My favourite gift
Hi, my name is Carlo and I am a computer science teacher, in particular I deal with computer networks and cybersecurity.
When I read the proposed contest, I immediately wondered what I would choose as a gift to give to my students.
The first thing that came to my mind is an Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense board (link)
It is a fantastic board, it is very versatile and requires a simple USB cable to be used. It has very small dimensions but excellent technical characteristics (1MB of Flash and 256kB of RAM), a Bluetooth BLE connectivity and is very rich in sensors of all kinds, for example:
- inertial measurement unit (IMU) features a 3D accelerometer, gyroscope and magnetometer and allows you to detect orientation, motion or vibrations in your project;
- microphone allows to capture and analyze sound in real time and can be used to create a voice interface for your project;
- proximity and gesture detection for measuring digital proximity and ambient light as well as for detecting RGB colors and gestures;
- barometric pressure sensor that allows for a 24-bit pressure data output between 260 to 1260 hPa. This data can also be processed to calculate the height above sea level of the current location;
- temperature and humidity detection using a capacitive digital sensor having a temperature accuracy of ± 0.5 ° C (between 15-40 ° C) and is thereby perfectly suited to detect ambient temperature.
The fact that the board has all these sensors makes it possible to use it to create simple projects or prototypes without using breadboards and external components or wiring.
Another feature of this board that makes it very interesting for educational use at school is the ability to program it using microPython.
Finally, the applications that can be created are not only related to home automation and the controls of simple systems but this is also one of the boards that can be effectively used to create simple Artificial Intelligence projects. For example, I was able to experience the students' interest live when they saw the possibility of making the board interact with the Edge Impulse platform for the creation of simple Artificial Intelligence applications that use the microphone or the IMU sensors as input for the training and subsequent use of a neural network for the classification of events.
In this video we can see how simple it is to use an Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense board to create a simple device that, after a training phase made using the data obtained from the sensors, can recognize particular events or classify events or situations.
My students are aged between 15 and 18 and I believe this board is a great compromise between ease of use and computing power and variety of on-board sensors. I also took into consideration the fact that different solutions may require the use of additional cards, connections and interfacing problems which, with this board, are completely eliminated. For this reason the Arduino Nano 33 BLE Sense is an excellent choice and with a single board, a cable and a PC you can realize many projects.
In short, today I believe that a boy might like a gift of this type and it could be useful both for his specialized training in the IT field and for the development of other skills such as teamwork or problem solving.
Finally, I must add that I have always loved electronics and I believe that two other splendid gifts could be the welder and the multimeter. They are fundamental tools for a maker and are very important because through their use you pass from a circuit on paper to a real and functional object.
However, I believe that these two tools must be chosen by the student himself, according to his preferences. For example, I have 3 welders but in the end I have always used the same one for years with great satisfaction and excellent results.
Happy holidays to all members of the community and element14 staff, thank you for your work
Carlo
