Hour of Code - September 2019

Hour of Code for September turned into a Flowlab session!  We're getting a sneak preview of what's to come at the end of September for our Flowlab Video Game Creator class.

Sign up!

Robot Club September 2019

PNG is back!  With the summer session over and school starting up it's time for PNG Fall!  A brand new slate of classes lined up and a brand new session of Robot Club with some fresh new faces!

We assembled our VEX robotics kits and now it's time to code them to do our bidding!

PNG Fall 2019

Robot Club: Tuesdays 4pm

9/3

10/1

11/12

Interested in robotics?  Join our monthly robot club to learn how to use our Vex Robotics kit and form our very own Library Robotics Team!

Hour of Code: Thursdays 4pm

9/5

10/3

Not only is coding massively important to the fabric of our digital world, but it can also be pretty fun!  Sign up for this quick introduction to activities on Code.org and play fun games while learning the fundamentals of basic coding then try your hand on some of our programmable robots!

September

4pm - 5pm

Photoshop Poster Design (3-part) 9/10 - 9/17

Lights, Camera, Action!  Let's write a script, shoot some footage and edit it into a movie.

Flowlab Video Game Creator (3-part) 9/19 - 9/26

Try your hand at making a simple video game using Flowlab!

October

4pm - 5pm

Soldering (4-part) 10/8 - 10/17

Learn how to solder electronics!  We'll teach you how to handle a soldering iron and soldering safety, how to assemble components on a circuit board and everything else you need to know to bring electronics to life!

3D Printing & TinkerCAD (4-part) 10/24 - 11/7

Learn to create 3D models and print them out on the Makerbot Replicator!  This class will teach you the basics of 3D design and how to use Tinkercad.com to create 3D objects that can be printed on any 3D printer.

Create-A-Ghost 10/31

Create a ghost in the library using everyday materials like packing tape, cling wrap and LEDs.

November

4pm - 5pm

Paper Signals with Google (4-part) 11/14 - 11/26

Combine creativity and technology in this fun program that utilizes vinyl cutting technology and natural artistry to create cool art!

Negative Space Art - Day 2

Today was the last day of the session! Now that school has started back up, all the students had a lot of pent up anger to release onto canvas. After painting over our vinyl, we (not so) patiently waited for the paint to dry and then peeled off our vinyl to reveal our awesome art!! Check them out!

Negative Space Art - Day 1

Who doesn't love some homemade (or library-made) art? We are dusting off our vinyl cutters and creating our own silhouette art on our appropriately named software, Silhouette Studios! We did a quick image search for some cool designs, cut them on to vinyl, and slapped them on a canvas. On Thursday, we will channel our inner Renaissance and paint our canvas. When we peel away our vinyl cling, we will be left with some awesome art!

The Great Egg Drop!

We are reviving an old fan-favorite PNG program: The Great Egg Drop! Our students had an hour to design an enclosure for an egg that would ensure its survival when thrown off of our roof using miscellaneous tools such as straws, balloons, cups, and newspaper. We got our engineering on and the results were no yolk.

Robot Club

We're back at it today with more robot building! We now have two "fully" built robots. One needed some syncing configuration and the other needed some screw and motor adjustments. We'll use this blog entry to record our progress so we can look back and fix all of our mistakes next month!

TinkerCAD - Day 4

It is the last day! We wrapped up and put the final touches on all of our designs and got them downloaded as STL files and sent them off to the 3D printer. In a couple of hours, our designs will be brought into the physical realm 

TinkerCAD - Day 3

At this point, everyone should have at least one design they can work hard on up until the last day. We've gotten some preliminary prints done and with some experience under our belt now, we can continue updating and improving our designs and taken what we've learned onto new designs!

TinkerCAD - Day 2

Today was the 2nd day of TinkerCAD.  We learned the basics and now it's time to design something cool!  Students are working on some cool designs that we can't wait to see finished!

TinkerCAD- Day 1

It is that time of the year again! Time for another TinkerCAD class...and a full one, too. We got some newcomers learning the ropes of 3D design and we cut some veterans loose right away so they could get started with their designs. We're excited to see how these prints turn out!

Hour of Code

We had another large coding session today! We all improved our coding skills on code.org, where we learned about if-then commands, repeat loops, and the importance of clean and efficient coding. We'll be back next month for another Hour of Code class

Robot Club

It is robot time again! We continue on building our 2nd Clawbot while doing some troubleshooting on the one that is already built! We had a newcomer  so we did some
referring back to old blog posts. These blog posts are also used as journal entries to remind ourselves of our progress when we dust off the robots next month.

The Bot is looking pretty good so far!

Movie Making: The Final Day!

We wrapped up editing today! After a grueling day of chopping up and throwing Chroma and Green Screen Keys on our raw footage, we got to add the elements of a film that bring out the magic! We added everything from wand dueling noises to car crashes to even a film score! One group finished a short film and the other a movie trailer. Check them out...

TinkerCAD: Special Edition (Part Two!)

Today was the other group's turn to take a crack at 3D printing! The Summer Academy students got some lessons on our CAD software, TinkerCAD. They learned how to move and adjust the workplane and objects, create holes, scale objects....the works! They get to pick up their keychain/nameplate designs necxt time they come to the library!

Movie Making: Day 4

All of the movies have been shot and now it's time to edit!  Can't wait to see the finished movies!

Movie Making: Day 3

Today is the 3rd day of movie making.  We had two groups finish principle photography for their movies and are now ready to start editing.  One other group is about to start filming in our PNG Studio B location!

With today, next Thursday and the Thursday after to work on our movies odds are pretty good that we might end up with some pretty great videos!

TinkerCAD: Special Edition

We had a very special TinkerCAD class today with the Mr. Fryer's Summer Academy students.  The kids learned the basics of TinkerCAD and created their very own name plate/key chain!  We'll get the 3D printers in the Next Gen Lab running and start printing out all of their cool creations for them to pick up the next time they're in the library!

Movie Making: Day 2!

While everyone started finishing up their scripts, we went ahead and started shooting scenes for the group that were already done! All of the planning that went into the last day is coming in handy; we're using our storyboards and scripts to shoot as efficiently as possible. We are about 50% shooting two movies and throughout the next two classes we'll wrap up shooting and prepare for the grueling editing process...

Movie Making - Day One!

Today was the first day of movie making here at Project Next Generation!  It's always tough to stare at a blank page with endless possibilities and try to figure out what kind of story to tell, but the faster we write a script and cast our movie, the faster we can get to shooting scenes and editing footage!