Finally we are done. We call our project Smart Room Jr.

- Kevin

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Description

Smart Room Jr is and educational tool which uses a smart home as a  setting to give kids a fun and easy introduction to electronics. It  consists of a set of modules, each performing discrete and clearly  defined functions. The modules can be plugged together in various  combinations to illustrate how a desired outcome can be broken down into  simple actions. Some simple lessons are suggested. These are  meant to be illustrative to parents and educators who can fine tune them  to their own purposes.

Goals for GGHSC:

• Satisfy requirements for the challenge, eg. microcontroller, portable power etc.
• Complete basic modules needed to demonstrate the concept
• Publish a website to be used for the competition and beyond

Wider goals:

• Overcome the initial intimidation factor of electronics
• Inspire curiousity and encourage independent learning
• Show in direct and immediate way how learning skills can impact life for the better. Compare this with endless hours spent playing mindless video games.

Design features:

• Be simple as possible. This applies all, including the PCB layout and the casing design. We have tried to avoid large pics and video for the website where possible.
• Reproducible with the simplest means. Possible to make everything except the basic components. The PCB and casing can be home brewed. The most complex piece piece of equipment used is a printer.
• Open source. For maximum reach, we have made our design open source. The software we have based our work on is also open source.
• Selection of the most widely available economical components. We want this to reach as far as possible, so we have selected the most easily availble and economical elements. For example we use 434 Mhz transmitter / receiver pairs instead of Xbees. Simple male and female pin sockets are used instead of specialised connectors.
• Modularity of all components. Both the firmware and hardware is modular, lending itself to working with new modules which we will want to continually add.
• Safety. We have kept 5V max for the internals, and used relays to control appliances of 12V max.

For the future:

• Outreach to educators, parents and of course children for further development
• Collaboration with other tinkerers on other modules and platforms (including PIC)
• Cottage production by disadvantaged communities

See the Smart Room Jr website

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Greetings from the Little Red Dot !

We are from the Singapore aka The Little Red Dot (on a map).

A little info about us

Those of you who know us, know that we are a strange little construct. We are tiny island city state, with no natural resources, save a population made up of varied ethnic and cultural groups. In such a small state, the issues of bread and butter / life and death are very real to us. The solutions we have adopted for our society may not suit everyone. Some of you may know the weirder quirks like the ban on sale of chewing gum (yes, you read it correctly). Don't get us wrong though, we make no excuses for the choices we have made. But having said this, one of the things we have are trying to correct, is that in our emphasis on efficiency and economic output, we have lost a sense of creativity and thinking out of the box. Our children learn much by rote, they seldom challenge their teachers, and creativity is often left in the realm of art or avant garde.

Our project

Our only resource is our people and our children. We love the theme on education because it is so pertinent to us. Our project is a learning tool meant to encourage in children ( and adults too - this topic to be mentioned in a future post) an interest in self learning, a sense that learning goes well beyond school textbooks, and that their creativity can benefit themselves and the larger world.

We have chosen Home Automation to be our learning tool. We are calling it a learning tool and not a teaching tool quite deliberately. Our concept is to create a set of simple modules that can have plug and play capabilities. The idea is to start with simple concepts that can be demonstrated easily with the modules. These concepts have been brewing for sometime and we will elaborate in a later post. Alongside the modules, we will recommend exactly the same hardware replicated in breadboard fashion. This will give complete transparency between the finished module and the breadboard instances. The suggested lesson plans will also be discussed with local educators and posted in future.

This project is to be open-source. The PCB layouts, the casings and accessories and the firmware will be made available. The wonderful Arduino environment will be used as a starting point. However we envisage simplified hardware based on the opensource "open device cloud" initiative to be developed for this project.

More on this soon,

Cheers from Sg !

Kevin for HSG