This week on "Let's Invent!" we teamed up with Strawbees to create chain reactions with everyday materials from home. Both Lindsay and Colleen were inspired to tinker with chain reactions at the start of the "stay at home" orders around the world because of a Twitter idea-spiration from The Tinkering Studio. 

We found the #RoundtheWorld_ChainReaction Challenge to be a great encouragement to keep learning through play at home. It's also a fun way to connect your ideas with the global community!

So grab your Makey Makey, a Strawbees set, and some household materials and join our silly and fun chain reactions below!

Lindsay's Track

She built a track with the classic Strawbees rollercoaster run using a ping-pong ball to roll with enough built-up energy to knock an aluminum ball down the pachinko form board to close a switch with the aluminum foil wires wired through the straws of the board. The aluminum ball was wrapped around coins inside, to create more weight for better contact of the aluminum foil switches to the ground. When the aluminum switch was closed a different sound played to represent a different random event each time in the Scratch animation. 

Here are some of the resources you can use to start building a track like Lindsay's example.

• STEAM School Kit 
• Robotic Inventions for micro:bit 
• #RoundTheWorld_ChainReaction Challenge from Tinkering Studio 
• How to make the Strawbees track and Rollercoaster Run 
• STL File to hold Makey Makey onto Strawbees inventions (Thank you Erik T for creating this!)

Colleen's Track

Colleen gamified the chain reaction by having her kids use a Strawbees grabber connected to Makey Makey to start a timer in Scratch. When the egg rolls into the egg drop, it stops the timer.  

I’m super excited to talk about #RoundTheWorld_ChainReactions in a playinar with @MaKeyLindsay and Erik from @strawbees tomorrow! (@wakeupsilver ) Here’s the @makeymakey / @Scratch mashup I worked on to share! #AtHome Registration link: https://t.co/DdA1twVXTo pic.twitter.com/lc78HlcIop

— Colleen Graves (@gravescolleen) April 27, 2020

• The Strawbees roller coaster track tutorial
• Mechanical Arm or Grabber
• Scratch Game for the Chain Reaction where Makey Makey starts and stops the timer.
• Switches designed for Strawbees- Tutorials coming soon! (Make sure to sign up for our newsletter to hear the news first!)

Erik's Track

Erik's track definitely showed the high ceiling example of chain reactions! He made so many elements, we aren't sure we can share them all, but here are some project ideas to help you build some of them!

• Quirkbot - Coding and Robotics Starter Kit 
• Quirkbot and Magnetic Feet- Creature Creator Kit
• Hovercraft Kit
• Catapult Project Details
• Robotic Crane Project Details
• micro:bit kit coming soon! (Or pre-order micro:bit Imagination Kit )

Resources Shared

This was a super active chat! It's one of the most fun reasons we love doing these webinars and live shows at Makey Makey. Here are a plethora of resources mentioned during the webinar.

• iPad Adapter - See the post for adapters we have tried
• Our previous blog post about chain reactions and an Instructables on creating Makey Makey switches for chain reactions. 
• Amazing Ok Go Chain Reaction Video (Youtube)
• Rube Goldberg's Granddaughter's Soap Challenge 
• Check out Jackie Gerstein's hypdoc on Rube Goldberg and Chain Reactions
• At Maker Faire San Mateo 2016 a group created a GIANT “mouse trap game."
• Chitty Chitty Bang Bang “breakfast machine!”  
• Greg Schwanke shared The Goonies as one of his favorites for sharing amazing machines.  
• Creative Learning Spiral from Mitch Resnick
• Facilitating Group Dynamics in Playful Learning Experiences- From Exploratorium
• Collaboration in the 21st century: Implications for Assessment 
• Our new classes for students learning "At Home"
• Makey Makey Teachers Hub on Instructables

Erik, our inventor sharing some insights why he thinks you should join our @makeymakey + @strawbees mashup, an interactive playinar creating some awesome #chainreactions - join us tomorrow, Tuesday, 28th April 10am EST/ 4pm CEAT - sign up https://t.co/oDscG8Dgvj pic.twitter.com/us2PMMHwvy

— Strawbees (@strawbees) April 27, 2020

For More Strawbees Inspiration

• For more activities: https://learning.strawbees.com/
• 10 days activities and more resources on our parent page: https://www.strawbees.com/learning-at-home
• For more Strawbees webinars part of the 'Making Connection Series': https://strawbees.com/professional-development

Yesterday we teamed up with @makeymakey for a #RoundtheWorld_ChainReaction Challenge, it was epic!!!! If you missed it, catch up here: https://t.co/GO3M5VZ6o4 pic.twitter.com/j6nMCaRc0w

— Strawbees (@strawbees) April 29, 2020

Upcoming Webinar!

Our next webinar will be in May and will feature a mashup of Makey Makey, Micro:Bit, and Scratch. Katie Henry and Colleen will share their ideas for creating gesture controlled wearables! A sign up link is coming soon! Make sure you are signed up for our newsletter catch the registration announcement!

Check out these gesture controlled wearables with Makey Makey and micro:bit in Scratch.

Keep an eye out for upcoming webinar with us in May#playdate with @gravescolleen
@makeymakey @microbit_edu @scratch pic.twitter.com/5D4dvk85cl

— Katie Henry (@KatieHenryDays) April 8, 2020