[chbot] Which robot kit?

Fri Feb 17 05:15:36 GMT 2012

Hi Andrew

Answer 5/100 :-)

There are an enormous number of options with hundreds of suppliers targeting
this market, so a lot of variables come into play in deciding what systems
might be a good fit.  (I have no connection with any product).

These include the skill level of those who will be teaching it - do you need
support and a pre-made curriculum?

What are other schools around you are using? Does this matter?  Are you
interested in competing with others?

Cost, flexibility.  

Some systems provide simulators which allow lots of students to test
programs on a simulator.  This can reduce the number of actual hardware
robots required.  There is a trade-off between lots of cheap robots vs a few
expensive ones.

I have personally used Vex, Lego, and systems based on Arduino.

VEX
There are three parts to Vex.
1. The hardware (building components and controllers) and software.  In my
experience the hardware is reasonably robust. The motors certainly have
limitations, but generally OK for school education. The controllers and
sensors are adequate, although the latest top-end controller appears to be
very capable.  The programming environment (RobotC is good for education).
The parts are relatively expensive when compared to alternatives, at least
when shipped to New Zealand.

2. Curriculum.  There are some very good teaching curriculi/curriculae [what
is the plural of curriculum?] (in English) for RobotC/ Vex.

3. Competitions. There is no need to participate in competitions to get the
educational benefits (In fact in my experience the team was so competitive
most of the educational benefits were lost in the quest to be the best).
The competitions allow only Vex parts to be used and they consist
principally of remote-controlled driving with very little autonomous
programming needed - in fact this is entirely optional.  You may be able to
achieve more educationally by using other parts together with Vex and
focussing more on autonomous behaviour.  

LEGO
I have used Lego Mindstorms, but only the older RCX system rather than the
NXT; and not in an education setting.  What I do know is that there is huge
educational support with the Lego system including education-specific
products and sets, curriculae, etc.  There are other suppliers who have
lego-compatible products.  The lego and lego-compatible parts tend to be
more expensive than the equivalent non-lego-compatible parts but the system
is easy for teachers to pick up and use.  

There are also some international competitions based on Lego, including
First Lego League (FLL).

ARDUINO
The open-source Arduino system is very popular and at the cheaper end of the
market.  The fact that it is open-source is both a huge advantage (LOTS of
easy-to-get products, free tutorials and lots of code, etc) and a
disadvantage (huge range of products can make it hard to choose, not all
expansion shields are compatible with each other).  The Arduino is only the
microcontroller board and a specification for expansion boards (known as
Sheilds) - there is no Arduino "system" of sensors and hardware; BUT there
is a huge array of sensors and hardware that could be used.  For example,
you could use Vex or Lego, or Meccano/ Erector set hardware building
components with an Ardunio controller.  Arduino's are not very powerful, but
are useful enough for basic educational robotics (and other types of
projects) like line-following, obstacle avoidance etc.

Arduino's can be programmed with a free IDE in a simplified version of C
language based on Processing (and can work well with Processing apps).  They
can also be programmed in industry-standard C, but probably easiest to stick
with the free IDE for students.  www.arduino.cc

As the Arduino system is open-source hardware there are a LOT of products
based on it, including products aimed at educational robotics.  I like the
Romeo from www.dfrobot.com - this is a standard Arduino with a built-in
motor controller and sensor plugs compatible with a range of sensors
available from that supplier.  They also provide some basic robot hardware
kits to get started with.  These are at the cheaper end of the range and are
poorer quality than Vex/ Lego systems.

As I said, there are a huge array of products, including the Pi robot from
Pololu and many others.

There are international competitions that don't restrict entrants to
particular hardware, like RoboCup/ RoboCup Junior.  These are more focussed
on autonomous programming than the Vex competition.

I don't know what Korean-language support there is for these various
systems, but I would imagine there is some for Lego, possibly Vex, and there
is sure to be an active Korean hobbyist community for Arduino.

Hope that helps
Wes

-----Original Message-----
From: chchrobotics-bounces at lists.linuxnut.co.nz
[mailto:chchrobotics-bounces at lists.linuxnut.co.nz] On Behalf Of Andrew
Errington
Sent: Thursday, 16 February 2012 8:11 p.m.
To: chchrobotics at lists.linuxnut.co.nz
Subject: [chbot] Which robot kit?

Hello chaps,

It's time for me to tap your collective wisdom.  I know I'll get a hundred
different answers, but right now I have nothing.

First, a bit of background.  I am teaching English in a Middle School in
South Korea.  The students are about age 12 to age 15.  The school wants
to make a robot class and has asked me to help.  We will try and use
English in the class, but we'll probably use a lot of Korean.  It doesn't
matter if the programming language uses mostly English words, and in fact
that would be preferable.

Naturally I have no problem hacking on stuff to make it work, but that's
no good for a classroom of beginners, and I can't solder up enough stuff
for a class of 15 or so students.  I'd like some sort of kit, or some
system with a range of plug-in modules and the ability to attach
third-party or homebrew modules.  And obviously not too expensive.  The
programming software must run on a Windows PC, and I'd prefer a text
editor interface to write programs.  I'm thinking Processing might be a
good environment for this, but I've enever used it.

I want something I can use to make simple robots for solving classic robot
problems such as line following, obstacle avoidance and simple navigation
(wheel encoders etc).  Maybe a Logo-based drawing turtle  I am hoping that
the topic of robots will expose the students to lots of English, and I
hope they will be interested enough to want to study English more so that
they can learn more about robots and technology in general.  Yes, there
are robot and technology companies in Korea, but I want them to look
outside Korea too.

I'd particularly like to hear from educators on this list, especially if
you have a system that works (and your advice to avoid things that don't
work, either specific hardware, or teaching traps to avoid).  I am very
aware that adopting something like this puts pressure on the teachers (to
learn how it all works) and the school (to pay for maintenance and replace
broken parts), but we'll start small and see how it goes.

There are some Korean suppliers, and if you guys make suggestions I might
find  the same stuff on sale here.  My first step is to define a couple of
typical robot tasks, buy one kit, and make sure we can all understand it
and get it to work.  After that we can buy a bunch of kits and put
together a course and worksheets and let the students play.

Thanks in advance for any advice and information you can offer.

Best wishes,

Andrew

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