Hello and welcome to another core electronics tutorial, today we're going to be taking another look at Circuit Scribe with the eyes of educators in mind so it's all about how you can bring circuit scribe bring that stem learning goodness into the classroom. So if you're not sure what circuit scribe takes a look at our getting started with circuit scribe goes up a little bit more in depth as to how it works how the special conductive pen works and some tips and tricks that today yeah as I said we're going to be looking at how I would have brought to the classroom how it differs from all of the other stem products that are out there and how you know which kit is going to be best in an educational setting.

So there are two main kits that we're going to be looking at in the eyes or of educators we put those together as bundles on our site we've got the basic kit and the maker kit, and the educator versions coming ten packs of these the maker kit comes with a few more extras I've done there some extra pens and extra resources in case things go missing in a classroom as they usually do the basic kit is just the ten basic kits but today let's look at why it is you would us circuit scribe in a classroom.

So circuit scribe is fantastic I really love it and I've gotten to understand the heart behind circuit scribe a little bit more as I've gotten hands-on with it and the idea is that you don't need any special tools or equipment to create a circuit from scratch, and I'm not talking about just connecting up modules in a color by numbers approach, you can actually create your own circuit however you want using this really, really cool silver pen. So it's got conductive ink it's got it's got silver in with the the rest of the ink which makes it highly conductive works really well when it dries it dries very quickly it stays conductive ages we haven't actually done a test on how long it stays but according to the circuit scribe guys got it's pretty much pretty much a very long time which is really really cool so it's not going to dry out on you in a couple of weeks and become unusable so in this kit we've got a couple of different modules and the idea of circuit scribe is that you have these modules which you connect together using the steel backing plates. So if I take this case off we've got a nice and large steel backing plate which these modules they have a magnetic connector so they simply snap on like that there's no soldering there's no are no mess any wire to worry about at all they all just clip on which is really cool this basic kit comes with six different modules you've got two different LEDs and expander connection module, a switch, really neat, power module, and transistor which you can use as an electronic switch, very very cool stuff so how exactly today I guess the big question that educators want to know is how do they bring something different to the table there's so much stem technology out that it could often feel like you're wading through you know through mountains of new stem products and technologies. Well something I really like about circuit scribe is that it simplifies the lower-level stuff it doesn't just cover it over and present it in a way that you know bypasses of any understanding of electronic components in a really really low discrete level on this module it's just an LED that you need to get using it to switch it you know a battery connector it's all this stuff that doesn't just bundle it in but it does it in a way that's real, really easy to get started you don't need to know anything previously about electronics you don't need to use any maths, any wires any special techniques you just draw the circuit which is really cool so a quick example we've got this they include a nice template which has all of the the footprints of the circuit scribe module so you can draw on there and the two kits the basic and the maker kits come with a really cool little workshop booklet so it's got some instructions what circuit scribe is I have units and tips and tricks we've got those are also an hour getting started with circuit scribe tutorial a bit about what voltages some of the electronic concepts are really handy for a teachers handbook as well they and get to know what you're dealing with and then it's got all these different example circuits a circuit scribe don't just leave you you know high and dry or left to your own devices to create lesson plans to create resources and content engaging material that's going to kids keep coming back with an interest in stem technology it's got all of these different circuits which by themselves could be a whole project or a whole afternoons technological based arts and crafts lesson and it's really cool but along with this example so you get over them it's got some challenge circuits which introduce something a little bit more hands-on and meaty but you can also create your own or go through exactly how easy that is.

So let's say you're doing you know an arts and crafts project and you want to you want to create a Christmas card for example so you could take all start by drawing our circuits we put our Steel backing plate underneath our paper up all right and we use the template to draw out the first a lot of tabs for our power module make sure it's nice and filled in that something really important so often while a lot of circuits won't work because there are gaps in the pad or it's not properly colored in something to watch out for so we've got our pads for our power module you can see that it'll just snap on clip-on they're super cool now what are we going to connect up to well let's look at connecting up perhaps some LEDs with an on/off switch something fairly simple. So first of all I'm going to put a plus and a minus on our circuit so we know which way is which connected up correctly although in beauty of circuits, circuit scribe, something I do love about it and I mentioned I went on about this in the getting started to talk I think it's super valuable there's a lot of attention to detail here where you've got you've got protection against accidental shorts you've got all this stuff which makes it really easy to get started particularly for educators so we've got a plus and a minus there and now we'll take our switch and we'll put this in series if the rest of our circuit, put it this way so it's a little bit easier to see what's going on so I'll draw our pad and this can apply to anything I'm just drawing a random circuit on some paper but you could use it to create a craft exercises Christmas card little paper series built using circuits crafts we've got a switch now.

So I want those two to connect so I just draw a nice thick trace connecting up the two of those now the LED modules are especially cool because they don't have a particular polarity that's required for them to work what this means is with a normal LED just discrete component you would have to put it a certain way in your circuit in order for it to correctly light up otherwise you can risk damaging the LED but there's actually two LEDs built into this one which allows current to flow one direction, one that allows currents flow in the other direction so all that happens is if you change the way it's connected in the circuit it changes colors really really cool so we'll add two of those in we can get two different colors in our circuits are from house that's going to be our switch or a little switch symbol so that I can move that stuff switch cool so from that two LEDs let's get one here then making sure to fill those pads in correctly and one here let's put another one right next to us we can create a few different colors so got one there one there awesome. I'm going to go and connect all of those up this doesn't require any special knowledge of you know of electronics or maths or any engineering anything like that it's a low-level product which makes it really easy to get started. I'm just connecting two LEDs up next to each other and it's got guidelines for how you can do this in the book and then we'll take this one connector all the way back to our power module ensuring it's got a nice white raise without any breaks in it all right cool so we'll put that on top about our steel sheet so the magnetic modules just attach we're going to put everything but the power module in so I can make sure that the circuits connected up correctly before I attach power. So this power module has a room for a 9-volt battery clip so go ahead and get that one sorted alright so we'll connect our battery up like that and attach our module ensuring that we've got the plus on the minus the right way so first of all we have to turn power on, so power is now on I have that little blue indicator letting me know, and there is another power on and there's another little LED here which is for short which means if something happens and you've shorted out your power module which can potentially damage anything it actually has a bit of protection to get that let me know with a nice bright red LED which is cool. So now we'll turn our switch on we've got our LEDs lighting up which is awesome if we need to reverse this one we can see this become red, if we reverse this one they just become blue and that's how easy it is to get started with circuit scribe in a classroom setting it's got everything you need pens you can use any paper you want I've used post-it notes for some circuits thank you there are really easy craft ideas the kids are going to love now Circuit Scribe is particularly useful for kids between the ages of I'd say 7 to 14 as a rough estimate but it's going to depend of course uniquely on the students some younger kids might just love it and really get a good grip on and some of the kids might find really unique and interesting ways to use some of the modules to create more complex and advanced circuits and projects.

So that's a few tips the future it's a few things we love about circuit scripts of course back to the kids I mentioned we've got the maker kit and the basic kit there's a bit of a price difference between them but if you're looking at which one's going to be better it really just depends on how many students you want to engage of it so as I said the maker kit has 11 modules per kit whereas the basic kit has six so there's a lot more depth to be had there and you can also break those modules up into two different groups but it allows for a really a really great collaborative learning environment I'd say one of the three kids is probably ideal in a group with Circuit Scribe because there's a limited amount that can be done at one time you've got you know drawing the circuit finding the modules but then you can also if you're in a group of three you can have a student creating you know perhaps creating a paper diorama to which you're going to attach the modules, someone figuring out what the circuit is going to do, another working on how you're going to connect all the traders up there's all these different problem solving challenges and tasks that come up when you explore the creativity with circuit scribe which is you know it's what it's all about so you get you get that other mentioned five additional pen plus a workbook or workbooks with the maker kit it's just the kids with me with the basic kit and as a rough guide I'd say ten to thirty students for the maker kit and perhaps ten to twenty students with the basic kit that's just a bit more depth that you get with us with those maker kids but that's that's circuits where we love it especially if it Eric eight better keep going on about a bit so so cool that such a fundamental part of electronics can be broken down into snappable magnetic bits and conductive ink it's really really awesome so educators, Circuit Scribe is fantastic I encourage you to try out perhaps grab one of our many kids or just a single basic you try it out see if it's going to work in your classroom and then as I said we've got those educational packs which are ready to go designed for classrooms, So I'll see you next time guys!