CHECK 1, 2 - ARDUINO OTS WORKSHOP BASICS

[Alessandro Contini]

Hello!

I'm gonna place here some of the stuff we talked about at the last Open Tech School Meetup as a starting point for the discussion.

So, basically me and Danila Pellicani proposed to OTS an introductory workshop to Arduino.

We are both professors and we deeply believe in the learning by doing approach.

This means that if you have goal, you learn while you're doing things to achieve that final result. With Arduino this becomes very natural.

We proposed the "Arduino Synth Orchestra" format that we already taught at Trade School in NYC - http://issuu.com/alesscontini/docs/arduino_tradeschool_2011?mode=window

Basically you learn the basics of circuits and coding while building your own Arduino-based musical instrument to have a final "show" with all the other participants (the orchestra).

Timing:

> 4 meetings (once a week, on weekends would be great)

> it could work like this

1. introduction + hello world + make some noise              4/6h

2. understanding tone library + coding + circuits              6h

3. finalizing code&circuit + soldering / approaching design      6h

4. finalizing design + orchestra time!      6h

People:

> 1 coach every 7 students at max (5 is better)

> I would suggest no more than 20/25 people in the class, because they will need space for prototyping and we will probably not have enough tools for everyone (see soldering irons) so they will have to share

Material:

> laptop

> Arduino board

> breadboard

> jumper wires and various sensors and actuators

> cardboard (design phase)

So, let's start from here!

Suggestions?

Alessandro

[mellbratt]

I'm happy to help out, but I don't think I can commit to a 6h meeting a week for four weeks.

/Anders

[brio taliaferro]

I agree with Anders, it's a little more time than I was hoping to invest, too. 

Maybe we can do a breadboard-based course first and offer an advanced course with soldering etc for the people who want to continue?

Brio

On Fri, Nov 9, 2012 at 4:48 PM, mellbratt <and...@mellbratt.se> wrote:

I'm happy to help out, but I don't think I can commit to a 6h meeting a week for four weeks.

/Anders

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[Alessandro Contini]

Ok,

So what kind of commitment were you guys thinking about?

That was my suggestion but we can try to re-model the format.

Maybe splitting the whole thing as Brio suggested.

[mellbratt]

I'd be happy to help out for a few (three) hours at a time, on a week night. Perhaps I could sign up to help out at a few of these, via a http://www.doodle.com/ or something.

A

[ha...@opentechschool.org]

Hej Everyone!

I'm Hanna and I'm a part of OTS Sthlm. 

I organized an event about Arduino at my school, Hyper Island a few weeks ago. I invited Anders Mellbratt (who is also in this group) to talk about what you can do with Arduino. As an inspirational talk. It worked out really well and when Bea was here from OTS Berlin, we organized a Learners Meetup with Ellen Sundh, that also talked about her cool Arduino projects.

 
I think we all thought it would be great to have a proper workshop, as an introduction to start using Arduino yourself. I talked to Anders and Ellen personally and wanted to organize this in the school for my fellow students. But when I joined OTS I thought of doing it as an open OTS workshop where anyone can sign up. 

So what I understand from your discussion, you think people need more than one afternoon/day to do this? 

I think a lot of people can participate a Saturday between 12-6 pm or so? That would be my suggestion for time. 

We don't have to show them everything, just how to start and the basics. What do you think about this suggestion? 
I would like to organize this before Christmas, do you think we can structure some learning material together until then? 

Have a good Monday!

//Hanna

[Sebastian Abrahamsson]

Hello all!
Living in Linköping and all, it is not without some planning that I can get to Sthlm. If there's a meet up on a Saturday or the like, just some heads up will do. :-)

Some short stuff about me first..
I know Hanna since we worked together on a company in Linköping called a2b Electronics. Having somewhat differing backgrounds, we quickly find some common ground on design and Arduinos. We did a small project together, with some LEDs, sensors and an Arduino. But more on that later.. ;-)

My background is basically all about electronics. I did my master's in electrical engineering about 2.5 years ago and I have been tinkering with gadgets about ever since I started my education.

Basically I am all about hardware. Sensors, communication, power supplies and whatnot.
I have experience programming microcontrollers of different sorts, designing PCBs and stuff like that.
What I may be lacking in creativity, I hope to contribute in other areas.. ;-)

I do not think I have been to any such workshop or event, but will be very happy to contribute in any form.
Being new to this, there's a few topics I would like to discuss.

How's the workshop going to go down? Will the participants have hands on experience combined with a short lecture/presentation and some Q&A?

Regarding the learning material, in what format should it be presented, and what topics should be covered? What audience is it aimed to be directed at?
Depending on the topics covered and the extent of the material it may be a little short on time if we want to do this in December?

Thoughts, ideas?

/Sebbe

[Alessandro Contini]

Hi Hanna & Sebastian,

Nice to meet you.

Sorry it took me a while to reply but I had a lot of work...

I know about Hyper Island and I've seen amazing stuff on your website, I'd like to come and have look some day!

So, we had a very very short Intro to Arduino this past week for the Beginners Meetup - http://www.meetup.com/opentechschool-berlin/events/93018322/

It was a 15/20 mins talk with some slides answering the five questions (What? Who? Where? When? Why?) about Arduino, plus a quick hands-on (me live-coding some sketches and showing them from how to blink an LED, to build a basic Theremin, to driving a floating monster inside a Processing sketch - http://www.slideshare.net/31al3/introduction-to-arduino-open-tech-school-berlin-6-dec-2012).

It was good to see how many people were interested in the topic, and the feedbacks were positive.

So now they're asking for a proper workshop, and I'm thinking again about what I proposed here.

In my opinion the format I proposed here was a bit too much, considering it seems like there's not a lot people willing to teach Arduino in Berlin (at least in the OTS community).

I did a lot of workshops before with different audiences and formats, but before talking about them I'd like to point out some key points about "the Arduino experience":

> first, it should be fun!

> an introductory workshop to Arduino to me is not about coding or electronics, it's about design and tinkering, aka making people aware of the possibilities and making them realize they can actually open objects and understand (or at least try to) what's happening inside, in two words "being curious!"

> that said, code and electronics are still there, and it can be a lethal mix for someone who's not into any of them (like many of the people I've met at OTS meetups), so you should give them time, sometimes a lot of time, that's why I will definitely avoid slides full of code but rather work in small groups listening to their problems and teaching them to find solutions on their own (and not just correct their code/circuit), otherwise they will stop with Arduino at the first obstacle they'll find when trying to replicate the projects at home.

> the boards and components are ALWAYS a problem, there are different ways to solve this problem, but to my experience the best solutions are: 1 participants have a workshop fee which includes an Arduino Starter Kit or similar; 2. participants are asked to bring their Arduino and a list of components, but you should always give the opportunity to people to buy an Arduino (or kit) on site, this is because you cannot rely on a total beginner to provide his/her components (even with a detailed list), some people won't have a clue where to go and buy an Arduino and it may happen that they arrive with an Arduino Mini or Lilypad and this would make things harder during the workshop because you'll have to spend more time on setting up properly the different boards with drivers etc...

> last, to my experience a workshop that works is a workshop that leaves you with some kind of outcome, say it is a Light Theremin or small robot or others, going home with just a board and spare wires + LEDs which don't work together doesn't leave you with the idea that you're actually able to create amazing stuff, and you are most of the time!

So, back on formats, based on what I've just wrote I believe an afternoon is not enough.

"Official" Arduino workshops runs usually for a full weekend (at Universities you usually have one week).

But, actually there's a format I've tried a couple times which works in half a day, though it's a hardcore approach and results can be very different depending on the participants.

Basically you have no introduction, no slides about what is Arduino and what you can do with it, when they arrive you divide them in group of two/three, you install the software in one of their laptops and you give them a board.

From here on you guide them through steps that take them from blinking an LED to an actual project by constantly adding features to the circuit/code they're working on.

Any group is working on the same stuff at the same time (that's because guiding them means not making them copy and paste code but debating at each step on how to solve the problem :) )

This approach have Pros and Cons:

PROS

> you can actually make them do something even if you don't have a lot of time

> they work in groups

> they learn basics of coding (not of electronics)

CONS

> the workshop needs to be planned accurately in advance, you need to be very good at timing

> results may vary depending on the participants and the mix you have in each group, so you should avoid having one group which is always late slowing down all the process, this might turn out in the impossibility of having a project in the end for all

> this approach skips all the tinkering side because they won't have the chance to experiment and fail, so they will follow a pre-defined path

> I'm not quite sure that participants in the end are aware of all the possibilities of the tool (Arduino)

Ok, so coming at a conclusion what I wrote is true if you have a class of 15/20, if you have up to 8/10 and you are 2/3 coaches then it's very different.

I have materials from my previous workshops and I can share it with you or help you with your own.

I don't know if it will be possible to plan something before Christmas since today it's the 10th, but at least we can start building a workgroup!

Sorry for being too verbose, it's a topic that requires attention to details, and that I really love :)

Looking forward to hear from you soon.

Best,
Alessandro