Our physical space would not be what it is without the Tools that we have available and the Projects that come out of the endeavors of mastering those tools. Below you can find out more about the tools available in our SELF Design Studio as well as review some of the projects that we are showcasing.
Tools
We are constantly searching for and experimenting with new tools in the SELF Design Studio. To see a full list of the tools currently available for UNCG SOE students to explore, please click on our SELF Design Studio Resources document.
Projects
Our students and Makers in Residence (MiR) are constantly working on great projects. Below you can click through to see some of the projects that we are showcasing and gain access to resources that you can use in your own projects. Our hope is that you will see something below that will spark your creativity.
MaKey MaKey
We use the MaKey MaKey extensively in the SELF Design Studio. When groups come into the studio, we start with a quick demonstration by creating a set of Human MaKey MaKey bongos. It’s a big hit, and a good way to get everyone’s attention. But how do we move from the Human Bongos and Banana Piano to integrating the MaKey MaKey into projects that teachers can use in their classrooms?
What follows are samples of activities we’ve developed with our pre-service teachers that incorporate the MaKey MaKey in different curricular areas.
Space Man Interactive Diorama
This project was to express different points of view with an interactive diorama. Three groups considered the journey of the spaceman along the diorama from the spaceman’s, the dinosaurs’, and the “Volcano God’s” perspective.
This was a MaKey MaKey project that also used Scratch. Below, check out the very different Scratch code projects that show off the different perspectives. Feel free to use and remix them as you wish.
To create your own model, follow these steps:
1. Create a diorama using any sort of art material that you have on hand.
2. At various points on your diorama, poke holes through the bottom of the diorama and wrap a small piece of wire through both of the holes and tie it together at the bottom.
3. To create a larger surface area for conductivity, on the top side of the diorama, place a piece of conductive copper tape on each exposed piece of wire. Connect the ground wire (Earth) to the character that you want to trigger the action on your diorama (in our case, the spaceman)
4. Connect an alligator clip to each of the wire connection points on the bottom side of the diorama. Connect the other end of each alligator clip to the MaKey MaKey (up, down, left, right arrows, space bar, etc)
5. Using Scratch, create an EVENT script for each trigger point (up, down, left, right arrows, space bar, etc) and attach a SOUND script.
6. In our class, we assigned students to three groups (Spaceman, Volcano God, Dinosaurs). Each group was assigned to write a first person point-of-view story for their character for each connection point on the diorama. The groups recorded their scripts on separate copies of the Scratch project.
This MaKey MaKey and Scratch project shows how a visual image can be an interactive educational tool.
1. For this science project, students were placed in small groups of 4 and assigned a system of the human body. Students were purposely assigned to specific groups based on their area of expertise / personal strength. These assignments included: Artist, Writer, Narrator, Musician, Technologist.
2. The students work collaboratively, making certain they complete the assignment for their job in the group.
3. After the students learn about the functions and components of their assigned body system, they begin writing their first person account of traveling through that system. For this example, the students wrote a story about a blood cell’s journey from the body, to the heart, lungs, back to the heart and returning to the body again.
4. The drawing is wired with conductive copper tape (on the back side so as not to get in the way of the illustration). The copper tape runs to the edge of the drawing where it is attached with alligator clips to the MaKey MaKey.
1. We wanted to explore the connection between “fine art”, sound/music and technology. As a concluding activity on the solar system, students were placed in groups, and each group was assigned a planet.This group’s assigned planet was Jupiter. After they painted a picture of what they thought Jupiter might look like, they created several .wav files using GarageBand. These files were then exported and uploaded to Scratch.
2. In addition, we worked with the students to create a visual animation in Scratch that would respond to triggering each input on the MaKey MaKey.
1. This project tells a story through image and audio: a talking book that reads a story upon touch. The circuit is underneath each page, exposed in key points to make connections and bridge between ground and trigger.
This project grew out of a desire to integrate circuits and language arts. Several groups wrote haiku about aspects of the “beautiful painting.” We then used Scratch and MaKey MaKey to create a touchable painting that read the poems when different points were touched.
To create your own interactive painting, follow and even expand upon these steps:
1. Paint a picture, or otherwise create a visual about which to write poetry.
2. Compose a poem about your visual, or perhaps create definitions about vocabulary items in the picture, or use different language terms for things happening in the pictures.
3. Make a small hole, just big enough for a small wire, in spots with which you’d like people to interact.
4. Stick wires from the back to the front, with exposed, conductive material exposed. You can leave this as a wire, or have it in contact with any conductive covering or object (like conductive paint, aluminum tape, et al).
5. Hook your wires to the MaKey MaKey, making each wire correspond with a different point on the MaKey MaKey. Thus, a picture of a mountain becomes the letter “W”, and a picture of a foot becomes the vocabulary word “pede.”
6. Use the Scratch files below as a model of how to program your picture. Use your written text as part of your “sounds” in Scratch, or have characters speak the text on screen.
7. And… voila!
This project was originally much larger. It has been downgraded in order to fit easily in the Studio.
