LED Menorah

[Janathan]

     I am fairly new to LabVIEW and am thinking about teaching the CLAD course in the Oklahoma City area. I am half way through the LabVIEW core 1 and core 2 tutorials and I thought that it would be a good idea to stop and work on an actual project. Last year I volunteered my time with a group of friends from a local synagogue to replace the candles on our outside menorah with LED's. I gave them a number of options, including a LabVIEW program to control the LED's. Unfortunately they did not choose the LabVIEW approach, but after prototyping it I realized it was a great exercise which demonstrates the control of the digital outputs of a USB-6009. It is fairly similar to an existing example but I try to explain in some detail what the sub vi's do and discuss optional approaches to achieve a similar result. I also include a schematic and explanation of how to choose external resistors to achieve a desired current flow given the usb-6009 specification and basic electronic principals.  

      I am attaching a write-up along with the actual vi. If anyone has other simple projects to demonstrate the input/outputs of a daq device that can be used in a classroom setting I'd be interested in hearing from you.

[SteveChandler]

That is an excellent goal. No better way to learn than by teaching! But definately check with the NI Training And Certification center. I think you have to be a certified instructor in order to teach classes. From the link above:

NI Certified Professional Instructor (CPI) certification distinguishes individuals who are authorized to teach NI courses and ensures that a CPI meets professional standards when teaching these courses. Besides National Instruments engineers, CPIs are the only professionals authorized to teach NI courses, and they typically teach regional courses in an NI Authorized Training Center.

Edit: The reason I am suggesting that you contact them is because you may be able to teach "non NI courses" meaning your own training material. But give them a call.

[Janathan]

I have checked with the training department and I need to at least have my CLAD. It's a 40 multiple choice test which I'll take after reading the rest of the course materials. Before that I want to come up with a similar project to demonstrate the use of the analog output using an LED as well. With hardware to demonstrate analog and digital outputs I'll be able to visit local community colleges and votecs, make a presentation and make a proposal to see what kind of interest there is in the local school sponsoring a course in LabVIEW leading to certification. NI has been very supportive and supplied teaching materials including power points as well as example exercises. Although I would be interested in teaching NI LabVIEW courses throughout the country, I would be competing against developers with many years experience and since I only have 1 year under my belt in LabVIEW, I don't think I would get many invitations to teach. If I could arrange to teach at a local college it would mean steadier work. Plus if there were a great deal of interest it would provide the motivation I need to ramp up the effort, get certified and get teaching. Oh well that's the plan anyway! Thanks for your interest! I've read a lot of your posts! Keep up the good work!

[SteveChandler]

I think that with one year of development and a good understanding of what you have learned you should be able to teach the Core1 and Core2 classes. It is a great thing to persue! Thanks for clarifying NIs position on teaching classes. Although I don't have any ambition to teach I was always kind of unsure about the requirements.