We are all makers
(From the MAKE Flickr pool)
Kevin Osborn used an Arduino, an Adafruit motor shield, and an infrared proximity sensor from SparkFun to create a hypnodisk for kids to interact with.
I did a presentation on makers for our elementary school’s Science Discovery Week. I have done a lot of projects but wanted to do some that would particularly appeal to my 4th grade audience. The hypno disk is a dvd with a hypno pattern glued on. It’s attached to a CD-ROM spindle motor attached to an arduino with Adafruit’s motor shield. I used a Sharp infrared rangefinder to make the hypno spin faster as you got closer. If you got too close it reverses direction.
The kids loved it, it was almost like watching a dance as they got closer, and farther away, reaching out to block the sensor, and generally interacting. Exactly what I wanted!