Makey Makey

Makey Makey

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A Makey Makey Drum Kit produced by another group of students in the DL Specialism.

A Makey Makey xylophone produced by another group of students in the DL Specialism.

A Makey Makey Piano produced by my group.

Makey Makey really opened my eyes to what interactive technology really is. I learned that we could use it to play games as a controller rather than the keyboard; I learned we could make an instrument out of virtually anything once we used conductive materials or combined conductive and non-conductive materials. Most fruits and vegetables work well as conductors, as you can see from me and Arlene’s Pacmac experiment using tomatoes. We used the tomatoes as the controls up, down, left and right and used our hand as earth. It worked really well and was so fun to figure out. Other items that were used or could have been used as conductors were foods such as marshmallow, haribo or gummy sweets, cupcakes. Plants also were suggested as good conductors through their leaves and flowers but moist not dry plants. Play-doh also works a treat or moist clay. I was surprised to find out that we people are conductive. Foil and metals such as coins, magnets, nuts, bolts, forks, knives, pots or pans would be the better known conductors.

A video of our completed piano.

As you can see from our creation of a piano, literally anything goes. We made our piano from cardboard, paper, black marker and tinfoil. The cardboard, paper and black marker were used for aesthetic purposes however the tinfoil was used as our conductor in order for our piano to play the musical notes when they come into contact with earth which in our case we choose our index finger.

The basic frame of our Piano made from non conductive materials.

Our piano with the conductive tinfoil and alligator clips attached.

Our finished piano.

I also learned how important it is to be prepared for Makey Makey. The teacher must supply all the materials and ensure they have a mixture of conductive materials and non conductive materials, the Makey Makey packs and most importantly tools for cutting, like scissors, knife and also ways to stick things together, like superglue or pritt-stick, various types of types and clips or clamps.

Scissors, glue and other materials used to make our Makey Makey instruments.

These materials could be used for a multitude of things in the classroom. The two main ways we used them in our lectures were to act as the controller for a game e.g. Pacman or Super Mario and Brothers but also to design, create and play our own instruments. Makey Makey can be derived for almost anything once there is some sort of conductive material used within the project. Which can be seen in our two projects as the tomatoes act as the controls for the Pac-man game and tinfoil acts as the buttons to come into contact with so the desired sound will play.

Tomatoes connected to the circuit board using extension clips.

A full view of how it is attached to the circuit board.

All four tomatoes connected and ready to act as the controls up, down, left and right.

Me playing Pacman online using the tomatoes as the controllers.

Makey Makey has links to Science Primary School Curriculum and also to a lesser extent the Music and Art. Primary School Curriculums. It can be linked to Science through the Strand: Energy and Forces, Strand Unit: Magnetism and Electricity and Strand: Materials and Strand Unit: Materials and Change.

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to work with children on the Makey Makey project as it ran towards the end of the semester however, we could definitely incorporate it into many different curriculum areas, strands and stand units on teaching practice as you can see from above. I feel the children would absolutely love Makey Makey as it involves them becoming creative and exploring everyday items such as tomatoes, cardboard, tinfoil and paper in our case and using these items to be able to play a game or produce an instrument which produces music. It is a very exciting project which I enjoyed immensely and children would too, it’s interactive, hands- on, requires good team work, exploration and experimentation without even going into how it would help children understand conductors and their purpose.

Another video of me playing Pacmac using the tomatoes as controllors.

I learned that in order for Makey Makey to work sufficiently it must be plugged into the computer and a red light should appear on the back to indicate that the power is on. One alligator clip must be connected to earth. When you use it with a conductive material an LED light should appear at the front of the circuit board. I learned that I really enjoy working with my hands and getting hands on with a project or task. I loved the fact that we were left in the deep end as to how the Makey Makey kit works in the first session. Through good class relations we each figured out one bit and we passed on the tip to the rest of the class and in no time we were all up and running using different conductors to play different online games in pairs. I learned how exciting it is to be able to replace something such as a keyboard of a computer with an innovative replacement such as tomatoes. I learned how we are so use to routine that it was quite difficult at first to discipline myself to ignore the computer keyboard and use the tomatoes because of a force of habit. I also was thinking too much about it and as a result Pacman kept reaching me initially and eating me before I pressed up, down, left or right successfully. However, both Arlene and I weren’t long getting into the spirit of things and we were playing against each other to see who could get the highest score, which in the end Arlene won by 2 points. It was really fun to try and strip back the knowledge I had of the computer keyboard and apply it to a completely different type of controls e.g. the tomatoes. I also learned how to download a certain sound onto the correct tinfoil circle on our musical keyboard so that when played we could press it with the earth finger and we could sequence an actual song. I learned about loads of different apps which work side by side with Makey Makey to enhance the users learning experience. We used the Makey Makey piano app and sound effects app when creating our piano and syncing the tinfoil circles with sounds.

Another groups final performance.