Programming Archives

Museums with Makey Makey and 3d printing

This is a project that was planned and implemented in our school (Experimental Elementary School of Florina) in the 2017-2018 school year.

Students created three museums with artifacts printed in the School’s 3D printer. In front of every Artifact there is a DIY touch sensor (two metal pieces) and when someone touches them the museum starts a narrative for the specific artifact along with images and info displayed on the screen.

The main theme of the museums is to present the sculptures, statues and other artifacts that are associated with Ancient Greek Culture and are in museums abroad.

After a short inquiry our students concluded in creating the following three museums :

The Louvre Museum
The British Museum
A World Museum (other artifacts scattered in many museums all over the world)

All the 3d models where downloaded from thingiverse and my mini factory and where manufactured in our 3d printer using the Repetier software.

Our students searched for available info in wikipedia and recorded them in audio form. They also downloaded photos and created three scratch programs (one for every museum) that included the audio, text and image info.You can download the programs from here: Scratch programs – museums

Students used wood, plexiglass and other materials to construct the three museums. They glued the Makey Makey boards and wiring under the museums floor and connected them with the DIY touch sensors.

In the final stage students created a sign with colored lights for each museum.

Our students presented their work in various festivals and exhibitions at the end of the school year.

Μαγικό ραβδί στην Processing

Σε αυτό το βίντεο χρησιμοποιούμε τις μεταβλητές συστήματος mouseX και mouseY της Processing, καθώς και την δυνατότητα να ορίσουμε διαφάνεια-αδιαφάνεια στα χρώματα μας για να δημιουργήσουμε ένα μαγικό ραβδί…

Interactive European monuments board with raspberry pi and makey makey

The board consists of a wooden structure with various 3d printed monumets of Europe, and can be connected to any screen and speakers. In front of every monument there are two metal pins and when they are touched the screen shows information and photos of the monument while the same info are being played by the speakers.

The project started in May 2016 as a part of a larger project from ellak.gr for using 3d printers in education. My school (Experimental Elementary School of Florina) collaborated with the 5th Elementary school of Florina and we formed a small team of educators (Giannis Arvanitakis, Sotiris Georgiou, Giorgos Katikaridis and Giannis Kaskamanidis) and a more extended team of students from various schools of Florina.

At the end of May 2016 i went to Athens together with Giannis Kaskamanidis to attend a seminar for using the 3d printer Rep Rap Prusa.

In June 2016 we scheduled and conducted four 3d design seminars using SketchUp and another four programming seminars using Scratch for students.

Following the seminars was the 3d printing day. Students printed small boards with their names 3d printed and we also printed the monuments for the interactive board. All of the monuments were downloaded from thingiverse.

After the summer vacations we continued the project in October 2016. Twenty two students of the sixth grade of my school formed a team and took the task to complete the project.

Working is small groups of 3-4 the students collected fotos and information for the monuments from the web using Wikipedia and Creative Commons libraries. They also recorded the information using Audacity.

They made the main program using Scratch and at the final phase they integrated the makey makey board and saved the program on a raspberry pi.

The 3d printed monuments were glued with silicon to the board and we opened small holes to place the metal pins, two for every monument. From the inside of the board we place the makey makey and the raspberry pi and all the wiring.

The board was presented in the 7th Student Festival of Digital Creation.

The project is still ongoing. This school year (2017-2018) another team of students will take the task to add more monuments and improve the board and the program.

Trivia board game – playing with circuits

A school project from the Experimental Elementary School of Florina in collaboration with the teacher of the fifth grade.

Students formed small groups of 5-6 and constructed four trivia board games using electric circuits. Each board game has 4 questions with 3 possible answers. Under every answer there are two metal pins. We can put a magnet over them to choose our answer. If we get all 4 questions right a led light turns on and a buzzer plays a beeping sound.

Each board game has a 9V battery, a led light and a buzzer. It also has 24 metal pins (two for every answer), cables and 4 magnets. The circuits starts from the battery’s positive and ends to the battery’s negative as shown in the pictures. The circuit remains in open state until the magnets are placed in the correct answers.

The final board games were presented by the students to the public along with other projects from all schools of Florina.

Plant watering alarm with arduino

A device that warns us with light sound and a sign when our plant needs water. The project was made by the students of the “Little Hackers” evening club of the Experimental Elementary School of Florina. The device contains a moisture sensor, a servo motor a led light and a buzzer.

The moisture sensor is placed the plant pot and continuesly reads the moisture values. When that values fall under a certain limit the device warns us by: