Sample IT Activities (Secondary Schools)

Advanced Drone Coding Capstone Project

Objective:
Drone is now widely applied in many industries and reforming human's practice significantly. This programme aims to teach students about the science and engineering knowledge of drone, as well as to enable them to control a drone and even programme it to complete different tasks up to advanced level.

Description:
The workshop is composed of 3 parts: theoretical session, practical session, and challenge session. Scientific information and engineering concept would be introduced in the theoretical part to let students have more understanding of aerospace science and industries. In the practical session, students would build the drone model to be familiarise with the structure and design of the drone, and learn the zone measurement of dimensions and area with aerial photogrammetry.

Afterward, students would learn how to control the drone using self-developed programmes on the drone SDK.

In the challenge session, an intra-class competition (or intra-school if more classes would take the course) will be organised for students to apply the knowledge practically. The task will be programming the drone to include getting the most accurate information of zone measurement, choreographing a drone performance that autonomously synchronise with music, control of multiple drones at the same time, design of innovative applications, etc.

Hardware	Programmable drones PC / laptop / tablet computer with Internet connection
Software	Drone SDK / APIs Common programming languages like Scratch / Javascript / C# / Python / Java / C++ / Swift
Major Activities	Theoretical session (1 session; 2 hours) Students will learn the scientific knowledge of aerospace science and also learn the flying principle of plane and helicopter. Other topics must include ethics, privacy, safety and related regulations, etc. (Some useful reference: https://www.cad.gov.hk/english/unmanned_aircraft_systems.html www.pcpd.org.hk/english/resources_centre/publications/files/GN_CCTV_Drones_e.pdf) Practical session (3 sessions; 2 hours each) Drone model making Build the drone model to learn the science of flying and engineering process Drone control and programming Learn the technique of controlling drone and basic coding knowledge Multiple drones control and programming Learn the technique of controlling multiple drones and advanced coding knowledge Geometry & trigonometry for drone programming Measure the dimensions and area of selection area with aerial photogrammetry Challenge session (1 session; 2 hours) Every 2-3 students will form a team to take the challenge. The challenge will require teams to program a drone to do various tasks in the shortest time
Learning Objective(s)	Understanding of science and technology of aerospace and flight science Understand the engineering process Acquire knowledge of coding and computational thinking Applying knowledge of geometry & trigonometry Enhance problem-solving skills Co-operation with other teammates Understand the technology application
Duration	4 sessions of workshop (2 hours each) and a 2-hour challenge
Difficulty	Medium - Hard
Target Level	S3 - S6
Target No. of Students	About 20 students per class