We have ended Term 2 here at CoderDojo Altona North, are on a short term break. A big thanks to all our dedicated volunteers here at CoderDojo Altona North without whom it would be impossible to run our weekly sessions for the kids. Also, many thanks to the parents for making time to come to class every week with their kids and work through various STEM challenges. And finally a big thanks to the Hobsons Bay Council without whom we would not be able to run these sessions. CoderDojo is a global movement of free, volunteer-led, community based programming clubs for young people. We are the Altona North (Melbourne, Australia) chapter of this amazing initiative. You can read more about the work we do at – https://altonanorthdojo.com/.
Focus for Term 2 : This year we have had our kids, parents focus on projects that we could take to the Monash Makerfaire. We decided to start early and kicked off our projects earlier in the year so as to give us enough time to work through the projects. Monash Makerfaire 2024 is scheduled for the 1st Sunday in December. To make it easy for the kids we usually identify core themes which the kids might focus on, think through each of the frameworks or concepts they could use for their projects and provide these concepts as potential options for them to consider when identifying a project to work upon. The intention here is not to solve the challenge for them but to give them a starting point. The volunteers discussed and came up with a number of themes for the various projects that the kids might work upon. This list was then distilled down further based on feasibility, availability of hardware, funding requirements, other practical constraints the kids would need to work within, etc. These themes where then presented to the kids at at the start of Term 2.
The kids divided themselves into teams, picked up an theme that was interesting to them, worked through ideas for a project internally and then white-boarded their thinking with a volunteer. For the rest of Term 2 the kids worked through a PoC (Proof Of Concept) for their project. The intention of the Proof Of Concept was to design and implement a solution with minimal effort without needing to worry about needing to deliver a finished product. The kids used materials available around the house, left over hardware from other projects they had built at the club, made some minimal investments in any hardware required and built their PoC setup to prove or disprove their thinking. The intention here is to iterate through ideas quickly, fail quickly, learn from failures and keep testing out new theories, while refining the solution as one gains learning. We are a big fan of agile thinking and the kids participate in agile stand-ups every session.
What did we accomplish : The different teams ended Term 2 with prototypes in different stages of evolution. Some had a fully functional prototype, some had partially functional prototypes, while others gained learning from their initial experiments that confirmed the need to pivot and try out an alternate approach. So lots of great learning overall, some teams making more progress than the others. Here are some pictures that provide a view of some of the projects in various stages of evolution.
The team working on the “Tap Car Race” project had managed to build their first PoC (Proof Of Concept) setup. This setup consisted of a podium made out of cardboard, a (Raspberry Pi Pico based) digital counter mounted at the top and sensors mounted at the bottom to detect vehicles crossing the finish line. The counter would trigger when the vehicles got off the podium, the vehicles continue around a track and then arrive back at the podium where they are detected by a laser sensor that stops the counter declaring a winner.
One of the other teams built a game in scratch called, “Cops & Robbers“. The game consists of a cop chasing a thief across a neighborhood. The game is designed such that the Cop Car and the thief’s car can both be controlled by the keyboard but also using external devices. The team has incorporate a BBC micro:bit to control the Cop’s car and a Makey Makey (copper tape stuck to a cardboard) to control the thief’s car. This project is still a work in progress with a lot of software development complete but additional work required on the hardware side of things. Amazing to see how the kids overcame the limitation of having only one BBC micro:bit connected to Scratch by including both the BBC micro:bit and the Makey Makey thus delivering two sets of physical controls for their “Cops & Robbers” Scratch game.
The third team was building their own version of the “Cops & Robbers” game but this time using a Raspberry Pi Pico to build a custom keypad that could be used to control the Cop car and the thief’s car. A different approach to using a BBC micro:bit and a Makey Makey to control the two cars. This team also has a fully functional game in Scratch and now needs to continue working on building out their physical interface using the Raspberry Pi Pico keypad.
This team of kids built a “Whack A Mole” game in scratch which can be played using the keyboard. The team is now prototyping a Raspberry Pi Pico based external keypad to build game controls. This is pretty much a work in progress with a lot of software and hardware still needing to be worked through.
Whats coming in Term 3, 4 : The kids at CoderDojo Altnoa North will continue working through their projects during Term 3 and Term 4. The kids will wrap up their Proof Of Concepts, take the learning from those Proof Of Concepts and being putting together their final product. There’s a lot of work to be done, software bugs to be resolved, hardware designs to be worked through and lots of testing to be done with end users (other kids, parents in class). The teams are encourage to invite kids from other teams to test out their solution, provide feedback suggesting areas of optimisation and improvement. There’s a lot of interesting work to be done and lots of interesting challenges to be worked through over the coming months.
Volunteering at CoderDojo Altona North : If you are keen to do some grass roots work here in Melbourne, if you are interested in helping us build the next generation of STEM enthusiasts then drop us a line at trevor at hack2 dot live. We are always looking for volunteers who are passionate about STEM. For more details on the work we are doing or to get your child on the waiting list please head over to – https://altonanorthdojo.com.au/.
