Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Animate Stories With Neopixel Ring and LightLogo

I've been trying out the Neopixel Ring-24, a ring of 24 RGB LEDs easy to plug in to an Arduino. Instead of using the Adafruit neopixel Arduino library I'm beta-testing LightLogo, a new IDE for the Neopixel and Arduino to write programs in Logo. This can make a really beautiful device with its rich colors more accessible to younger
children. Josh Burker has a nice introduction to using LightLogo that can show you how to get started.
I thought about how to use this in the context of children telling stories. One central idea with Logo is the turtle that acts as an object you give instructions to do things. In this case the turtle is a white LED you tell where to go on the ring and what colors to leave behind or take away as it moves around. So I thought about connecting that with the common ELA practice of using graphic organizers for young writers and having the turtle move from one part to the next of a diagrammed story to help tell it, animating each part along the way.
Here is a video of my own model version illustrating the idea:

The program in full is down below but I want to point out an important aspect of it. The first procedure, called "startup," is like a roadmap to the whole story. Just like the ring story diagram, it contains all parts of the story in one place, also sort of like a table of contents. The flow of the program jumps from the startup procedure to each story sub-procedure in sequence:

to startup
reset wait 4000
tent
reset pu fd 4 wait 4000
stove
reset pu fd 8 wait 4000
campfire
reset pu fd 12 wait 4000
marshmallows
reset pu fd 16 wait 4000
raccoons
reset pu fd 20 wait 4000
raccoon-face
end
The main events in the story drawn in the diagram become commands in the program; tent, stove, campfire, marshmallows, raccoons, and raccoon-face. I need to discuss this with an English teacher to find out more about the value of this in learning to write, but my sense is it could provide valuable connections for students in planning their writing.
Here is the whole program:
to startup
reset wait 4000
tent
reset pu fd 4 wait 4000
stove
reset pu fd 8 wait 4000
campfire
reset pu fd 12 wait 4000
marshmallows
reset pu fd 16 wait 4000
raccoons
reset pu fd 20 wait 4000
raccoon-face
end

to tent
setc green
repeat 10 [
pd
fd random 0 6
wait 500
pe
bk random 0 6
wait 500
]
pd
fd 5
end

to stove
setpos 6
pd
setc blue
fd 12
wait 2000
setc yellow
fd 12
wait 2000
end

to campfire
pd
setc orange
repeat 25 [
setpos random 0 24
stamp
wait 100
]
end

to marshmallows
pd
all white
wait 1000
repeat 30 [
pe
setpos random 0 24
stamp
wait 100
]
end

to raccoons
pd
setbrightness 5
setc white
repeat 7 [
fd 1
wait 500]
wait 1000
end

to raccoon-face
setbrightness 20
pd
setc white
repeat 40 [
setpos random 0 24
stamp
wait 100
]
end

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