Drone Recomendations

[Benjamin Howe]

Hello,

 My school is looking to do a drone summer camp and then include it into the curriculum next year in science. This would be for Middle School, which is 6th-8th grade. The first science teacher to use it would be in 8th grade. I'm looking into them for coding ability as well as talking about flight, forces, etc. in science.   

 I've looked through our group and I don't see anything recent about people's experience with drones since 2019. Does anyone have any experience with drones recently? Do you have any favorite brands and curriculum you like? We are looking for something that is reliable where we can easily get spare parts and spare batteries from the company. We would be purchasing a class set with a ratio of 2:1 or about 10 drones. I am familiar with drone laws, so this would be flown in our gym or classroom, since they are illegal in our town outside, and we would not need to worry about drift from the wind. I have 1-2 old Parrot Mambos that I really liked and looking for something similar or better. 

 Thanks for the help and recommendations!

Ben Howe | Sacred Heart Schools, Atherton | Creativity Hub Teacher

Apple Teacher with Swift Playgrounds Recognition | Google Certified Educator: Level 1

150 Valparaiso Avenue | Atherton, CA 94027 |  

This email message and any attachments are intended only for the addressee(s) and contains information that may be confidential and/or proprietary.  Any dissemination, distribution, or copying without appropriate authority is against SHS policy.

 

[Kathy Giori]

Hi Ben,

I don't have first-hand experience but I was recently very impressed by a ski guide who took video using a DJI drone with camera. I'd have to ask for the model number but it wasn't cheap (and I doubt the company targets education). The ski guide flew it using the included controller. I don't know if DJI drones are programmable. 

Instead of buying lots of drones where you might be tempted to buy cheap ones (as they are expensive), they might easily break or won't last or won't perform well. Instead, you might consider only buying 2 high-quality drones (one for redundancy) and instrument the "class drone" with different sensors depending on what the students want to research or need to study. 

One nice "instrument" for the drone would be the databot. I could loan you my databot to see what you think (I live nearby). Doesn't even need to be attached to a drone for starters. Just throw it up and catch it or make sure it lands on a soft spot, or tie it to a string and drop it from on high so it won't hit the ground. It's already loaded with high-quality (high-sensitivity) sensors and it's easily programmed using MicroBlocks. A couple of teachers recently took a few databots along on several ZeroG flights (normally such flights are used for astronaut training). They've shared the data. It's pretty cool. I'm not sure I can attach images to these distro emails, but I'll try to attach one snippet from one of the flights that was pulled into Snap! to plot it. CO2 is blue, acceleration is red, and cabin pressure (inverted) is green.

Also, scroll to the bottom of this databot web page -- there is a drone project where they talk about using the databots programmed as red or blue "flags" and then use drones to play "capture the flag". The game might be good practice for learning to fly the drones.

kathy

--
For a compilation of resources/links/etc mentioned on this forum, visit: https://sites.google.com/site/k12makers/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "K-12 Fab Labs and Makerspaces" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to k-12-fablabs...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/k-12-fablabs/8dcc01bf-8fbd-4991-8a0a-722f7fd81207n%40googlegroups.com.

[Erik Nauman]

We've be using a couple Codrones, edu version, for a year now for a club and enjoying them very much. They are easy to learn and can be used with a controller or programmed with blocks code or Python. I would recommend highly.

ERik