Over the last five years I’ve developed a vex curriculum for a project based Introduction to Robotics course. However, the powerpoints are still useful for anyone interested in picking up a concept like gear theory, or arm design.
There is a tried and true one semester unit plan, powerpoints, and assignments. The powerpoints are relatively simple, but they include lots of robot pictures and animations to illustrate concepts. Each project assignment includes instructions for an A, B, and C level challenge. Some weeks have seperate software and hardware challenges.
I don’t know how it compares to the Autodesk curriculum but its free and posted online at the following link.
I’ve tried several approaches, and I just started cleaning up and consolidating so everything is still in beta. Please let me know if you find anything useful or in need of correction. I need feedback before I decide if I should continue cleaning up my resources for online consumption.
I just went out and looked at most of your presentations and the one that you used for your source. I think that they all look great and would a very valuable and useful teaching aide for a robotics class or for a VEX team just getting started.
The only mistake that I saw was that you hadn’t updated the “encoders” to the new ones. In one of the presentations, I think the arm one, it showed the old encoders and mentioned that the encoders couldn’t provide information on the direction that a shaft was turning.
Other than that, I say great job! I wish that they had VEX robotics classes when I was in school.
I think this looks just like the Autodesk curriculum. You hit the same major areas (with the exception of the programming materials). I do recommend that you find some better graphics though.
If my free curriculum looks just like the curriculum created by a graphics/design company, I’m happy. What are you suggesting I update the graphics on: assignments, powerpoints, or the website itself?
I haven’t decided what to do with my programming materials yet. When I first started this I developed several assignments to teach students C with a free compiler and MPLab (should I post them?). Since then I’ve found that students understand algorithim design much better when they start with EasyC and integrate programming with building robots (hence the special software challenges as part of the assignments). I haven’t spent time developing more EasyC programming powerpoints since I’m not sure how long EasyC is going to be around.