fighter that was downloaded from the Sketchup warehouse - it did not print properly. As we have already found with our own simple designs there seems to be a problem with the faces and unless there are all facing the right way the model will not print properly.

Lessons learned - 

• It takes a long time to print - 4 hours + for many things
• It is difficult to remove the objects from the blue taped platen  - we bought some plastic putty knives and they are doing the trick. We have to remove the platen then kind of chisel it.
• The platen needs to be leveled after several removals 

The printers are amazing and have been in use at least 8 hours a day for the last 3 days. 

3D Printers 2

We have been tinkering with the printers and software for a couple of days and although we still do not have kids on campus (December Holiday Vacation) we have made a few discoveries. I'm sure there will be many more to come

Sketchup -

1. You need to download a .stl exporter - this is the right language for the MakerBot software to print. This exporter is found in the "extensions warehouse" within the sketchup program. Note that I found that I had to sign in to download the extension.
2. Once you create something in sketchup (and believe me anything I have made in very simple) I found that if I selected it all and "grouped" it that worked well before I exported.
3. Faces and facing the right direction - this has been tricky and has been the subject of some inline discussions. When we thought everything looked perfect and exported it to .stl then into the MakerWare software it looked great. When we printed it look much different than the model. What we found is that the "faces" of the objects created in Sketchup were not facing the right way. If when you look at the structure in either Sketchup of Makerware, you find that one of them is dark (and it seem logical that it should be light color) then it needs to be turned around. This is better described in this blog - http://www.makerbot.com/blog/2011/07/22/google-sketchup-design-tip-fix-flipped-faces/

The MakerBot 2 Printer

1. Printing from the computer - When we first printed using the MakerWare from the computer, the computer tried to logout (network setup in school) and paused the printing and we could not resume it. We solved this by unbinding the computer from the network and now it does not disconnect or sleep. The OTHER solution was to "Make" to the supplied SD card and then plug it back into the printer.
2. Sticking to the blue tape - The first object was fairly easy to remove but since then we have had trouble getting the objects off the tape. We have not arrived at a solution yet but are working on one.