PyCon UK 2018 is your chance to be welcomed into the wonderful Python community. At the Education Summit, we’ll put on a young coders’ day on the Saturday, and an educators’ day on the Sunday.

Saturday — young coders’ day

On Saturday we’ll be running a CoderDojo full of workshops on 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi and micro:bits for young people aged 7 to 17. If they wish, participants will get to make a project and present it to the conference on the main stage, and everyone will be given a free micro:bit to take home!

Kids’ tickets at just £6 will be available here soon.

Kids presenting their projects to the conference

Sunday — educators’ day

PyCon UK has been bringing developers and educators together ever since it first started its education track in 2011. This year’s Sunday will be a day of professional development: we’ll give teachers, educators, parents, and coding club leaders the chance to learn from us and from each other to build their programming, 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆, and digital making skills.

Professional development for educators

Educators get a special entrance rate for the conference, starting at £48 — get your tickets now. Financial assistance is also available.

Call for proposals

We invite you to send in your proposal for a talk and workshop at the Education Summit! We’re looking for:

• 25-minute talks for the educators’ day
• 50-minute workshops for either the young coders’ or the educators’ day
  

If you have something you’d like to share, such as a professional development session for educators, advice on best practice for teaching programming, a workshop for up-skilling in Python, or a fun physical 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 activity for the CoderDojo, then we’d love to hear about it! Please submit your proposal by 15 June.

After the Education Summit, the conference will continue for two days of talks and a final day of development sprints. Feel free to submit your education-related talk to the main conference too if you want to share it with a wider audience! Check out the PyCon UK 2018 website for more information.

We’re looking forward to seeing you in September!

The post Join us at the Education Summit at PyCon UK 2018 appeared first on 葫芦娃app.

The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Camer team: Damien Doumer, Eyong Etta, Loïc Dessap and Lionel Sichom, aka Lionel Tellem

Preparing for the #PiParty

One birthday kit went to Yaoundé, the capital of Cameroon. There, a team of four students in their twenties — Lionel Sichom (aka Lionel Tellem), Eyong Etta, Loïc Dessap, and Damien Doumer — were organising Yaoundé’s first Jam, called 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Camer, as part of the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend. The team knew one another through their shared interests and skills in electronics, robotics, and programming. Damien explains in his blog post about the Jam that they planned ahead for several activities for the Jam based on their own projects, so they could be confident of having a few things that would definitely be successful for attendees to do and see.

Show-and-tell at 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Cameroon

Loïc presented a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi–based, Android app–controlled robot arm that he had built, and Lionel coded a small video game using Scratch on 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi while the audience watched. Damien demonstrated the possibilities of Windows 10 IoT Core on 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, showing how to install it, how to use it remotely, and what you can do with it, including building a simple application.

Loïc showcases the prototype robot arm he built

There was lots more too, with others discussing their own Pi projects and talking about the possibilities 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi offers, including a Pi-controlled drone and car. Cake was a prevailing theme of the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend around the world, and 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Camer made sure they didn’t miss out.

Yay, birthday cake!!

A big success

Most visitors to the Jam were secondary school students, while others were university students and graduates. The majority were unfamiliar with 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, but all wanted to learn about 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi and what they could do with it. Damien comments that the fact most people were new to 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi made the event more interactive rather than creating any challenges, because the visitors were all interested in finding out about the little computer. The Jam was an all-round success, and the team was pleased with how it went:

What I liked the most was that we sensitized several people about the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi and what one can be capable of with such a small but powerful device. — Damien Doumer

The Jam team rounded off the event by announcing that this was the start of a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community in Yaoundé. They hope that they and others will be able to organise more Jams and similar events in the area to spread the word about what people can do with 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, and to help them realise their ideas.

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Camer gets the thumbs-up

The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community in Cameroon

In a French-language interview about their Jam, the team behind 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Camer said they’d like programming to become the third official language of Cameroon, after French and English; their aim is to to popularise programming and digital making across Cameroonian society. Neither of these fields is very familiar to most people in Cameroon, but both are very well aligned with the country’s ambitions for development. The team is conscious of the difficulties around the emergence of information and communication technologies in the Cameroonian context; in response, they are seizing the opportunities 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi offers to give children and young people access to modern and constantly evolving technology at low cost.

Thanks to Lionel, Eyong, Damien, and Loïc, and to everyone who helped put on a Jam for the Big Birthday Weekend! Remember, anyone can start a Jam at any time — and we provide plenty of resources to get you started. Check out the Guidebook, the Jam branding pack, our specially-made Jam activities online (in multiple languages), printable worksheets, and more.

The post 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Cameroon #PiParty appeared first on 葫芦娃app.

We sent the Jams special birthday kits to help them celebrate in style, and a video message featuring a thank you from Philip and Eben:

The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam photo booth

I put together code for a Pi-powered photo booth which overlaid the Big Birthday Weekend logo onto photos and (optionally) tweeted them. We included an arcade button in the Jam kits so they could build one — and it seemed to be quite popular. Some Jams put great effort into housing their photo booth:

Here are some of my favourite photo booth tweets:

#PiParty photo booth @RGVSA & @ @Nerdvana_io #Rjam pic.twitter.com/1R9svDuakS

— RGVSA (@RGVSA) March 4, 2018

The @SouthendRPIJams #PiParty photo booth pic.twitter.com/guMReG3bGE

— Denis Stretton (@DenisStr) March 4, 2018

#PiParty photo booth pic.twitter.com/fi7NydFcKK

— rpijamtokyo (@rpijamtokyo) March 4, 2018

Preston 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Photobooth #RJam #PiParty pic.twitter.com/tT6esYAOY8

— Preston #RJam (@PrestonRJam) March 5, 2018

If you want to try out the photo booth software yourself, find the code on GitHub.

The great 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam bake-off

Traditionally, in the UK, people have a cake on their birthday. And we had a few! We saw (and tasted) a great selection of Pi-themed cakes and other baked goods throughout the weekend:

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jams everywhere

We always say that every Jam is different, but there’s a common and recognisable theme amongst them. It was great to see so many different venues around the world filling up with like-minded Pi enthusiasts, 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam–branded banners, and 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi balloons!

Europe

Thank you so much to all the attendees of the Ikana Jam in Krakow past Saturday! We shared fun 韩国理伦大片三色眼影s, some of them… also painful ;) A big thank you to @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi for these global celebrations! And a big thank you to @hubraum for their hospitality! #PiParty #rjam pic.twitter.com/7lcNN4ib6q

— Sergio Martinez (@mg_sergio) March 6, 2018

We also had a super successful set of wearables workshops using @adafruit Circuit Playground Express boards and conductive thread at today's @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi Jam!
Very popular!#PiParty pic.twitter.com/j8RLk8L9E2

— Northern Ireland 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam (@NIRaspJam) March 3, 2018

My SenseHAT workshop, going well! @SouthendRPiJams #PiParty pic.twitter.com/8kt8weh2HN

— Jasmine S. Thompson (@SuzySceptile) March 4, 2018

Learning how to scare the zombies in case of an apocalypse- it worked on our young learners #PiParty @worksopcollege @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi pic.twitter.com/pntEm57TJl

— Worksop College 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam (@worksopjam) March 4, 2018

Africa

Being one of the two places in Kenya where the #PiParty took place, it was an amazing time spending the day with this team and getting to learn and have fun. @TaitaTavetaUni and @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi thank you for your support. @TTUTechlady @mictecttu ch pic.twitter.com/g4PoNwkySe

— Miss Kaniaru (@missKaniaru) March 3, 2018

pic.twitter.com/UwR7zEFzpj

— GABRIEL ONIFADE (@GABONIAVERACITY) March 5, 2018

@GABONIAVERACITY #PiParty
Lagos 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam 2018 Special International Celebration – 6th 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆-Pi Big Birthday!
Lagos Nigeria @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi @ben_nuttall #RJam #4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆Jam #韩国理论电影 #physical4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 #robotics #edtech #coding #programming #edTechAfrica #veracityhouse pic.twitter.com/V7yLxaYGNx

— GABRIEL ONIFADE (@GABONIAVERACITY) March 5, 2018

North America

The Riverside 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam @Vocademy is underway! #piparty pic.twitter.com/Vl2LXTjk0z

— Heidi Baynes, Ed.D. (@BaynesHeidi) March 3, 2018

The Philly & Pi #PiParty event with @Bresslergroup and @TechGirlzorg was awesome! The Scratch and Pi workshop was amazing! It was overall a great day of fun and tech!!! Thank you everyone who came out! pic.twitter.com/aH9urzROOE

— Brad Derstine (@bradderstine) March 5, 2018

Thanks everyone who came out to the @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi Big Birthday Jam! Special thanks to @PBFerrell @estefanniegg @pcsforme @pandafulmanda @colnels @bquentin3 couldn’t’ve put on this amazing community event without you guys! pic.twitter.com/BxQdlgNaio

— Houston Raspi (@houraspi) March 3, 2018

We are back at @SciTechMuseum for the second day of @OttawaPiJam! Our robot Mergius loves playing catch with the kids! #pijam #piparty #omgrobots pic.twitter.com/WAayFEk6XM

— Merge Robotics 2706 (@frc2706) March 10, 2018

South America

Así terminamos el #4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend #Bogota 2018 #PiParty de #4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆JamBogota 2018 @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi
Nos vemos el 7 de marzo en #ArduinoDayBogota 2018 y #4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆JamBogota 2018 pic.twitter.com/HEVPvMSNFF

— Javier Garzón (@Javiertecteos) March 5, 2018

Asia

Happy 6th birthday, @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi! Greetings all the way from CEBU,PH! #PiParty #IoTCebu Thanks @CebuXGeeks X Ramos for these awesome pics. #Fablab #UPCebu pic.twitter.com/RRWBAwFv5B

— Fablab UP Cebu (@fablabupcebu) March 3, 2018

ラズパイ、6才のお誕生日會スタート in Tokyo
PCNブースで、いろいろ展示(shì)とhttps://t.co/L6E7KgyNHFとIchigoJamつないだ、こどもIoTハッカソンmini體験(yàn)やってます
at 東京(jīng)蒲田駅近https://t.co/yHEuqXHvqe#piparty #pipartytokyo #rjam #opendataday pic.twitter.com/DBldxTx2kD

— 福野(yě)泰介 (@taisukef) March 3, 2018

Happy birthday @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi! #piparty #iotcebu @coolnumber9 pic.twitter.com/2ESVjfRJ2d

— Ren Stanforth (@TheMrsStanforth) March 3, 2018

Oceania

#PiParty photo booth pic.twitter.com/Lvrg6fElw1

— Glenunga 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi Club (@GlenungaPiClub) March 4, 2018

Personally, I managed to get to three Jams over the weekend: two run by the same people who put on the first two Jams to ever take place, and also one brand-new one! The Preston 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam team, who usually run their event on a Monday evening, wanted to do something extra special for the birthday, so they came up with the idea of putting on a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Sandwich — on the Friday and Monday around the weekend! This meant I was able to visit them on Friday, then attend the Manchester 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam on Saturday, and finally drop by the new Jam at Worksop College on my way home on Sunday.

I'm at my first 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam #PiParty event of the big birthday weekend! @PrestonRJam has been running for nearly 6 years and is a great place to start the celebrations! pic.twitter.com/mz1ApqV3VF

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) March 2, 2018

Back at @McrRaspJam at @DigInnMMU for #PiParty pic.twitter.com/swGrImPBMN

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) March 3, 2018

Great to see mine & @Frans_facts Balloon Pi-Tay popper project in action at @worksopjam #rjam #PiParty pic.twitter.com/GswFm0UuPg

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) March 4, 2018

Various members of the 韩国理伦大片三色眼影 team attended Jams around the UK and US, and James from the Code Club International team visited AmsterJam.

Thanks to everyone who came to our Jam and everyone who helped out. @phoenixtogether thanks for amazing cake & hosting. Ademir you're so cool. It was awesome to meet Craig Morley from @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi too. #PiParty pic.twitter.com/kGMieDlmnw

— hackerfemo (@hackerfemo) March 4, 2018

Great #PiParty today at the @cotswoldjam with bloody delicious cake and lots of 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 goodness. Great to see @ClareSutcliffe @martinohanlon playing on my new pi powered arcade build:-) pic.twitter.com/MZuvRu9meg

— Stuart Fox (@stuartfoxmusic) March 4, 2018

Happy 6th Birthday @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi from everyone at the #PiParty at #cotswoldjam in Cheltenham! pic.twitter.com/MztpcQP1Lc

— Clare Sutcliffe MBE (@ClareSutcliffe) March 4, 2018

It's @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi 6th birthday and we're celebrating by taking part in @amsterjam__! Happy Birthday 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, we're so happy to be a part of the family! #PiParty pic.twitter.com/u0tbIbpePL

— Code Club Global (@CodeClubGlobal) March 4, 2018

For more Jammy birthday goodness, check out the PiParty hashtag on Twitter!

The Jam makers!

A lot of preparation went into each Jam, and we really appreciate all the hard work the Jam makers put in to making these events happen, on the Big Birthday Weekend and all year round. Thanks also to all the teams that sent us a group photo:

Lots of the Jams that took place were brand-new events, so we hope to see them continue throughout 2018 and beyond, growing the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community around the world and giving more people, particularly youths, the opportunity to learn digital making skills.

So many wonderful people in the @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi community. Thanks to everyone at #PottonPiAndPints for a great afternoon and for everything you do to help young people learn digital making. #PiParty pic.twitter.com/VX6Mljk1AP

— Philip Colligan 🧢 (@philipcolligan) March 3, 2018

Special thanks to ModMyPi for shipping the special 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam kits all over the world!

Don’t forget to check out our Jam page to find an event near you! This is also where you can find free resources to help you get a new Jam started, and download free starter projects made especially for Jam activities. These projects are available in English, Français, Français Canadien, Nederlands, Deutsch, Italiano, and 日本語(yǔ). If you’d like to help us translate more content into these and other languages, please get in touch!

PS Some of the UK Jams were postponed due to heavy snowfall, so you may find there’s a belated sixth-birthday Jam coming up where you live!

Ours was rescheduled until later in the Spring due to the snow but here is Babbage enjoying the snow! pic.twitter.com/JLHEQ0eBth

— MakerCupboard (@makercupboard) March 5, 2018

The post 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend 2018 roundup appeared first on 葫芦娃app.

Find a Jam near you

There are Jams planned in Argentina, Australia, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Canada, Colombia, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Iran, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Poland, South Africa, Spain, Taiwan, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, and Zimbabwe.

Take a look at the events map and the full list (including those who haven’t added their event to the map quite yet).

We will have 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jams in 35 countries across six continents

Birthday kits

We had some special swag made especially for the birthday, including these T-shirts, which we’ve sent to Jam organisers:

There is also a poster with a list of participating Jams, which you can download:

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam photo booth

I created a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam photo booth that overlays photos with the Big Birthday Weekend logo and then tweets the picture from your Jam’s account — you’ll be seeing plenty of those if you follow the #PiParty hashtag on 3–4 March.

Check out the project on GitHub, and feel free to set up your own booth, or modify it to your own requirements. We’ve included text annotations in several languages, and more contributions are very welcome.

There’s still time…

If you can’t find a Jam near you, there’s still time to organise one for the Big Birthday Weekend. All you need to do is find a venue — a room in a school or library will do — and think about what you’d like to do at the event. Some Jams have 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pis set up for workshops and practical activities, some arrange tech talks, some put on show-and-tell — it’s up to you. To help you along, there’s the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook full of advice and tips from Jam organisers.

The packed.
And they packed.
And they packed some more.
Who’s expecting one of these #rjam kits for the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend? pic.twitter.com/70gslJApR6

— 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi (@4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi) February 7, 2018

Download the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam branding pack, and the special birthday branding pack, where you’ll find logos, graphical assets, flyer templates, worksheets, and more. When you’re ready to announce your event, create a webpage for it — you can use a site like Eventbrite or Meetup — and submit your Jam to us so it will appear on the Jam map!

We are six

We’re really looking forward to celebrating our birthday with thousands of people around the world. Over 48 hours, people of all ages will come together at more than 100 events to learn, share ideas, meet people, and make things during our Big Birthday Weekend.

Since we released the first 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi in 2012, we’ve sold 17 million of them. We’re also reaching almost 200000 children in 130 countries around the world through Code Club and CoderDojo, we’ve trained over 1500 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi Certified Educators, and we’ve sent code written by more than 6800 children into space. Our magazines are read by a quarter of a million people, and millions more use our free online learning resources. There’s plenty to celebrate and even more still to do: we really hope you’ll join us from a Jam near you on 3–4 March.

The post Big Birthday Weekend 2018: find a Jam near you! appeared first on 葫芦娃app.

For the last few years, we have held a big 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community event in Cambridge around 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi’s birthday, where people have come together for a huge party with talks, workshops, and more. We want more people to have the chance to join in with our birthday celebrations next year, so we’re going to be coordinating 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jams all over the world to take place over the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend, 3–4 March 2018.

Big Birthday fun!

Whether you’ve run a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam before, or you’d like to start a new Jam in your area, we invite you to join us for our Big Birthday Weekend, wherever you are in the world. This event will be a community-led, synchronised, global mega-Jam in celebration of our sixth birthday and the digital making community! Members of the 葫芦娃app team will be attending Jams far and wide to celebrate with you during the weekend.

Jams across the world will receive a special digital pack – be sure to register your interest so we can get your pack to you! We’ll also be sending out party kits to registered Jams – more info on this below.

Need help getting started?

First of all, check out the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam page to read all about Jams, and take a look at our recent blog post explaining the support for Jams that we offer.

If there’s no Jam near you yet, the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend is the perfect opportunity to start one yourself! If you’d like some help getting your Jam off the ground, there are a few places you can get support:

• The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook is full of advice gathered from the amazing people who run Jams in the UK.
• The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Slack team is available for Jam organisers to chat, share ideas, and get help from each other. Just email jam [at] 韩国理论电影.org and ask to be invited.
• Attend a Jam! Find an upcoming Jam near you, and go along to get an idea of what it’s like.
• Email us – if you have more queries, you can email jam [at] 韩国理论电影.org and we’ll do what we can to help.

Get involved

If you’re keen to start a new Jam, there’s no need to wait until March – why not get up and running over the summer? Then you’ll be an expert by the time the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend comes around. Check out the guidebook, join the Jam Slack, and submit your event to the map when you’re ready.

Like the idea of running a Jam, but don’t want to do it by yourself? Then feel free to email us, and we’ll try and help you find someone to co-organise it.

If you don’t fancy organising a Jam for our Big Birthday Weekend, but would like to celebrate with us, keep an eye on our website for an update early next year. We’ll publish a full list of Jams participating in the festivities so you can find one near you. And if you’ve never attended a Jam before, there’s no need to wait: find one to join on the map here.

Register your interest

If you think you’d like to run a Jam as part of the Big Birthday Weekend, register your interest now, and you’ll be the first to receive updates. Don’t worry if you don’t have the venue or logistics in place yet – this is just to let us know you’re keen, and to give us an idea about how big our party is going to be.

We will contact you in autumn to give you more information, as well as some useful resources. On top of our regular 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam branding pack, we’ll provide a special digital Big Birthday Weekend pack to help you celebrate and tell everyone about your Jam!

Then, once you have confirmed you’re taking part, you’ll be able to register your Jam on our website. This will make sure that other people interested in joining the party can find your event. If your Jam is among the first 150 to be registered for a Big Birthday Weekend event, we will send you a free pack of goodies to use on the big day!

Go fill in the form, and we’ll be in touch!

PS: We’ll be running a big Cambridge event in the summer on the weekend of 30 June–1 July 2018. Put it in your diary – we’ll say more about it as we get closer to the date.

The post Announcing the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Big Birthday Weekend 2018 appeared first on 葫芦娃app.

You may remember that last year Philip and I went along to Coolest Projects, CoderDojo’s annual event at which their global community showcase their best makes. It was awesome! This year a whole bunch of us from the 葫芦娃app attended Coolest Projects with our new Irish colleagues, and as expected, the projects on show were as cool as can be.

This year’s coolest projects!

Young maker Benjamin demoed his brilliant RGB LED table tennis ball display for us, and showed off his brilliant project tutorial website codemakerbuddy.com, which he built with Python and Flask. [Click on any of the images to enlarge them.]

Next up, Aimee showed us a recipes app she’d made with the MIT App Inventor. It was a really impressive and well thought-out project.

This very successful OpenCV face detection program with hardware installed in a teddy bear was great as well:

Helen’s and Oly’s favourite project involved…live bees!

BEEEEEEEEEEES!

Its creator, 12-year-old Amy, said she wanted to do something to help the Earth. Her project uses various sensors to record data on the bee population in the hive. An adjacent monitor displays the data in a web interface:

Coolest robots

I enjoyed seeing lots of GPIO Zero projects out in the wild, including this robotic lawnmower made by Kevin and Zach:

Philip’s favourite make was a Pi-powered robot you can control with your mind! According to the maker, Laura, it worked really well with Philip because he has no hair.

This is extraordinary. Laura from @CoderDojo Romania has programmed a mind controlled robot using @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi @coolestprojects pic.twitter.com/SOLdvH5h8A

— Philip Colligan 🧢 (@philipcolligan) June 17, 2017

And here are some pictures of even more cool robots we saw:

Games, toys, activities

Oly and I were massively impressed with the work of Mogamad, Daniel, and Basheerah, who programmed a (borrowed) Amazon Echo to make a voice-controlled text-adventure game using Java and the Alexa API. They’ve inspired me to try something similar using the AIY projects kit and adventurelib!

Christopher Hill did a brilliant job with his Home Alone LEGO house. He used sensors to trigger lights and sounds to make it look like someone’s at home, like in the film. I should have taken a video – seeing it in action was great!

Meanwhile, the Northern Ireland 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam group ran a DOTS board activity, which turned their area into a conductive paint hazard zone.

Creativity and ingenuity

We really enjoyed seeing so many young people collaborating, experimenting, and taking full advantage of the opportunity to make real projects. And we loved how huge the range of technologies in use was: people employed all manner of hardware and software to bring their ideas to life.

Wow! Look at that room full of awesome young people. @coolestprojects #coolestprojects @CoderDojo pic.twitter.com/hRJY6PSW0G

— Philip Colligan 🧢 (@philipcolligan) June 17, 2017

Congratulations to the Coolest Projects 2017 prize winners, and to all participants. Here are some of the teams that won in the different categories:

Take a look at the gallery of all winners over on Flickr.

The wow factor

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi co-founder and 韩国理伦大片三色眼影 Trustee Pete Lomas came along to the event as well. Here’s what he had to say:

It’s hard to describe the scale of the event, and photos just don’t do it justice. The first thing that hit me was the sheer excitement of the CoderDojo Ninjas [the children attending Dojos]. Everyone was setting up for their time with the project judges, and their pure delight at being able to show off their creations was evident in both halls. Time and time again I saw the ninjas apply their creativity to help save the planet or make someone’s life better, and it’s truly exciting that we are going to help that continue and expand.

Even after 8 hours, enthusiasm wasn’t flagging — the awards ceremony was just brilliant, with ninjas high-fiving the winners on the way to the stage. This speaks volumes about the ethos and vision of the CoderDojo founders, where everyone is a winner just by being part of a community of worldwide friends. It was a brilliant introduction, and if this weekend was anything to go by, our merger certainly is a marriage made in Heaven.

Join this awesome community!

If all this inspires you as much as it did us, consider looking for a CoderDojo near you — and sign up as a volunteer! There’s plenty of time for young people to build up skills and start working on a project for next year’s event. Check out coolestprojects.com for more information.

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Norwich 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam

Norwich is a place where I’ve always hoped there would be a Jam. It’s a tech city in the East of England and there’s plenty going on there, but so far no one has been running a Jam. I met Archie Roques at the Jam I run at Pi Towers, and was thrilled to discover that he was planning to set one up with Claire Riseborough.

I wanted to start the Norwich Jam for a few reasons. Firstly because I really love visiting other Jams (CamJam and Pi Towers Jam) and wanted something closer to home. Also because there’s a great tech community in Norwich, so we want to use that to help encourage more young people into tech and digital making. As one of the founders of the Young Makers’ Tech Club, I’ve seen how much tech potential Norfolk’s young people have. It would be great to have a place where we can have more of them getting involved, and somewhere where those who are interested can learn more skills and show them off to others.

I had the idea brewing in my mind for a while. I visited a few Jams and Pi Parties, and started by helping out at the Pi Towers Jam to get a feel of what running a Jam involves. Then Sarah, who works in education at the Forum (a big public building in Norwich, which amongst other things houses the main library and does lots of tech stuff) got in touch, as she’d heard about the idea and wanted to have a Jam as part of their Norwich Gaming Festival. We got a few other people on board and it’s been all go from there!

Finding a venue can be tricky, but sometimes you find the  perfect place, with a vested interest in running a community interest event, especially if it’s for young people. And you never know, they might lend a hand with organising it, too.

The Forum has been really helpful in getting us a venue. They couldn’t host the Jam themselves as they’ve got other events on that week, but they booked us another venue, the fantastic OPEN Norwich.

The Forum has also helped with the organisation – they are overseeing the ticketing, and helping to promote the event (which is good, as they have 33,000 more Twitter followers than I do!). They also are helping with some of the less exciting stuff like insurance and safeguarding, and organising some events for schools and educators to go alongside the Jam, which is great. Claire Riseborough, who has founded a social enterprise with the aim of helping kids to reach their tech potential, has also been instrumental in getting people in the tech community on board and getting the word out. Lots of other people have helped in their fields of expertise, which is great!

I asked Archie how he planned the Jam’s activities, and how he decided what to put on.

We knew that we wanted to have some talks, stalls, vendors and workshops: when we’d been to events like the Pi Party, those were the bits we liked best. We did a quick social media call for volunteers and we’ve had a pretty good response (though there’s always room for one more!).  We’ve got a nice selection of talks and workshops, and we aim to have some more informal general activities for people who don’t want to do anything too formal. The most important thing for us is having as many awesome people there as possible, whether they are visitors or volunteers.

I’d really like to see the Jam continue, probably on a quarterly basis, as there are lots of other more frequent tech events in Norwich. The Norwich Science Festival is coming up in the Autumn, so it’s possible that a science-themed Jam will be on the cards for then!

The first Norwich Jam takes place on 27 May. Tickets are free from Eventbrite. Maybe I’ll see you there?

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Berlin

James Mitchell is a Scotsman living in Berlin. I first met him when I gave a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi talk in a furniture showroom, and somehow that led him to start a local Jam.

After owning a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi for a few months I started to search for tips, tricks and tutorials online. I then started to notice 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jams being set up all over the UK. We didn’t have these events in Berlin, so I decided to start a Jam of my own. Thankfully I had loads of support from Jam leaders and even got the chance to meet Ben Nuttall when he visited Berlin shortly before he joined the 韩国理伦大片三色眼影. He was a great inspiration!

After getting started with the Jam, lots of things started to fall into place. I started to build a lot more projects, mainly using the Camera Module. I have a little obsession with photography, and I am particularly fond of time-lapse. My kids also started to get involved with the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi. They are still a little young yet but I love that they stay enthusiastic.

James felt that he was missing out on the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community vibe.

It really was the lack of events in and around Berlin that got the Jam going. I wanted to attend one of the UK Jams, as it seemed full of like-minded people willing to help each other and learn new things – something we sorely lacked here.

I did later manage to attend the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi Birthday Party in Cambridge. While the event was considerably larger than most Jams I had heard about, it was totally amazing to meet the community. It reinforced the sense of belonging I had been looking for.

I held the first 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Berlin in a co-working office that offers their space at weekends for free if you don’t charge for tickets. I had some Pis set up with various add-on boards and we also gave a few talks about the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi.

My favourite thing about the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam is meeting different people and seeing those projects that are getting pushed beyond my own understanding, but also being able to help new people get interested in the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi. It’s very satisfying to know someone has left the Jam inspired!

I asked James what advice he would have for someone setting up a Jam in their area.

Start small, and have a clear outline of what you want from your Jam. Invite a few friends and maybe the local school’s 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 teacher. Find your like-minded corner of the community, and with their help expand if you want.

Don’t be intimidated by the size of other Jams. They come in all shapes and sizes and some can be really large. Just keep in mind you are in it to have fun!

You never know how many people will show up to a Jam. Will it be too many, or too few? Here’s James’ take on the dilemma:

It can get a little stressful when you have low numbers, but the key is to ignore the numbers and just enjoy the moment. If one person shows up and they walk away inspired, it’s a job well done.

Wimbledon 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam

Cat Lamin went to Picademy in July 2014. She got really excited about the teaching possibilities of the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, but didn’t know where to start, so she reached out to the community to create local networks for teachers to share their skills. She started a Coding Evening in Twickenham, and helped organise the Wimbledon 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam.

Albert Hickey, who organises the Egham Jam, approached me to see if I was interested in helping him run the Jam in Wimbledon. He had been offered a venue and wanted me to be involved from the start. Wimbledon is close to the school I taught in and I knew this would be an excellent opportunity to give some of the children from school the chance to help develop their passions. What I really enjoyed about the Jam was seeing all of the families there. Several parents asked if we could let their children’s schools know about the next one because they were keen to bring more families down!

I was really lucky with Wimbledon Jam, as loads of helpful people were really keen to offer up their time as volunteers. If I’m honest, I took over a little bit, but Albert seemed quite happy to let me handle the actual event while he dealt with the venue. By the end of it, I felt that we had been the perfect team. While Albert negotiated the space, I took on the role of organising the timetable of events. I had to figure out timings for workshops and who was available to run them. We were really lucky that so many people offered their help almost straight away, and it was great having Ben along as a representative from the 葫芦娃app. It added a sort of official stamp of approval to the day.

I really like having workshops, talks and show-and-tells going on, and we were really lucky that loads of people were interested in doing everything. One of my highlights from the day was watching the Mums creep over to Whack-a-Pi and sneak a go while their children were taking part in workshops – it was very funny!

Cat and Albert have run three Jams at Wimbledon library now. It’s great to see it continue on from the initial event I attended.

Why do people run Jams?

People run Jams for many reasons. I started the Manchester Jam so that I would have a group of people to learn about 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi with, and it ended up benefiting hundreds of other people. While organising an event can be a lot of work, it is good fun. It all seems worth it in the end when you see how you can positively affect people you’d never otherwise have met. Here are some more insights from other Jam makers:

Read more in this excerpt from the Guidebook.

If you want to run a Jam, wherever you are, just remember that all these people were once where you are now. If they can do it, you can do it. Find some helpers, share ideas, make arrangements for your first event, and have fun. Be sure to check out the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook for tips from other Jam makers, and lots of practical information on organising an event.

There are plenty of Jams coming up in the next month, including Oklahoma, Bogotá, Virginia and Melbourne, as well as lots in the UK, from Egham to Blackpool, Huddersfield to Belfast. Check out the Jam calendar for more.

I’ll be back next month with another Jam round-up, so if you have a Jam story to share, please get in touch! Email ben@韩国理论电影.org. I really want to hear about all your 韩国理伦大片三色眼影s.

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Preston 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam

The Preston Jam is one of the most long-established Jams, and it recently ran its 58th event. It has achieved this by running like clockwork: on the first Monday evening of every month, without fail, the Jam takes place. A few months ago I decided to drop in to surprise the organiser, Alan O’Donohoe. The Jam is held at the Media Innovation Studio at the University of Central Lancashire. The format is quite informal, and it’s very welcoming to newcomers. The first half of the event allows people to mingle, and beginners can get support from more seasoned makers. I noticed a number of parents who’d brought their children along to find out more about the Pi and what can be done with it. It’s a great way to find out for real what people use their Pis for, and to get pointers on how to set up and where to start.

About half way through the evening, the organisers gather everyone round to watch a few short presentations. At the Jam I attended, most of these talks were from children, which was fantastic to see: Josh gave a demo in which he connected his 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi to an Amazon Echo using the Alexa API, Cerys talked about her Jam in Staffordshire, and Elise told everyone about the workshops she ran at MozFest. All their talks were really well presented. The Preston Jam has done very well to keep going for so long and so consistently, and to provide such great opportunities and support for young people like Josh, Cerys and Elise to develop their digital making abilities (and presentation skills). Their next event is on Monday 1 May.

Manchester 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam and CoderDojo

I set up the Manchester Jam back in 2012, around the same time that the Preston one started. Back then, you could only buy one Pi at a time, and only a handful of people in the area owned one. We ran a fairly small event at the local tech community space, MadLab, adopting the format of similar events I’d been to, which was very hands-on and project-based – people brought along their Pis and worked on their own builds. I ran the Jam for a year before moving to Cambridge to work for the 韩国理伦大片三色眼影, and I asked one of the regular attendees, Jack, if he’d run it in future. I hadn’t been back until last month, when Clare and I decided to visit.

The Jam is now held at The Shed, a digital innovation space at Manchester Metropolitan University, thanks to Darren Dancey, a computer science lecturer who claims he taught me everything I know (this claim is yet to be peer-reviewed). Jack, Darren, and 葫芦娃app co-founder and Trustee Pete Lomas put on an excellent event. They have a room for workshops, and a space for people to work on their own projects. It was wonderful to see some of the attendees from the early days still going along every month, as well as lots of new faces. Some of Darren’s students ran a Minecraft Pi workshop for beginners, and I ran one using traffic lights with GPIO Zero and guizero.

The next day, we went along to Manchester CoderDojo, a monthly event for young people learning to code and make things. The Dojo is held at The Sharp Project, and thanks to the broad range of skills of the volunteers, they provide a range of different activities: 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, Minecraft, LittleBits, Code Club Scratch projects, video editing, game making and lots more.

Manchester CoderDojo’s next event is on Sunday 14 May. Be sure to keep an eye on mcrraspjam.org.uk for the next Jam date!

CamJam and Pi Wars

The Cambridge 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam is a big event that runs two or three times a year, with quite a different format to the smaller monthly Jams. They have a lecture theatre for talks, a space for workshops, lots of show-and-tell, and even a collection of retailers selling Pis and accessories. It’s a very social event, and always great fun to attend.

The organisers, Mike and Tim, who wrote the foreword for the Guidebook, also run Pi Wars: the annual 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi robotics competition. Clare and I went along to this year’s event, where we got to see teams from all over the country (and even one from New Mexico, brought by one of our Certified Educators from Picademy USA, Kerry Bruce) take part in a whole host of robotic challenges. A few of the teams I spoke to have been working on their robots at their local Jams throughout the year. If you’re interested in taking part next year, you can get a team together now and start to make a plan for your 2018 robot! Keep an eye on camjam.me and piwars.org for announcements.

Ely Cathedral has surprisingly good straight line speed for a cathedral. Great job Ely Makers! #PiWars pic.twitter.com/2QQSoUorLq

— PiBorg (@Pi_Borg) April 2, 2017

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam @ Pi Towers

As well as working on supporting other Jams, I’ve also been running my own for the last few months. Held at our own offices in Cambridge, 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam @ Pi Towers is a monthly event for people of all ages. We run workshops, show-and-tell and other practical activities. If you’re in the area, our next event is on Saturday 13 May.

#rjam @ Pi Towers pic.twitter.com/PdJZ6Ucr4n

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) February 11, 2017

4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jamboree

In 2013 and 2014, Alan O’Donohoe organised the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jamboree, which took place in Manchester to mark the first and second 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi birthdays – and it’s coming back next month, this time organised by Claire Dodd Wicher and Les Pounder. It’s primarily an unconference, so the talks are given by the attendees and arranged on the day, which is a great way to allow anyone to participate. There will also be workshops and practical sessions, so don’t miss out! Unless, like me, you’re going to the new Norwich Jam instead…

Start a Jam near you

If there’s no Jam where you live, you can start your own! Download a copy of the brand new 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook for tips on how to get started. It’s not as hard as you’d think! And we’re on hand if you need any help.

Visiting Jams and hearing from Jam organisers are great ways for us to find out how we can best support our wonderful community. If you run a Jam and you’d like to tell us about what you do, or share your success stories, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. Email me at ben@韩国理论电影.org, and we’ll try to feature your stories on the blog in future.

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We think Jams provide lots of great learning opportunities and we’d like to see one in every community. We’re aware of Jams in 43 countries: most recently, we’ve seen new Jams start in Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, and Honduras! The community team has been working on a plan to support and grow the amazing community of Jam makers around the world. Now it’s time to share the fantastic resources we have produced with you.

The 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook

One of the things we’ve been working on is a comprehensive 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Guidebook to help people set up their Jam. It’s packed full of advice gathered from the 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi community, showing the many different types of Jam and how you can organise your own. It covers everything from promoting and structuring your Jam to managing finances: we’re sure you’ll find it useful. Download it now!

Branding pack

One of the things many Jam organisers told us they needed was a set of assets to help with advertising. With that in mind, we’ve created a new branding pack for Jam organisers to use in their promotional materials. There’s a new 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam logo, a set of poster templates, a set of graphical assets, and more. Download it now!

Starter kits

Finally, we’ve put together a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam starter kit containing stickers, flyers, printed worksheets, and lots more goodies to help people run their first Jam. Once you’ve submitted your first event to our Jam map, you can apply for your starter kit. Existing Jams won’t miss out either: they can apply for a kit when they submit their next event.

Find a Jam near you!

Take a look at the Jam map and see if there’s an event coming up near you. If you have kids, Jams can be a brilliant way to get them started with coding and making.

Can’t find a local Jam? Start one!

If you can’t find a Jam near you, you can start your own. You don’t have to organise it by yourself. Try to find some other people who would also like a Jam to go to, and get together with them. Work out where you could host your Jam and what form you’d like it to take. It’s OK to start small: just get some people together and see what happens. It’s worth looking at the Jam map to see if any Jams have happened nearby: just check the ‘Past Events’ box.

We have a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam Slack team where you can get help from other Jam organisers. Feel free to get in touch if you would like to join: just email jam@韩国理论电影.org and we’ll get back to you. You can also contact us if you need further support in general, or if you have feedback on the resources.

Thanks

Many thanks to everyone who contributed to the guidebook and provided insights in the Jam survey. Thanks, too, to all Jam makers and volunteers around the world who do great work providing opportunities for people everywhere!

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As well as working with classroom teachers and supporting learning in schools, 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi brings 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 and digital making to educators and learners in all sorts of other settings. I recently attended Wintercamp, a camp for Scouts at Gilwell Park. With some help from Brian and Richard from Vodafone, I ran a 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi activity space introducing Scouts to digital making with 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Pi, using the Sense HAT, the Camera Module, and GPIO, based on some of our own learning resources.

Today I'm running @4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆_Pi activities for @UKScouting at @gpwintercamp with @VodafoneUK! pic.twitter.com/Mjw6FmbyIp

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) January 7, 2017

Note the plastic sheeting on the floor! Kids were dropping into our sessions all day with muddy boots, having taken part in all sorts of fun activities, indoors and out.

.@gpwintercamp pic.twitter.com/21wv3EXhJX

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) January 8, 2017

In the UK, the Scouts have Digital Citizen and Digital Maker badges, and we’re currently working with the Scout Association to help deliver content for the Digital Maker badge, as supported by the Vodafone 韩国理伦大片三色眼影.

The activities we ran were just a gentle introduction to creative tech and experimenting with sensors, but they went down really well, and many of the participants felt happy to move beyond the worksheets and try out their own ideas. We set challenges, and got them to think about how they could incorporate technology like this into their Scouting activities.

Having been through the Scouting movement myself, it’s amazing to be involved in working to show young people how technology can be applied to projects related to their other hobbies and interests. I loved introducing the Scouts to the idea that programming and making can be tools to help solve problems that are relevant to them and to others in their communities, as well as enabling them to do some good in the world, and to be creative.

Scouts coding

"Can you breathe on the Sense HAT to make the humidity read 90?"
"That's cool. It makes you light-headed…" pic.twitter.com/hlrFrEMqTU

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) January 7, 2017

While conducting a survey of 4hu44四虎www在线影院麻豆 Jam organisers recently, I discovered that a high proportion of those who run Jams are also involved in other youth organisations. Many were Scout leaders. Other active Pi community folk happen to be involved in Scouting too, like Brian and Richard, who helped out at the weekend, and who are Scout and Cub leaders. I’m interested to speak to anyone in the Pi community who has an affiliation with the Scouts to share ideas on how they think digital making can be incorporated in Scouting activities. Please do get in touch!

Not a great picture but the Scouts made a Fleur de Lys on the Sense HAT at @gpwintercamp pic.twitter.com/I1UN42rNN8

— Ben Nuttall (@ben_nuttall) January 8, 2017

The timing is perfect for young people in this age group to get involved with digital making, as we’ve just launched our first Pioneers challenge. There’s plenty of scope there for outdoor tech projects.

Thanks to UK Scouting and the Wintercamp team for a great weekend. Smiles all round!

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