Electronic Textiles Workshop for Girls

I had the opportunity to attend a weekend workshop at University of Canterbury,  

which incorporated electronics and textiles and used a LilyPad microcontroller to code and design a circuit for  LED lights.
The objective of the course was to encourage girls to experience electronics combined with computer science, so they gain confidence and knowledge in these areas. This experience will hopefully open more learning opportunities and students will continue to explore these subjects in the future.

LilyPad  microcontroller

The workshop was provided by a group of visiting lecturers from Longwood University, United States.  Students that attended the workshop were from classes -  Years 7-13.

On the first night we planned and sketched our designs of what were going to make. The next day we cut our design from felt and stitched our circuit using the special conductive thread attaching the LilyPad controller and battery pack. We designed our ciruits for our LEDS and connected them at the positive with the conductive thread to separate pins on the LilyPad. Finally we completed the circuit by stitching all the negative LEDS together to the battery pack.

Above: Stitching the LEDS and components to the creation.

We used Arduino software on PC computer to programme each pin on the LilyPad to decide on time delay and order that they would light up. This was saved and then the LilyPad was connected to the computer to download to our creation.

The creation was then completed.

I used 6 LEDS in my mermaid design.



A  'Teddy' made by a Year 8 student - he has light up ears too!