Hawaiian Technology Inventors Club, Arduino and Beyond

Well, this is week three of exploration into the realm of electronics using the Arduino microprocessor board, the Elenco Electronic Lab, and the Elenco Snap Electronics Lab. This week students began to code using Sketch to control the behaviour of circuits made on the Arduino. Lessons learned, one has to write code correctly in order for the IDE to recognize it. Second, all components must be correctly connected to the board. Students practice following directions and learned the difference between brackets { } and braces ( ) and how to type these symbols. Also, they learned that these specific symbols have a purpose and a specific place in coding. The software is fairly easy to use and tells you what errors were made. Most students were successful and the others realized what they did wrong. Next week they will fix it. The first circuit involved controlling a flashing LED. Students also really enjoyed the Elenco kits. You can easily see the flow and construction of circuits with these kits. Students drew these circuits in their journal entries and you can see the flow in their drawings.  I was pleased to see that my students were enthusiastic about drawing and writing about what they learned. Next week I will include pictures in my blog.

Until then, Straight Ahead!