Year 5 Programming Physical Devices
🕓 1-3 Hours (1-2 hours if just using Microbit online activities)
Progression of skills in this pack:
1. Understand that computers use physical inputs and outputs and give examples.
2. Program physical inputs, outputs (e.g program LED lights), loops and random variables (Microbit activities).
3. Design, write and debug programs that accomplish specific goals, including controlling or simulating physical systems.
National Curriculum Content
Design, write and debug programs that accomplish specific goals, including controlling or simulating physical systems.
Use sequence, selection, and repetition in programs; work with variables and various forms of input and output.
Introduction
These activities and lesson ideas can be carried out with any Key Stage 2 year group because it is important for children to firstly understand how computers work but also that when they are writing programs, often they are used to control physical equipment such as traffic lights. Programming physical components with inputs and outputs develop visual understanding of cause and effect. Dependent on how many pieces of equipment you have will determine how you teach. For example, if you have limited equipment, you may want to show small groups of children while the rest of the classwork on other activities. The Microbit pupil activity below does not require a physical Microbit.
Microbit Activities
Pupil Activity Code: MB72 – What is it?
Objectives/Learning outcomes
1. Understand that computers use physical inputs and outputs and give examples.
2. Program physical inputs, outputs (e.g program LED lights) and loops.
3. Design, write and debug programs that accomplish specific goals, including controlling or simulating physical systems.
Introduction
The Microbit was handed out to all Year 7 students in 2015 as a way to promote programming but there is also lots of uses in Primary Computing lessons for it too, even if you do not have any Microbits.
The Microbit works a little like a USB stick, where the program is written on the website and downloaded to the Microbit to run it. The code builder website on the Microbit website also has a live previewer so pupils can test/simulate a Microbit with their programs without needing a Microbit itself.
Assessment
As demonstrated in the second video below, pupils can download their projects to the Microbit (if they have one). For the online Microbit emulator, pupils can publish their projects and share the link with the teacher using the Share icon (also shown in the second video). Microbit.org also has a classroom feature, which allows teachers to see from a dashboard what code the pupils have created. We have made a video below explaining this.
Parts of a Microbit Assessment Activity
Below is a downloadable and printable activity sheet for pupils to label the correct parts of a Microbit and their uses.
iPad/Android App
There is a free iPad and Android app available to download the code to the Microbit over Bluetooth. We have created a video below.
Pupil Activities
These 4 activities below (included in the pupil activity pack) are just a starting point for what’s possible with a Microbit but form a good introduction. The pupils will need an understanding of block-based coding software such as Scratch before they begin.
The videos below are also included in the pupil activity pack (see code above) but you may also want to watch them together as a class before the pupils try them, especially the first one.
1. This first activity is simply looking at the Microbit, investigating what it is and the different inputs/outputs. There is an opportunity to pause the video and talk about objects at home and school that have computers inside (picture below).
You will also want to talk with the pupils about the safety instructions.
2. This tutorial and activity looks at how pupils can write simple programs for the Microbit (light outputs and loops), test them and then download them to the Microbit itself (pupils do not need a real Microbit and just run them on the Microbit emulator).
3. This tutorial and activity looks at how the different inputs (buttons) on the Microbit can be used to control the outputs (lights).
4. This tutorial covers how pupils can access the other interactive tutorials for different projects on the www.microbit.org website. This includes the dice project, which covers inputs using the accelerometer and random variables.
Raspberry PI
Pupils understanding how a computer works is particularly important in this day in age, where devices are smaller and hard to change internal parts. Simply taking a case off a desktop PC and discussing the internal components is often a real eyeopener for children.
The Raspberry PI is a mini-computer which has a variety of inputs and outputs that can be connected up to monitors, TVs, keyboard, mouse etc. There is a getting started guide here and the videos below demonstrate how it can be explained to and used by pupils. There are also more resources on this website.
Update! The latest Raspberry Pi is called Raspberry Pi 4
This video demonstrates how to connect the Raspberry Pi, what the ports do and turning it on.
This video demonstrates the operating system and includes software.
Makey Makey
Makey Makey board is a circuit board that connects to a computer or Raspberry PI. It allows various objects to be connected to it using crocodile clips and be used as input devices – in many ways it is a simplified version of the Microbit as it does not require programming to run it. It is great for Computing but also science with electricity lessons.
Activity Ideas
Pupils could use the Makey Makey board as an input for our Scratch running activity (part of Year 4 Scratch Pack) where the four inputs of the Makey Makey could be connected to aluminium foil with crocodile clips, then the pupils could hold the output crocodile clip and step on the foil with either foot (jogging on the spot) to make their sprite move.
Using the Makey Makey board as an input device to control a game.
Watch tutorial to learn how to use the Makey Makey piano.
Watch the video tutorial to see how Makey Makey can used in a science experiment on conductors.
Lego WeDo
Lego WeDo is a series of different lego projects that can then be connected via Bluetooth to a computer or tablet to be programmed with simple code blocks. We would recommend starting with the Lego WeDo 2.0 as it works well as a starter set, includes a dividing tray for the lego and different robots/vehicles can be made. The pupils can work through the steps to construct the lego using the Lego WeDo 2.0 software that can be downloaded on different platforms here. Once the lego is made and connected by Bluetooth to the computer then the software can be used to add code blocks to make the robots move, turn, light up and play sound effects.
