Tech Project 2: Circuit Art

I, like all of you, have been in full Summer Reading mode for the past couple of months.  I had about 40 teen programs all told, luckily all that's left other than my monthly clubs is the Wrap Up Party.

I've been doing more tech projects, at least one per newsletter cycle.  This time around I did Circuit Art, which was really fun even though the teens were a bit apprehensive at first.

What is Circuit Art?  Using paper and other stuff lying around (buttons, googly eyes), teens could make any type of picture they wanted and add LEDs to it.  Here's my sample:

Using a coin cell battery, conductive paint, and an LED I made a robot who learns to love when you pet his kitty.  In this case, the cat acts as the "switch" that makes the light turn on when it's connected to the battery.

This is the conductive paint product that we used: http://www.bareconductive.com/

I bought one tub, which was plenty for the 12 teens that showed up plus all of my practice projects.  So long as you're making smallish things one tub should be just fine. I have plenty leftover.  You can get LEDs cheaply wherever--mine were just found on Amazon. I bought a variety of colors.

This project was a little difficult, if only because the teens couldn't decide what to make.  Next time I will probably make it less open-ended and have a basic project ready to go--for example, we'd ALL make robots or something.  Still, we had some cute projects in the end, including one TARDIS with working light!  Fun Fact:  All the girls finished functional projects, and none of the boys did. Heh.