Teaching hands-on engineering with remote robotics

Virtually Maker Faire 2020

May 22nd-23rd

When I was told I would need to teach from home, my first reaction was "how in the world am I going to move my engineering courses online?" Well, as you have probably also discovered, this has been no easy task. Fortunately, I have had a lot of success creating a system of web-enabled robots that my students can control from anywhere in the world.

Each year I have my students design and construct unique laser cut & 3D printed Sumo fighting robots, but since everyone went home back in March, I wasn't able to finish the lesson. Instead of throw in the towel, I had my students design 3D-printable attachments for a standardized robot chassis, which I printed out at home (24 in total). The robots were controlled over UDP and the students could remotely drive their robots during our Zoom classes. All I needed to do was port-forward a handful of ports on my network and my students from Spain, China, and across the US were able to compete. Everything runs on ESP8266, costs ~$20/robot, and was a ton of fun.

Join me for an in-depth look into how we can keep Tech Ed & Engineering education alive while stuck at home!