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We recently invited José Antonio Bagur to join us on EDUvision, to talk about his work on Quetzal-1; Guatemala’s first satellite. It was a hugely popular show with the Arduino and edutech communities, and we ran out of time before we could ask José all your space-based questions!

The range of questions you guys had around open-source, custom-built satellites were too good to go unanswered. So we brought him back for an EDUvision EXTRA. Melissa and Roxana teamed up to dig deeper into his amazing project.

Arduino EDUvision EXTRA about satellites and Quetzal-1

José Antonio Bagur, and Quetzal-1

You can check out José’s first interview, which took place during the EDUvision livestream. But to quickly get you up to speed, let’s give José, and his pride and joy Quetzal-1, a quick introduction.

He’s a mechatronics engineer, university researcher and professor from Guatemala. He’s no stranger to the Arduino community either, as he regularly joins the Arduino team to host the Spanish-language Explore IoT webinars.

There are no formal aerospace science education programs in Guatemala, so José and his colleagues really had their work cut out designing and building the country’s first satellite! Over 100 people were involved in its development, which, of course, made plenty of use of Arduino.

In the EDUvision EXTRA video interview below, you can find out all about the incredible work they achieved. He talks about how they managed to get it into space, how it works, and what kind of challenges they faced throughout the project. Feel free to add any other questions you might have in the comments, over on the forum, or on social media.

Oh, and you’ll also find out where the name Quetzal-1 comes from!

Enjoy this extra slice of EDUvision goodness, and remember to join us on 20th May, 2021, for the next livestream. If you have a project you’d like to see featured live on EDUvision, let us know all about it. If it’s picked to be showcased, we’ll even send you some free Arduino swag.

See you then!

The post EDUvision EXTRA: Quetzal-1 Strikes Back appeared first on Arduino Blog.

We’re on the lookout for the most creative and innovative Arduino projects made by you – our EDUvision viewers!

Each week, we’ll feature the projects we think should be put in the spotlight. If your project is featured, we’ll send you a selection of some super cool Arduino merchandise, such as:

  • Lanyards
  • Water bottles
  • Notebook
  • Hats
  • Beanies
  • Stickers
  • Stationary
Featured Arduino Projects for EDUvision

How to share your Arduino project

All you need to do is shoot a short video (maximum one minute) of your project, explaining what it’s all about, what it does, and how it works. Because we’re featuring these on the show, and on the Arduino channels, we want you to make your video looks as great as possible.

Here are some tips:

  • Make sure you shoot in landscape (horizontal)
  • You can send in .mp4 or .mov video files
  • A voice over is effective, to help explain your project
  • Make sure the lighting is good
  • Reduce background noise as much as possible

Video files can only be submitted if they’re less than 10MB in size. If yours is bigger, you can upload it to a file sharing service like Dropbox, Google Drive or WeTransfer and put the link into your application form instead. Even then, please keep them to one minute.

You’ll also need a project name and a short written description.

The necessary bit: First we need you to read and accept these terms and conditions.

If you’re under 18, you’ll also need to provide permission from a parent or guardian to share your Arduino projects. You can take care of that in the application form.

Finally, you’ll need to be a registered Arduino user to be able to send your project in. It’s totally free to sign up if you aren’t already, and comes with lots of great benefits including being able to participate in the forum and get Arduino news as it happens.

Make sure you join us each week on the EDUvision livestream to see which projects have been featured!

We can’t wait to see what you’ve been building!

The post Share your Arduino projects on EDUvision appeared first on Arduino Blog.

In the latest Arduino Education update, we’ve made the Arduino Create app free for Chrome. From today, as many educators, students, and parents around the world as possible can now access the Arduino Create Agent.

Arduino Chrome app is now free

What is Arduino Create (soon to become Arduino Cloud)?

Arduino Create is an online platform that lets students write code, access tutorials, configure boards, and share projects. 

Designed to provide users with a continuous workflow, Arduino Create connects the dots from inspiration to creation. This means students can manage every aspect of their projects right from a single dashboard.

Get the app for Chrome and Chromebooks

The app lets you use the Arduino Create on Chromebooks. You can then code online and save your sketches in the Cloud. Then you can upload them to any Arduino board connected to your computer, and do it all without having to install anything locally.

Developed with the classroom in mind, the Arduino Create app runs on Chrome OS. It enables you to teach and play with Arduino electronics and programming in a shared environment. Because it’s a Cloud-based environment, you can also be sure it’s always up-to-date. All the contributed libraries are automatically included, and any new Arduino boards are supported out-of-the-box.

Arduino’s CEO, Fabio Violante, says, “The aim of Arduino Education is to put technology into the hands of every student around the world. Making Arduino Create free, and therefore more accessible, is a step towards doing this. We’re proud to provide open-source software, and want to inspire students and educators in STEAM learning.”

Download the Arduino Create app here, and join us on the forums to tell us about your experiences.

The post Now free! Get the Arduino Create app for Chrome classrooms appeared first on Arduino Blog.

With so many students attending class virtually these days, how can you give kids — or adults — some hands on experience with electronics projects? [Ben Finio] says you can by moving your lab to the virtual world using — of all things — Tinkercad. [Ben] should know something about a classroom since he is a lecturer at Cornell.

Of course, you could do this trick with any online simulator, but Tinkercad is nice because it is easy to use, looks real, and doesn’t cost the students a dime. [Ben] mentions there are some scenarios where it is especially useful like large classes or online classes. There are probably some cases where it doesn’t make sense, like teaching RF design, for example. Even then, maybe you just need a different tool.

It would be something else if Tinkercad would add some features to support this use case. Imagine an instructor being able to peek at a student’s circuit or modify it without having to screen share to the whole class. Or perhaps provide a connector to connect one student’s outputs to another student’s inputs.

We couldn’t help but think you could do some more hardcore electronics using our favorite Falstad simulator. It doesn’t have the realistic look, but it can simulate a lot of interesting circuits. After all, we’ve long been a fan of project-based learning.

The last year has clearly been challenging for educators around the world due to the pandemic. Yet despite these difficult times, educators and students haven’t stopped getting hands-on and experimenting with STEM.

But how is it possible to create a systematic environment for student ideas through scientific observation when the science lab is no longer accessible?

It’s down to creativity and innovation, which haven’t been put on hold even during a pandemic. Teachers have had to adapt quickly to this fast-changing environment, and technologies like Arduino have supported this adaptation, providing educators with flexible tools to keep experimenting from home. 

Arduino is committed to making STEM accessible for all students, with free tools and resources like the Arduino Science Journal app to collect data, leveraging either your mobile device or external sensors connected to Arduino, or a portable science lab for your remote needs (now on sale).

Teachers can also take advantage of different boards to experiment with science, which is what UK-based physics teacher, Alan Bates, did. Bates created an experiment to demonstrate the phenomenon known as the conservation of momentum, published in the February edition of The Physics Teacher.

Bates combined an Arduino Uno Rev3 and a PASCO Smart Cart to create a movable rubber band launcher to investigate the conservation of momentum, and the energy transferred by the system as the potential energy of the rubber band is released. The Arduino board was used instead to activate the motion releasing the rubber band, and consequently, the cart.

The launcher was made with a wooden stick, a nail, and the rubber band, placed on a low-friction track, and mounted on top of a PASCO smart cart base. Masses are added to the cart every three measurements of recoil velocity. 

Thanks to this scientific investigation, Bates was able to demonstrate and verify that, “elastic potential energy is not only transferred into kinetic energy, but also into other types of energy that include thermal and sound energy.”

For more information on the findings and analysis of the Conservation of Momentum with Dual Technologies, get your copy of the February edition of The Physics Teacher.

This article was written by Valentina Chinnici, Arduino Education Product Manager

Arduino acquired the Science Journal app from Google on August 5th, and the final handover takes place on December 11th, 2020. 

From that date, the Science Journal will no longer be supported by Google. If you haven’t exported your experiments and imported them into the Arduino Science Journal, we strongly encourage you to do so now, as your data will no longer sync with Google Science Journal after that date.

Here’s a short guide to help you transition to the Arduino Science Journal: 

1. How to export your experiments 

We’ve created a series articles to help you export your experiments:

You’ll find these articles – and many more – on the official Arduino Help Center. If you experience issues with your export, you can contact us using this contact form.

2. Why you need to export your experiments

From December 11th, the Science Journal app will be made available, maintained, and supported by Arduino. This means that the Arduino Science Journal app will only be available on the main app stores. 

You can rest assured that we’ll stay loyal to Google’s principles, and ensure high quality standards for the community we inherited. 

In this current climate of remote learning and as advocates for openness, the app will be available for free, and the repositories are publicly available on GitHub.  

We strongly believe that every student has the ability to reach their full potential, and we’re pleased to support the next generation of STEAM leaders with tools that help their learning process.

3. What’s coming next for the Arduino Science Journal app?

While we can’t disclose too much about our future plans for the app, we can tell you that we’ll ensure it will offer easy access to a stream of data that leverages your smartphone sensors, as well as Arduino sensors. The aim is to help learners understand the importance of an inquiry-based educational method rather than passive consumption of information.

We’ll also continuously improve the accessibility of the app for all users, and find new ways of experimenting with science. 

In the near future, we’ll be interacting more with users, so you’ll hear more from us soon! We’ll also be adding more tutorials on our platform dedicated to Science Journal

Last, but not least…

…if you want to support us, leave a feedback or simply rate the app, don’t forget to add a review on the app store of your choice: App Store, Play Store, Huawei App Gallery

We’re looking forward to supporting your teaching in the future, and welcome you to this amazing community of Arduino educators!

P.S. Do you use the Science Journal as a teaching tool? Are you planning on using it for teaching in the future? Let us know!  

This post was written by Valentina Chinnici, Arduino Product Manager.

Arduino and Google are excited to announce that the Science Journal app will be transferring from Google to Arduino this September! Arduino’s existing experience with the Science Journal and a long-standing commitment to open source and hands-on science has been crucial to the transfer ownership of the open source project over to Arduino.  

The Google versions of the app will officially cease support and updates on December 11th, 2020, with Arduino continuing all support and app development moving forward, including a brand new Arduino integration for iOS. 

Arduino Science Journal will include support for the Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense board, as well as the Arduino Science Kit, with students able to document science experiments and record observations using their own Android or iOS device. The Science Journal actively encourages students to learn outside of the classroom, delivering accessible resources to support both teachers and students for remote or in person activities. For developers, the Arduino version will continue to be open: codes, APIs, and firmware to help them create innovative new projects.

“Arduino’s heritage in both education and open source makes us the ideal partner to take on and develop the great work started by Google with the Science Journal,” commented Fabio Violante, Arduino CEO. “After all, Arduino has been enabling hands-on learning experiences for students and hobbyists since they were founded in 2005. Our mission is to shape the future of the next generation of STEAM leaders, and allow them to have a more equitable and affordable access to complete, hands-on, and engaging learning experiences, in line with UN Sustainable Goals of Quality Education.”

In 2019, we released the Arduino Science Kit, an Arduino-based physics lab that’s fully compatible with the Science Journal. Moving forward, all new updates to the app will take place through Arduino’s new version of the Science Journal, available in September. 

The new Arduino version of the app will still be free and open to let users measure the world around them using the capabilities built into their phone, tablet, and Chromebook. Furthermore, Arduino will be providing better integration between the Science Journal and existing Arduino products and education programs. 

Stay tuned for Arduino’s version of the Science Journal, coming to iOS and Android in September 2020!

With thousands of users around the world entering the Arduino Certification Program, we are excited to announce the availability of the Arduino Certification Program: Arduino Fundamentals in Bengali, the seventh language now available.

Localized in partnership with our Education partner in Bangladesh – Code19, this first release of the ACP in Bengali opens up the opportunity for our huge Bengali speaking user base to become Arduino certified.

The Arduino Certification Program: Fundamentals is a structured way to enhance and validate your Arduino skills, and receive official recognition as you progress. Anyone interested in engaging with Arduino through a process that involves study, practice, and project building is encouraged to pursue this official certificate. 

The Fundamentals Certification offers the right balance of academic excellence and real-world skills to give participants the confidence and motivation they need to succeed both in educational and professional environments. Successful entrants receive an official certificate verifying their skills and knowledge on Arduino, which can be referred to in a resume for academic or professional purposes.

Based upon the Arduino Starter Kit, the official assessment covers three main subjects: theory and introduction to Arduino, electronics, and coding. During the exam, entrants are asked to answer 36 questions of varying difficulty and formats in 75 minutes. 

Questions will test knowledge on the following topics: 

  • Electricity 
  • Reading circuits and schematics 
  • Arduino IDE 
  • Arduino boards
  • Frequency and duty cycle
  • Electronic components
  • Programming syntax and semantics 
  • Programming logic

Want to learn more? You can find additional supporting information on how to take the program in Bengali via our partner Code19 here, or purchase the Arduino Certification Program: Fundamentals from our store.

Schools have recently had to make a sudden and seismic shift in the way they teach. As both educators and students get used to remote learning, the onus is now more on parents to support their children through homeschool, and that means parents themselves need support. At Arduino Education, we want to help you and your children by making remote learning experiences as smooth (and fun!) as possible.

LEARNING ELECTRONICS & CODING AT HOME

As parents to children aged 11-plus, learning electronics and coding with them at home may not be something you’d ever think you’d be doing. But don’t worry, it really isn’t as daunting as it sounds, and electronics and coding skills are crucial in the world your children are growing up in.

ABOUT ELECTRONICS & CODING

Learn coding and the basic concepts of electricity together with your child at home with the Arduino Student Kit. It comes with all of the electronic components you need, as well as step-by-step instructions for how to start coding. But what is coding, exactly? Well, it’s simply the language that computers understand. It’s how we tell a computer what to do. In the Student Kit, you get pre-programmed code to help you understand how it works. You could also explore drag-and-drop visual coding such as Scratch to help you get a better understanding of what coding is.

LEARN ELECTRONICS & CODING AT HOME WITH THE ARDUINO STUDENT KIT

The Student Kit is a hands-on, step-by-step homeschool starter kit for children aged 11-plus that will help them get started with the basics of electronics and coding at home. You’ll get all the hardware and software you need for one person, as well as complete guidance, step-by-step lessons, exercises, and a logbook where you can answer the lesson questions and find solutions. 

HOW THE KIT HELPS YOU HOMESCHOOL YOUR CHILDREN

This is your hands-on, step-by-step remote learning learning tool that will help your child learn the basics of programming, coding, and electronics at home. As a parent, you don’t need any prior knowledge or experience as you are guided through step-by-step. The kit is linked directly into the curriculum so you can be confident that your children are learning what they should be, and it provides the opportunity for them to become confident in programming and electronics. You’ll also be helping them learn vital skills such as critical thinking and problem-solving.

WHAT’S IN THE KIT?

  • All the basic electronic components you need to complete each lesson
  • Access to an online platform which helps children take their first steps into the world of electronics and inventions
  • Nine step-by-step lessons with up to 25 hours of learning time
  • Two open-ended projects. These projects don’t have a right or wrong answer – the solution to the project question is unique to each individual
  • A digital logbook that students can use to annotate their exercises, observations, and experiments. Parents can also use the logbook to find solutions

WHAT DOES THE KIT HELP TO TEACH?

By using the kit at home, you’ll be mirroring what your children would learn in their classroom. As well as how to code, the kit teaches:

  • Basic concepts of electricity
  • Safety 
  • Schematics
  • Writing code
  • Controlling a circuit
  • Coding concepts
  • Controlling a servo motor
  • Producing sounds, tones, and music
  • Measuring the intensity of light 

WHAT YOU NEED

You’ll need to purchase one Student Kit per child – you can either find your country’s distributor or buy the kit online. To use the kit, you’ll need a desktop computer, laptop or tablet device which has a compatible operating system and meets minimum requirements for downloading the Arduino software. Find out more about this here.

COVID-19 is playing a huge role in everything we do. With schools closed and a large number of countries under total lockdown, we want to support educators, parents, and students with hands-on electronic, programming, and coding lessons from home.

NEW: The Arduino Education remote learning platform

We have been working on several initiatives to support remote learning. Our aim is for children to still have access to hands-on STEAM lessons even whilst they can’t attend school. We are pleased to announce that to support homeschooling needs we have launched a remote learning platform.

What will you find on the remote learning platform?

This platform will deliver online support to educators, parents and students so they have the tools they need to feel comfortable and confident in completing successful STEAM lessons at home. On a weekly basis we will post new helpful material including video tutorials, live sessions, and extra support with resources, ideas, and tips.

We will also be hosting weekly live sessions on Arduino EduVision. You can find all details, dates and times, and book the next coming session here

All the activities and tutorials in our remote learning platform currently support using the Arduino Starter Kit and Arduino Certification as learning tools in the home.

18 tips and tricks for educators new to remote learning

Many schools are set up for some kind of remote learning, but there are an equal number for whom this is a whole new world. It’s also true that while you probably have lesson plans ready for the upcoming semesters, it’s a whole different ball game to suddenly put all these lessons online without disrupting any learning. These 18 tips and tricks will help you if you’re new to remote learning.

We hope that Arduino Education programs can support you in enabling students to learn, innovate, and succeed at home by making complex technology simple to understand and use.

Keep safe

All best from Arduino Education Team



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