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Question.
Question.
Answer ( of a kind and longwinded )
Answer ( of a kind and longwinded )
So we have 2 rooms that use hardware;
- Microbit
- Arduino
This is going to be a bit longwinded, as we cover
- Reusability
- Gender
- tips
- Age profile
- and everyone's favorite topic, brexit ! So haven given a summary on with the show !
Re-usability
Re-usability
This is a good re-usable investment.. You can go from ;
- no hardware
- minimal hardware
- enable sound
- enable servos
- enable robotic
Gender
Gender
Microbit and arduino are not gender specific. However we do not exist in bubble separate from society. We aim microbits at a younger age group than the Arduino room. This is done as the microbit supports Javascript blocks which means you can program it like clicking Lego blocks together. If folks know scratch, then its picked up very quickly.
tips.
tips.
We try to encourage an arts and crafts, i.e
We started with elecfreaks ringbit cars, which are great, but delicate, so we plan to experiment with some more robust cars we put together;
Age profile
Age profile
Can be either aimed at younger audience ( 7 - 12 ), or if you use the python interface ( caveat - you have to use the microbit hardware, the simulator does not work ) , an older audience.
brexit
brexit
A lot of the hardware;
- microbit - excluding farnell
- crocodile clips
- servo's
- Amp speaker
- robot cars ( or from the source -, elecfreaks )
- servo drivers boards
- Robot car chassis
can be got in UK ( other countries are available ! ) However if you do source from the UK, note BREXIT will make buying 'interesting' for the next while.
Links provided are examples, other shops exist, such as;
in addition to amazon or ebay (We put link to Irish site but you will probably have to look in UK)
Others sits are available, but we haave only put links from sites we purchased from.
This is what we do - https://www.coderdojocastleknock.com/home/arduino
We aim this at a slightly older age group than microbit. It fits into roughly 10 – 14 age group.
Gender.
Gender.
As mentioned for the microbit, the arduino is gender blind, but at this stage society has decided it’s a ‘boys’ area, and the room follows that trend. Note we do not believe this to be true, but we can only report reality L
Value for money.
Value for money.
To get value for money, we ended up getting kits of Arduino and sensors from China. This is slow to deliver ( factor in 4-6 weeks), but is a significant cost saving. Purchase kits individually to avoid exceeding the VAT threshold.
We get kits and provide to attendees. We try to leave kits in the hands of attendees as it;
· Creates curiosity. Kits can the explored outside of Dojo.
· Minimizes the amount of kit we need to lug around !
We take a deposit at start of term to cover kit cost and return it at end of term. ( Theoretically – all kits have been kept so far – which is what we want )
For Arduino, you should have mentors comfortable with micro electronics.
Microbit is greater value for money ( even I with no hardware background can use them comfortably )
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