Book Image

Build and Code Creative Robots with LEGO BOOST

By : Ashwin Shah
Book Image

Build and Code Creative Robots with LEGO BOOST

By: Ashwin Shah

Overview of this book

LEGO BOOST is a feature-rich creative toolbox that helps kids to develop science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) skills in a fun way. The LEGO BOOST kit consists of motors, sensors, and more than 840 LEGO pieces to bring various multifunctional robots to life. This book will take you on an interesting and enjoyable journey where you will have fun building robots while developing your problem-solving and logical thinking skills. This book is an end-to-end guide that will take you from a beginner to expert level of robot building with LEGO BOOST and Scratch. Starting with the unboxing and a brief introduction to LEGO BOOST, you'll quickly get your first robotic model up and running. You'll understand how to use the electronic and non-electronic components and have fun building a range of intriguing robotics projects with increasing complexity and advanced functionality. Throughout the book, you'll work on a variety of amazing projects, such as building your own R2D2, a fictional character from Star Wars, that will pique your curiosity to learn robotics and help you explore the full potential of the LEGO BOOST kit. Once you've had fun working with the projects, you'll be introduced to an interesting challenge for you to solve by yourself! By the end of this book, you'll have gained the skills to build creative robotics projects with the LEGO BOOST creative toolbox, and have built on your logical thinking and problem-solving skills.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
14
Bonus Chapters

The difference between machines and robots

You might have come across the question "How do you differentiate between a machine and a robot?" Let's try to understand this with a simple example of a fan and an air conditioner.

Imagine how a fan works. When you turn on the switch, the fan starts working, and when you turn off the switch, the fan stops working. In a simple statement, a fan takes an input (turn on/off the switch) and directly gives us an output (it either starts moving in a clockwise direction in the on condition or stops working when the switch is off).

A machine is something that takes an input and directly gives you an output. Can you think of at least four such machines in and around you and write them down?

Names of the machines around you:

The following figure represents the input and output mechanism in a fan:

Figure 1.1 – Input/output mechanism of a fan

Now, let's try to understand how an air...