MIHS Media Center News
An introduction to our MakerSpace
The Electronics MakerSpace is ready
The electronics Makerspace is a place where students can experiment with electronics. We have a Makey Makey, Arduinos, a Raspberri Pi, and various parts and pieces for students to learn about and experiment with electronics.
Beginning after the December break, students will be able to come to the library before school for club time- I am still working on a schedule, but I am thinking about a morning for Scratch (very simple programming), and a morning for tinkering.
If you want your entire class to use the space, meet with me so we can work out a plan.
What is a Makey Makey?
A Makey Makey is a simple microcontroller that you computer recognizes as a keyboard. This allows you to use anything that conducts even a little electricity to control what is happening on your computer. It is fun to play with, but when combined with a programming site like Scratch, the possibilities become endless. I included two videos- the first shows one of the developers demonstrating some of the things you can do with it, and the second is just a series of examples of projects done with a Makey Makey.
Jay Silver: Hack a banana, make a keyboard!
MaKey MaKey Music Examples
What is an Arduino?
An Arduino is an open source microcontroller. It sounds very impressive, but that just means that the programming code is available for anyone who would like to fiddle with it, and it can be programmed to turn on and off circuits using simple programs called sketches. You plug it in to a computer to program it, but it will keep running the program even after it is disconnected from the computer. This makes it very useful for robotics, sensors, cameras, etc. In fact, most 3D printers use Arduinos as the "brains". I have included a link that shows a few of the projects you can do with an Arduino. Unfortunately, we don't have all of the accessories used for some of the projects on the site.
Don't eat the Raspberry Pi!
What is a Raspberry Pi? It is a tiny, programmable computer. It doesn't have a lot of memory, but it can do some pretty amazing things. This can be used for many projects- home entertainment system, Minecraft server, live streaming video, etc. I have included a link to a page that has examples with varying degrees of difficulty.