HAPPY NEW YEAR
2019

It’s hard to believe that our first year of STEM investigations has come to an end.  Over the past twelve months, we stocked our STEM Lab with all sorts of cool gadgets and supplies, we exposed dozens of kids to the world of electronics with our paper circuit designs, and we sponsored a local charity race in hopes of introducing even more kids to the incredible world of STEM activities.

So much has happened in the past year we thought a Year in Review post would be enjoyable.  Our investigations included a variety of topics, from electronics to coding.  We had incredible successes and mind-boggling glitches.  Whether an investigation was a success or not, our goal was always to investigate STEM projects for you, saving you both time and money.  We hope we met our goal.

Most Popular 2018 Investigations

Thanks to a visitor traffic plug-in, we know that our Valentine Paper Circuits and Scratch Programming posts were the most popular in 2018.

1. The Case of the Broken Valentine Circuit (Valentine Paper Circuits)
2. The Scratch Programming Mystery (Part 1)
3. The Scratch Programming Mystery (Part 2)

Note:  On January 2, 2019, Scratch 3.0 was officially released.

This next generation of Scratch includes new sprites, a new sound editor, and new programming blocks.  Plus, your kids will now be able to create and use their projects on their tablets.

As exciting as these updates sound, what has our curiosity piqued are the new extensions that allow you to control hardware.  We can’t wait to see whether or not these extensions work with any of our Scratch programmable robots.

2018 Glitches

Our first investigative glitch was in The Case of the Fidgety Art Bot (An Art Bot With a Twist). In spite of the glitch, this investigation was a lot of fun.  Our design was a sturdier, cooler looking Art Bot that created awesome artwork.  Unfortunately, the fidget spinners couldn’t handle the constant vibrations from the motor.  The caps covering the ball bearings couldn’t hold up to the rigorous wobbling movements.  We solved this problem with a glue gun, but this fix wasn’t ideal, especially for a classroom setting.

If you’re interested in Art Bots you should also check out The Case of the Classy Art Bot (An Art Bot for the Classroom Setting).

Our second investigative glitch was in our Runaway Battery Train investigation, which is now on our 2019 To Do List.  We used a single battery, some neodymium magnets, and bare copper wire to build our battery train.  Seeing the train as it raced through the copper wire was amazing, but we could only get the train working on short tracks.  We needed to figure out why so many people, including us, were having trouble getting the battery trains to work on longer tracks.

We started testing several theories behind this issue, but time was not on our side.  With the first of the month approaching fast, we turned our attention to our homopolar motor investigation and posted The Spinning Copper Contraption Mystery (A Homopolar Motor) instead.  But our battery train investigation is only paused, it has not been canceled.

STEM Detective Lab Favorite

Here at STEM Detective Lab, programmable robots are never far from our thoughts.  If we had to pick a favorite investigation, The Case of the Mysterious Robots would have to be at the top of the list.

Goals for 2019

We’re still trying to figure out where 2018 went.  We posted a new investigation each month, but we weren’t able to complete our blog’s layout.  In addition to enjoying our monthly investigations, we hope you check out the following improvements.

» Kid’s Corner – Our goal has always been to have a spot where your kids can find something new each month.  Whether it’s a new Scratch programming challenge or a word search puzzle to coincide with our current month’s investigation, we hope to have something your kids can look forward to.

» Teacher’s Lounge -We are currently looking into designing a Teacher’s Lounge where you can find additional materials to use in your classroom.

» Scratch 3.0 – With the release of Scratch 3.0 on January 2, 2019, we need to do a follow-up investigation into the new Scratch features and extensions.

» Robots – Our long-term project is to finish expanding on our robot investigation, The Case of the Mysterious Robots.  We want to add additional videos of our robots in action and include screenshots for the programming options available with these robots.  We also plan on adding information on any new robots we purchase during 2019.

We’ve learned a lot over the last year, and we have a long list of investigations to check out.  With any luck, we’ll also have time to improve our site as we investigate our way through 2019.