What To Cover In a Short "DIY Tech" Course? 256
edumacator writes "Our school is working hard to provide our students with relevant opportunities of study. We have a short 'seminar' period that meets three days a week for thirty minutes. I've chosen to teach a seminar on 'Home Grown Technology' even though I'm an English teacher and only an amateur techie. If you had thirty minutes, three days a week, for nine weeks, what would you teach a group of high school students? I'm considering the Wii-mote smartboard and multitouch displays, but I'm afraid I'm overreaching."
A long-lasting technology (Score:2, Insightful)
Morse Code.
Re:A long-lasting technology (Score:5, Interesting)
Boooring!
show the kids how to build a PotatoGun (tm).
That should keep them interrested
Re:A long-lasting technology (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Some of that will be difficult to teach in just 30 minute sessions. Stick to the basics.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sexual harassment awareness(seriously)
Seconding this. Teach the boys that letting the girls use the tools is a good thing. If you do hardware/mechanical projects, please pay attention to the class and call the boys on their sexism. It may have gotten better since I was in high school (graduated 5 years ago), but I remember lots of boys doing the mechanical stuff for the girls, sometimes due to misguided chivalry but often plain old sexism.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
How about building a reprap? Constructing a machine that can build most of its own parts is a rather useful task. Doing so will cover electronics, mechanics and material science all in one go.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe just soldering, to start with, yeah?
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Bomb making? (Score:2)
Improvisation? (Score:3, Interesting)
Instead of bomb making, take a lesson from bomb makers all over the world. Improvisation. Each week teach the students some basic principles, say, how electric motors or toasters or pulleys or whatever work. Then give them a range of materials out of which they can make their own device. As you go, choose items with which you can teach basic but important principles in physics and electronics. Later on in the course, do repairs on household appliances etc (pref low voltage or get an electrician on hand to t
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd suggest going to a car scrapyard rather than pulling apart household appliances, though. The thought of a classroom full of kids doing 240V wiring (cmon, Real Men don't use 110V
Lego Mindstorms (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Lego Mindstorms (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
...build a pinata to represent the school at an event sponsored by the Richmond Hispanic Chamber of Commerce...
Does the district have severe racial problems?
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, I only heard of this Richmond Hispanic Chamber of Commerce deal last week... I didn't know there was such a thing until I went home to visit my parents over the weekend.
Re: (Score:2)
FWIW I'm looking at having to fund and "interesting" science curriculum for my daughters class.
I already have a standing wave tube built out of polystyrene beads in a 6 foot long, 6 inch diameter plexi tube.
This would also be an awesome demo for the school kids for the OP.
I'm looking to build a tennis ball canon powered by dropping a bowling ball down a tube.
yeah, OP should expect to have to fund much of this himself.
-nB
Re:Lego Mindstorms (Score:4, Interesting)
He could start by teaching his students how to find materials for building these projects from free sources, such as the trash.
The most talented makers I know tend to pay very very little for their materials. I have heard the term "The Garbage Santa" as an answer to the question "Where did you get this stuff?" on several occasions.
I have found everything from 23" LCD monitors to Prada coats in the alleys next to the trash cans just within a 4-block radius of my home. Americans, especially the well-off ones, have the richest garbage you could imagine. I learned this from my wife, early in our marriage. She grew up in a rather poor Eastern European country. When I met her, she was already a math PhD on her way to a tenure position, and made a decent living, but she still marveled at our wastefulness. At first, I was a bit embarrassed to take something that someone else had discarded, but I think it was the slick Prada coat (it didn't look like it had ever been worn) that I still wear, that I began to overcome my discomfort. I'm guessing some divorcee was purging her townhouse of her ex-husband's belongings or something, and I was the beneficiary. Seriously, this is one fine-looking coat.
Also, for example, I am currently sitting in a Herman Miller Aeron Chair that someone had thrown away. Seriously. It had a small tear in the mesh that was easily repairable.
re: pinata (Score:5, Funny)
I am sure you meant to write: piñata.
Self-Made Software (Score:3, Informative)
"DIY" and software do not appear together often enough.
I would teach them how to create their own personal "apps" using Squeak. Use Nebraska to collaborate and share in class. Look for a few techies to help.
To get stared, try Sugar on a Stick and look at Etoys, a specialized subset of Squeak. (You use Squeak to create Etoys.)
http://www.squeak.org/ [squeak.org]
http://squeakland.org/ [squeakland.org]
http://www.sugarlabs.org/ [sugarlabs.org]
Nebraska: http://wiki.squeak.org/squeak/1356 [squeak.org]
Wider range of info: http://squeak.zwiki.org/SqueakNotes [zwiki.org]
A recent class a
Re: (Score:2)
Even if this isn't what you are after, it's worth checking out.
I'm also remembering that my brother had an electronics-for-boys kit and built his own lie dete
Teach them something useful (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm considering the Wii-mote smartboard and multitouch displays, but I'm afraid I'm overreaching."
Not necessarily overreaching (I guess it depends on their prior experience), but those projects, while they have a definite "cool" factor, aren't particularly useful.
Personally I would stick to teaching them more useful stuff... maybe basic repair of electric appliances, or if you want something more advanced and that has both the cool factor and would be useful (at least to some people), maybe this DIY book scanner. [instructables.com]
Re:Teach them something useful (Score:4, Informative)
How about starting off with the proper use of a multimeter? Just being able to find out the current/voltage/resistance conditions on various rigs have served me well in the past.
Re:Teach them something useful (Score:4, Informative)
How to use a multimeter, how to solder, what electronics bits do and how they all fit together. Start with the basics.
Re: (Score:3)
grammar correction (Score:3)
Ack, grammar failure due to changing parts of sentences and not proofreading the changes.
I though the multimeter's was
should read
I thought that the multimeter was
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It shocks me how many of my friends who consider themselves to be technically adept cannot fix a simple short.
Re:Teach them something useful (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Agriculture (Score:2, Insightful)
Crop agriculture, farm equipment repair, and irrigation systems.
Kroger is NOT the future.
Re:Agriculture (Score:4, Funny)
The way things are going, I'd throw in the construction and usage of spears, slings and bows.
That way you can steal other people's crops. Er, I mean, stop them stealing yours.
Pyrolysis of biomass. (Score:5, Interesting)
Pyrolysis of wood or other biomass such as garbage into carbon monoxide and hydrogen gas for use as a fuel for vehicles or cooking.
Re: (Score:2)
2nd vote on this one- it's an easy experiment requiring only two garbage cans and a loop of copper tubing.
Go with basics (Score:3, Insightful)
Go with basics: EM interference/signal crossover and Electrostatic Discharge. Each one can be taught in a 30 minutes session and would provide such a foundation to further lectures.
Re:Go with basics (Score:4, Informative)
Because nothing says a good time like Electrostatic Discharge.
Designing and building (Score:4, Insightful)
Engineering! Fun and applicable! (Score:4, Insightful)
I've always thought that teaching something that combined science, engineering, and Vo-Tek would be highly practical in high school.
How about Small Engines? You can buy a small lawnmower engine (and a manual) and teach them principles of mechanics and combustion while also levening parts of "how things work" as well as basic repair techniques. Eventually you put the thing back together and start it up. You can even show how to mess with it to trick it out or solve common problems.
Not only would this get kids interested in science and engineering, but it would be practical.
Re: (Score:2)
>How about Small Engines?
Do you have small engines in America?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Engineering! Fun and applicable! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Engineering! Fun and applicable! (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a damn good idea. Another one would be to teach nothing at all. Seriously.
There is sooooo much DYI tech that's been done floating around. Just expose them to it. HD video from the edge of space on a weather balloon. Multi-stage water-rockets which can go up 1km. Homebrew wifi antennas which can cover miles. Diesel-electric engines crammed into sedans. Ruben's tubes. Railguns.
Rather than teach, expose them. Show them what's been done. Challenge them to go beyond that. The point of DIY tech is it's...."do it YOURSELF!" It's not "have my teacher show me how to do it".
Seed their dreams, and let them figure the rest out.
Re: (Score:2)
Provide links and you just made the lesson plan.
Re: (Score:2)
I almost did. Then I remembered that I just quit [slashdot.org] and wasn't responsible for lesson plans anymore. Old habits die hard, for sure....
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
There is sooooo much DYI tech ..
Hmm, DYI. That stands for "Do Yourself In" ... ?
Re: (Score:2)
How about Small Engines? You can buy a small lawnmower engine
You can buy a pile of barely-working RC engines for relatively cheap.
It's not a gas engine, but the principles are the same.
Linux installation (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Make sure they use Gentoo too.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
rather useful skill... develops a desire to learn more about computers.
If simply installing Linux has become as easy as the geek pretends, why should it inspire any greater desire to learn about the machine than any other OS?
Re: (Score:2)
Ubuntu is easy to install. Gentoo forces you to actually learn something about it.
Besides which, once you've got it installed, there's still plenty to explore.
microcontroller projects (Score:2, Informative)
i would spend at least a couple of weeks having them build and program some microcontroller projects.
here's a place to start: http://hacknmod.com/hack/top-40-arduino-projects-of-the-web/ [hacknmod.com]
Arduino is a physical computing platform based on a simple open hardware design for a single-board microcontroller, with embedded I/O support and a standard programming language. The Arduino programming language is based on Wiring and is essentially C/C++ (several simple transformations are performed before passing to avr-gc
Teach 'em something useful (Score:5, Interesting)
I took a course in 10th grade, it was some simple electricity course, Electrical safety, series and parallel circuits. resistors and capacitors. The final project was to build a simple electric motor. Including winding the armature and coil by hand.
I found this course much more useful in real life than just about anything else I have ever learned.
Re:Teach 'em something useful (Score:5, Interesting)
My point is, electricity, in and of itself, is nothing to be feared/worshiped if properly understood. Teaching kids to hack away at some electronics could greatly improve their understanding of some of the most common items we use everyday.
As for a suggestion, I would tell you to have each of them go home and get their parents/grandparents to donate an old walkman to them for a project. Then have them disassemble it and use the components to make some kind of mobile toy (hence using something with a motor) that they can take home and show off. Of course, this requires soldering, but it still could be great fun for them. I personally have built two Symets (little bouncy pseudo robot things) from old Discman's and had a great time doing it.
That's my two cents.
Me too (Score:3, Insightful)
Electronics. people don't know jack about electricity. could start as simple as static electricity and giving shocks to people. you could make a van-dagraph from junk.. old soap bottles with paper clips make nice capacitors. then work towards a simple circuit from scratch--- a motor might be a nice idea but a generator / motor would be better-- ties into the 'green' movement; they could power an LED from their hand-made generator and a simple prop placed on it.
Could mess with solar, but the cells cost an
how bad are kids now? (Score:3, Insightful)
My brother is a shop teacher and kids these days have a hard time doing a half decent job assembling simple plastic models -- in high school!
This may be true, kids today may have trouble doing something we did growing up, but they have skills that didn't exist then. When I first got into computers microprocessors and microcomputers were only for hobbiest and were homebrews [wikipedia.org]. The kids today that are the age I was then can post their own websites, even if only on Facebook or Myspace. I used to be able to wo
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
You need to figure that you're teaching a high school class. You might have one or two student
Re: (Score:2)
I'm genuinely *not* dissing you here...
WTF? that was 10th grade? I know I started sooner than most on electronics when I took apart my dad's HP (first or second HP RPN engineering calc made, forget the model) when I was 3, but wow! I was winding motors and series / parallel circuit stuff in elementary school.
Since I'm in a similar situation to the OP I'll ask:
Was 10th grade the right time for this kind of stuff or do you think you could have handled the series/parallel circuit stuff in late elementary wit
Re: (Score:2)
Given that bit of geek narcissism, I think the really hard part for you will be remembering that the majority of any given population has, by definition, IQ scores less than 110.
Anyway, it is for me- and yes, by 5th grade I had built my first crystal AM set, though no soldering iron- I had the spring kit on cardboard circuit diagram from Radio Shack....but that is by far NOT what you can expect from 21st century public school students for the most part. Oh, you'll get one or two kids in every class who und
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, I know, my inner geek is um... enthusiastic.
That's why I'm making sure (trying to anyway) anything I design will be understandable in basic concepts by the teachers, with the hope then that they can explain it. What I'm really scared to death of (besides over complexity) is the grown-ups not simply saying "I don't know" and asking me for clarification to be given to the student (and appended to the materials for the future).
-nB
Re: (Score:2)
Of course, you could really scare both the left wing and the right wing by having the students build a *working* model of the Ark of the Covenant and hook it up to a HERF gun. Should give you a range of about 40 feet, at only 3 Farads.....
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, you'll get one or two kids in every class who understand what you're talking about, but the majority will have no clue.
At the start of the course, maybe. But the teacher's job is to help the kids learn. If most students still have no clue at the end of the course, the teacher has failed.
Re: (Score:2)
At the start of the course, maybe. But the teacher's job is to help the kids learn. If most students still have no clue at the end of the course, the teacher has failed.
There is also the point of age appropriate instruction. The subject was when beginning electronics should be taught- the GGP said 10th grade, the GP said 5th or 6th grade. I'm making the point that the concepts involved would NOT be developmentally appropriate for a 5th or 6th grader, unless the kid is a 1 in 10 level genius. Eve
Re: (Score:2)
I believe you. What you are missing, is I am an old man.
I have owned radios with tubes in them.
I took apart anything I could get my hands on from a very early age.
Highschool was a VERY long time ago. I remember it being grade 10, but it might have been earlier.
Grade 11 and 12 electronics courses were great! My instructor had worked on the Apollo project. He showed the class an early IC. White ceramic, and dripping with gold. He had removed it as defective from the
Re: (Score:2)
No need to teach children soon-to-be obsolete skills. In the post-singularity future, strong AI will have eliminated spam.
Re: (Score:2)
I did something similar with 8th graders (Score:5, Interesting)
I did something similar with 8th graders. Use short physical projects to keep them engaged. Have each student build a tower out of a single sheet of copier paper and tape. The tallest free standing tower wins. Build boats out of measured amounts of aluminum foil. The boat that holds the most marbles before sinking wins. Build water rockets out if 1L plastic bottles. Build bridges out of tooth picks, paper, and glue. The bridge that holds the most weight before failing wins.
Each of the projects can be completed in 2-3 half hour sessions with almost no material cost. These projects teach basic physics and engineering in a fun and competitive way. You can even repeat the same projects later in the term so that the second rounds of towers are designed with knowledge gained in the first round, etc.
Digital Electronics. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
One 30minute project. (Score:2, Interesting)
How Not to Be Seen (Score:4, Funny)
Camera Self Timer. (Score:4, Funny)
Seriously, how many photos of hot young girls in the mirror or even worse that look like they're trying to point the camera at themselves.
Do the world a favor, show them that most cameras have a self timer. Heck my Canon has an awesome feature where it'll crank off up to 10 photos after a custom timer delay. Plenty of time to 'get into position'.
Fire (Score:2)
Basics first (Score:3, Informative)
You got 27 half-hour sessions. At least three of these should be spent on basics if the students haven't already had them, such as soldering & desoldering, basic principles of electrical/electronics (including reading diagrams) and using a multimeter... one that measures capacitance, frequency and temperature if you can afford it.
And basic safety, of course.
From there it's really a matter of what, exactly, you want your students to take away from your class.
The multitouch display is neat but the bulk of it is programming; do your students have any programming experience? Do you have time to teach them?
Homebrew robotics can be pretty straightforward and inexpensive. A few stepper motor drivers (Allegro used to give free samples of their 5804 controller...), some stepper motors of course (Easily salvaged from dead scanners/printers), a spare PC power supply, an old PC with a parallel port and adequate amounts of wire can make a pretty versatile robot platform.
If you want something more digital, microcontroller projects might be a bit of an initial investment but are also pretty cheap in the long run. Build robotic platforms, embedded data loggers, "smart" appliances, etc.
$20 worth of properly rated relays and isolation components will turn a PC into a crude home automation system. Add in photo sensors, temperature sensors (thermistor + ADC chip), motion sensors, etc for a more complete system.
Keep is simple, keep it cheap, keep it interesting.
=Smidge=
cover basic electronics skills (Score:2)
You don't have to go overboard and etch your own circuit boards, but learning to solder really goes a long way. you can talk about cold solder joints, RoHS and the future of equipment failure. It would be great to show how to splice and insulate wires properly, how to replace a frayed cord on an appliance (huge money saver), and the basic safety tips about working on household current. teach them to read a wiring schematic while you're at it, and show them how to use a multimeter properly.
if you have 9 we
Re: (Score:2)
90 minutes per week? (Score:2)
DIY Tech? (Score:5, Insightful)
This sounds a little broad. Are you looking at it from a hacker scene? Electronics and Mechanical building? Electrical, mechanical, and chemical technology?
Most of the projects posted on blog.makezine.com would be a good starting point. While the wii is cool, it only touches on a small number of technologies. I would recommend having a final project in mind, and developing the skills required to finish that final project. For example,
1.) Basic electronics (How to solder). Use a kit from ladyada or sparkfun.com. If you get a small enough kit, a beginner can solder a kit in less than 10 minutes. (http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=9206 might be fun). Addon: How to use a voltmeter ...
2.) Basic programming (Create a simple program on the PC).
3.) Basic woodworking: How to use a drill, saw, and other tools Safely.
4.) Basic Plastic/Metal working: Create a professionally looking project enclosure. (Look at the proper glues, cutting methods, tricks for a decent enclosure)
5.) Basic Chemistry: Creating a mold, possibly making gears for # 6
6.) Basic Mechanical: Creating a gearbox
7.) Basic Plumbing/hydrolics/pneumatics: How to get water/air from point A to point B
8.)
The best programs will have an end project in mind, such as a small car or an elaborate prank. Each step will be directly related to the final product, giving the students a purpose and motivation to do well.
DC Motors (Score:2)
MAKE (Score:3, Insightful)
Principles of troubleshooting and then... (Score:2)
Check out the book, "The Complete Problem Solver" by Arnold ( http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Problem-Solver-Competitive-Decision/dp/0471541982/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top [amazon.com] ) . Then use these methods for troubleshooting technical problems that abound locally, in order to teach principles. Take easy problems, and reward students for finding and reporting on useful examples of their learning during the week. This way you can find a variety of problems in different technical areas and keep them interested. Advanced
Small tesla coil (Score:4, Interesting)
Start out with the transformer. Right there is a lesson in power/watts/amps etc right off the bat.
HV caps are expensive, so make some leyden jars.
Hook up your coils and caps and you've got some sparks.
Then you can move on to inductance and resonance and tune the thing.
Add a rotary spark gap, terry filter, power conditioner etc as they learn more.
Get a couple neon bulbs, build a corona motor, etc.
I've got some experience in electronics, but in the past few days my knowledge is really starting to solidify.
Plus giant sparks are fun, everyone will dig it.
Ham radio (Score:2)
How about the original home grown tech, ham radio? Simple projects abound and the technician license is easy to teach and pass.
Project Management (Score:2, Interesting)
I would encourage you to teach the students about project management. Put them into groups of three, tell them to come up with a concept of a project, and develop a plan to bring it to fruition. Have them search for resources among peers. Encourage them to form relationships with other groups so that projects can support each other. Teach them about managing resources - time, money, talent, etc.
Let them figure out the specific details of their projects and approach subject matter from a higher level - skil
Musical Equipment (Score:2)
Maybe make a PA and a speaker cab, wire some pickups or something, etc... you're bound to have a few kids in
Game console modding (Score:2)
Pick up an original Xbox, walk them through a softmod and a Linux install, teach them to make USB adapters for the mouse and keyboard. Voila...you've taught them about computer internals, BIOSes, operating systems, and how to solder, and they thought it was all about video games.
Open Source Hardware (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
I was about to make the exact same suggestion. Good one.
I'm working through some Processing stuff right now, gonna add arduino later and finally tie it all together and do some interactive a/v work with my music live show. I'm pretty stoked. I gave up developing software years ago, but for the first time in a long while, I'm actually excited again.
At the risk of being serious... (Score:2, Redundant)
1. Basic customer service skills. I'm assuming you will also be teaching some about fixing stuff. Get your victim's/customer's/friend's name, and use it. Pay attention to what they say. Rephrase your responses until the understand. Try to leave them with a solution that not only works, but that they can see works, and can see if it fails. Stand behind your work. Be focused on your customer first, and then do the techie stuff.
2. Ethics. Same scenario as above. Don't go snooping around their hard dri
Cigar Box guitars and amps (Score:2)
Prepare them for the future... (Score:2)
...teach them how to say "Yes Sir" in Mandarin & Cantonese...
Impress, analyze, and then synthesize (Score:2)
You've got to get their attention first -- impress them with something that makes them say, "Wow, that's cool!" This is particularly important when reaching out to high schoolers and others who aren't necessarily techies yet. While some "neat" algorithm or circuit may capture your attention or mine, it's really hard to visualize for people who aren't already in that mindset, so you generally need a good physical interaction to capture their attention and spark their interest in the first place. From our
Where and how to find information. (Score:2)
The most useful and far reaching thing you could teach in such a limited time are skills surrounding how to structure online information searches, how to clearly ask the right questions when speaking or writing, who to ask various types of questions, and how to understand the validity of the answers (marketing, technical, or just FUD).
The students would then be able to make use of these skills to find more appropriate and direct information about whatever interests them now, and into the future.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Right have a bunch of common people play with CRTs... Thats always a good way to start (a lawsuit). How about not letting them play with things that can easily kill them to start with. And it is not just the high voltage side that can reach out and grab out, the low voltage side of CRTs can potentially do more damage than the high side.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
May not be legal. It is on school property, the guns will have to go :(
-nB