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Course curriculum

  • 1

    Lesson Preview

    • Welcome to Reaction Time

  • 2

    Introduction

    • Intro to Reaction Time

    • What's Your Mission?

    • Let's get to know you!

  • 3

    Download the Booklet

    • Reaction Time Booklet (Optional Download)

  • 4

    Review the Hardware Components

    • Microcontroller Board and Components

    • Components You'll Need

    • Breadboard Basics

    • What's the Voltage?

  • 5

    Part 1 - Reaction Time Tester

    • Envisioning the Game

    • Setting Up the Board

    • Two Complete Circuits

    • Get the Arduino Code Editor

    • Test Your Board

    • Add This Optional Library (Windows and Mac Users)

    • Add This Optional Library (Chromebook Users)

    • Instructions For the Microcontroller

    • Setting Up the Pins

  • 6

    Part 1B - Programming the Reaction Time Tester

    • Break it Down

    • Program Design with Pseudocode

    • How to "Print" to the Screen

    • Creating a User-friendly Program

    • Avoiding the Infinite Loop

    • While Loops

    • Creating a Random Delay

    • We Need Random Numbers!

    • Keeping Track of Time

    • Estimating the Reaction Time

    • The "Do...While" Challenge

    • Waiting for the Button Press

    • The Last Few Steps

    • Calculating the Elapsed Time

    • Final Code for Part 1

    • Test Run! - Video

    • Test Run!

    • You Did It!

  • 7

    Part 2 - Test Your Reaction with Light Sensors

    • Introduction to Light Sensors

    • A New Mission and Circuit Revisions

    • Finding Your Threshold - Video

    • Choosing a Threshold

    • Updating Your Sketch

    • Code Revisions

    • Final Code for Part 2

    • Congratulations! Part 2 Complete!

  • 8

    Part 3 - A Two-player Reaction Time Game

    • Introduction to the Two-player Game

    • A New Mission and Board Setup

    • Interrupting Is Okay - Sometimes

    • Interrupts and the Winner

    • Code for Part 3 - Two Player Game

  • 9

    Congratulations!

    • Congratulations and Introduction to Challenges

    • Coding Challenges

    • We're excited for you to join us next time!

  • 10

    Glossary

    • Glossary

  • 11

    Reference Materials

    • Appendix 1 - Using the Ultrasonic Sensor