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Description

Wire up and code a Raspberry Pi Pico to build a small gadget your section can actually use: a quiz buzzer, a tent alarm, a reaction game or a camp weather station. Starts from zero. Teams get a light flashing from their own code, add a button, then pick a build challenge. No coding experience needed. Written for The Pi Hut's two maker advent calendars, but any Pico starter kit works.

Resources

Per team of 2 or 3:
- 1 Raspberry Pi Pico kit: Pico, breadboard, Micro-USB cable, jumper wires, LEDs, buttons, a buzzer and at least one sensor. Written for The Pi Hut maker advent calendars (The 12 Projects of Codemas, Let it Glow).
- 1 laptop with Thonny installed (free from thonny.org) and a USB port to suit the cable.

For the room:
- Internet access for the online guides
- Tables near sockets and an extension lead
- Printed challenge menu (page 1 of the attached PDF)

Instructions

BEFORE THE DAY
Install Thonny on each laptop and put MicroPython on each Pico (the Day 1 guide shows how). Push each Pico firmly into its breadboard. Test every laptop with its own Pico. The attached PDF has the full checklist, the challenge menu, links to every guide and a badge map.

SAFETY
Low voltage only (5 V from USB). Unplug the USB cable before changing any wiring. Keep drinks off the tables. Route or tape down trailing leads. Do not stare into LED strips or rings at full brightness. Count small parts back in at the end. Young people stay on the guide pages when online. Add these to your own risk assessment.

RUNNING IT (90 minutes)

1. Unbox (0 to 10 min)
Split into teams of 2 or 3, one kit and one laptop each. Show the Pico and explain it is a microcontroller: it runs one program and talks to parts through its pins. Ask where they already meet these (thermostats, bike lights, vending machines).

2. First code (10 to 25 min)
Each team types a print line into Thonny and runs it, then lights the Pico's onboard LED and makes it blink. This proves the laptop and Pico are talking before anything is wired. Guide: Day 1.

3. In and out (25 to 45 min)
Wire an LED and a button on the breadboard. Code it so pressing the button changes the light. Swap the wirer and the coder at the end of this step. Guides: Day 2 and Day 3.

4. Pick a challenge (45 to 75 min)
Each team chooses one gadget from the challenge menu, opens that box and builds it. They must be able to say who in Scouting would use it and when. Help by asking what the error message says, not by fixing it.

5. Show and tell (75 to 85 min)
Each team demos to the others: what it does, what broke, how they fixed it. If a gadget suits a quick game (buzzer, reaction game), play one round with it.

6. Pack down (85 to 90 min)
Unplug, put parts back in their numbered boxes and count the boxes. Ask which gadget they would want to finish properly.

ADAPTING IT
- 60-minute meeting: take 5 minutes off steps 1, 2, 3 and 5 and 10 off step 4, and offer only the Easy challenges.
- Finished early: combine two boxes, such as adding the buzzer to the motion sensor.
- Small numbers: run one team and keep the second kit as spares.
- Follow-on meeting: finish one gadget, use it in a real game and present it. That covers two of the four Digital Maker Stage 3 requirements.

GUIDES
The 12 Projects of Codemas: https://thepihut.com/pages/maker-advent-2022-guides
Let it Glow: https://thepihut.com/pages/maker-advent-2023-guides

Tags

• Christmas
• coding
• Digital Maker
• Electronics
• Problem solving
• raspberry pi
• STEM

Badge Links

• Digital Maker - Interaction
• Digital Maker - Scouting Program