Physical Computing: Introduction to Arduino

This workshop has been developed as a result of a Digital Maker Collective collaboration between alumni artist in residence Rosie Munro Kerr and Chelsea BA Fine Art student  Daniel Bandfield

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Slides for this workshop can be downloaded HERE.

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Physical Computing Lesson Plan

Structure:

10 to 12 people per lesson.

Time length: 3 hours

• Introduction

    Talk about principles of the lesson topic - 15 minutes.

• Follow along demonstration

    Demonstrate how to build something, while students replicate it - One hour.

• Problem/Task

Present a task for the students to work out themselves using the principles established, or give them the opportunity to make something using students initiative - One hour.

Lesson 1 – Introduction to Arduino

Equipment introduced

• Arduino Uno

• Button   

• LED

• Capacitive Touch (not really equipment)

Principles explored

• Introduction to micro controllers and arduino uno.

• • What is a micro controller and how is it different to a computer?   

  • What is it good at and what is it not good at?   

  • Brief  overview of the internals of an arduino           

    • The Atmel atmega328p           

    • USB chip           

    • Pins:     Digital and analog       

    • Power   

• Basic common principles of code.   

  • Variables       

  • Functions       

  • Libraries       

  • Conditional Statements   

  • Loops

• Basic electronics principles.       

  • Volts, amps and ohms.   

  • LEDs   

  • Resistors   

  • Capacitance

• How to learn about physical computing.   

  • DO NOT need to memorise everything now.

  • Everything is a google search away.

  • Start with problem statement.

  • Divide complicated problems into smaller, simpler problems.

Demonstration 

• Part     1: Blink an LED       

  • pinMode()       

  • digitalWrite()       

  • Serial     functions

• Part     2: Blink an LED with a button

• Part     3: Register touch using capacitive touch and fruit

Task

Students can choose to either:

• Create a circuit in which a blinking LED blinks faster when someone is     touching a fruit.

• Play around with the electronics and come up with their own circuit.