Hi all, not sure exactly where to put this question, so if a moderator feels it should be elsewhere, please do move it accordingly.
Iv'e just been roped into helping my local youth center with arduino activity's. I.E; teens between 12 - 17 yrs of age, some with great computer skills, very limited electronics skills.
Due to the age range and skill set likely involved, i'm basing the activity's on the Uno/Nano, will possibly have a couple of mega 2560's in the mix too. Other devices for them to use will be numerous sensor boards and a couple of 2x16 LCD displays / 12864 LCD's, along with some servo's and basic motorized platforms for bot's. Obviously i'll have the usual range of LED's / 7 segment displays / resistors / PB switches / small value capacitors, but i'm sort of lost on which IC's I should bring.
I'm also acutely aware i'm probably going to end up with a few popped caps and some burnt out components.....
So the big question I have today is "what are the top 5 must have IC's for beginners with arduino and electronics ?"
If anyone has some suggestions of their own ( Top 5 IC's list ) or additional IC's I should consider, please do drop a comment in. Iv'e got 3 weeks to get it all together, I have all of the equipment on hand and loads more but that's where i'm getting lost, I don't want to needlessly haul my entire electronics workstation down to the youth center every weekend.
I see little value in the 555 unless your aim is just to show how much simpler it is to do things with an Arduino
I can see some value in illustrating how a shift register can extend the number of I/O pins - but I wonder if that is a bit too advanced. The list of stuff in your 3rd paragraph will take a long time to get through and I don't think I would dilute the learning of that stuff just to cover a shift register.
I don't know the difference between the two shift registers you mention but the same comment applies, but even more so.
The ULN2003 would be useful (essential) if you are using it to drive an 48BYJ stepper motor. Otherwise I don't think I would bother, for the same reason.
As an alternative, I reckon it would be valuable to stress how the Arduino I/O pins have very limited current capacity and how a simple transistor circuit can be used to allow it to control a larger current. That could provide a lead-in to the existence of chips that make the use of transistors simpler without needing to spend any time discussing those chips.
I don't see any mention of a h-bridge for driving a DC motor - that would be high on my list.
For the more capable I'd suggest some kind of I2C peripheral. Maybe one to drive an LCD serially rather than the usual parallel way. Or, something like a MCP23017 with two 8-bit ports or an I2C variable resistor.
I dunno; I rarely have a need to attach external ICs to an Arduino. Functions seem to divide into the "simple enough to do in code" and "complex enough to get their own module or shield.
Interfacing to chips outside the arduino range would be one frequent reason - optoisolators might be a good idea, and maybe level-shifters and high-current drivers. Some Op-amps and/or Arduio amps?
I'd tend to add an H-bridge driver onto that list, something to let one control DC motors. That sort of thing is particularly good at attracting interest.
DS3231 RTC, readily available cheap from Ebay as a breadboard version, this teaches I2C, introduces the concept of RTCs, can also be used to demonstrate interrupts on rising/falling edges by outputting a 1Hz square wave from the DS3231. All the cheap Ebay boards usually incorporate an EEPROM chip as well as a bonus.
This also brings in discussion about crystals and oscillators and accuracy expressed as PPM and what that means in reality.
