This is a recording of a recent live robotics teleclass I did with thousands of kids from all over the world. I’ve included it here so you can participate and learn, too!
We’ll cover topics in electricity, magnetism, electrical charges, robot construction, sensors and more by building several projects together. For now, just watch the video and if you already have the materials to build the projects, feel free to do it along with me. If not, don’t worry… we’ll get to these projects soon in the course.
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Materials:
- AA battery case (Jameco 216081)
- Two AA batteries for your battery case**
- A couple of LEDs (You can use any under 3V, but if you need recommendations, try Jameco 2-lead LEDs or 3-lead LEDs)
- Set of 10 alligator wires (Jameco 10444)
- One or two 1.5-3V DC motors (Jameco 231925)
- Index card
- 6 brass fasteners
- Two large paper clips
- One foam block (2” cube or larger)
- 1 wooden clothespin
- 10 wooden skewers
- Drill & bit the size of the motor shaft diameter
- Hot glue gun, razor and adult assistant
- OPTIONAL: Buzzer (Jameco 24872)
**Note about batteries: The cheap dollar-store kind labeled “Heavy Duty” are recommended. Do not use alkaline batteries like “Duracell” or “Energizer” for your experiments with us during this class. (We’ll explain during the class.)
Download the worksheet for this teleclass HERE.
Key Concepts
A robot not only moves but it can also interact with its environment and it does that by using sensors, like light detectors that can see light, you can have motion detectors that can sense movement, touch sensors, pressure sensors, infrared light sensors, proximity sensors, water detectors, spit sensors, detecting all different kinds of stuff!
Robots need electricity to make the motors move, the LEDs light up, the buzzers to sound, and more. When you move electrons around, that’s what creates the electricity. When you rub a balloon on your head for example, you’re picking off the electrons from the atoms in your hair and sticking them on the balloon. There’s a static charge on your head due to the extra electrons.
The electrons have a negative charge, and so just like the north and south poles of a magnet attract each other, the negative charge of the electron is attracted to positive charges. That’s why your batteries have plus and minus signs on them. Electricity is when the electric charge is moving around inside the wires in the circuit.
Current is measured in amps, and is a measure of how much charge is flowing through the circuit at a certain point. We use the letter I to mean current when we’re doing calculations on paper, and it’s important to remember that current is like velocity in that it’s a rate.Just like velocity is the change in position per unit time, current is the amount of charge per unit time: I = Q/t. This means that one amphere (amp) is one coulomb per second.
Click here to go to your next lesson on Franklin’s Mistake!
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