Unlike Brian, I have no formal background in electronics or computer programming; I am completely self-taught. I learned Arduino so that I could give my students access to a technology they could control and build with. I was a middle school technology teacher asked to dream up a shop class for the 21st century. Electronics was part of that vision, and over a three-year process, Arduino (and, later, the Processing language) took center stage in my classroom. I learned electronics and programming so that I could teach it in my class.
Many of these projects come directly from my classroom experience teaching Arduino. My students learned computer science and electronics out of necessity, in order to develop their ideas rather than have a teacher telling them “because you need to.” I hope that my contribution to this book honors my students and puts electronics and programming into a format that sparks your imagination.