MGA Workshop Classroom: From Bionic Hands to Brainwave Headsets, Young Scientists Are Creating the Future

Inside Our NeuroMaker Program

This semester, 5th and 8th graders completed the NeuroMaker Neuroscience Curriculum, exploring how the brain and nervous system function and connect to modern technology. Students created individual portfolios on Google Sites documenting their learning process and discoveries.

Project 1: NeuroMaker Arm Assembly

Students built a bionic robotic arm from scratch. Student Abigail drew parallels between mechanical and human anatomy:

"The servo motors act as muscles and rotate to create movement...tendons in the hand connect muscle to bone and cause movements."

Project 2: Rock Paper Scissors Coding

Emma programmed a NeuroMaker robotic hand using mBlock to play rock-paper-scissors. She identified a design problem and proposed a solution:

"We used the 'Wave' movement to represent 'Paper.'"

Emma systematically documented mBlock code categories including control codes, event codes, variables, motion blocks, and sensing blocks.

Project 3: Headband Attention Level

Vincent conducted an independent BCI (Brain-Computer Interface) experiment using an EEG headband and micro:bit. His findings showed that ping-pong uses less focus than Wordle™, based on recorded focus levels of 30–50 versus 40–90 respectively.

Key Competencies Demonstrated

Students exhibited interdisciplinary thinking, scientific inquiry, problem-solving skills, and professional communication abilities across biology, engineering, and computer science fields.