makershala announcement speaker phone image
Join the Parent Board & enjoy exciting benefits. Details here
21st century parent parent of 8 to 16 years old kids parents of stem learners

Automatic crop irrigator - Solving problems of our farmers - brief

Samvit Smaran
Samvit Smaran
16 Oct, 23
Automatic crop irrigator -  Solving problems of our farmers - brief

Problem scenanrio : 

During irrigation, farmers frequently face a number of difficulties. They frequently run into the following issues:

Water needs that vary by crop: At different phases of growth, different crops have variable water needs. Farmers may find it difficult to balance the water requirements of various crops in a diversified agricultural environment, especially if water supplies are scarce.

Unpredictable weather patterns, such as erratic rainfall or unanticipated droughts, might cause irrigation plans to fail. Farmers must change their practises and schedules for irrigation in response to changing environmental circumstances.

Solution to the problem

This machine can water a single plant or, if it is designed for large-scale use, it may water a huge field.A few jumper wires were used to make the circuit connection, which was then perfectly sealed. It has a water tank inside of which water is stored before being pumped by the device to the plant. The water is sprayed across the field by a removable circular disc, which must be detached in order to water a specific plant. Additionally, the machine can be made movable using a joystick or by using AI as power. The device also features a PIR sensor and an ultrasonic sensor. The PIR sensor detects if someone approaches and alerts the farmer through buzzer to let him know. The ultrasonic sensor displays the distance to the plant.

Additionally, there is simulated part that allows us to notify the farmer of the temperature and humidity. The same Blynk console receives data from both the hardware and simulation. We also developed a smartphone dashboard for farmers to easily access.

The farmer can turn on manual watering by clicking on the button on the dashboard, and he can turn it off accordingly by viewing the soil moisture display gauge on the dashboard.

Our project will be containing 4 blogs

1st blog - Project brief

2nd blog - Simulation

3rd blog - Hardware 

 

 


Published by
TEAM

*As submitted by students on Makershala portal.
footer_svg

About Makershala

Makershala is a Learning by Making ecosystem for kids from age 8-16 to help them discover their interests, develop future skills and deepen conceptual understanding. Makershala follows the Project Based Learning approach as its way of teaching in which kids work on authentic, real life & personally meaningful projects.

Kids work on these projects in different educational settings, namely; self-learning; online 1:4 Peer to Peer with a mentor; or in a school. Projects are categorized in different interest segments like Robotics, Coding, Electronics, 3D Printing, Animations, Photography, Machine Learning, Astronomy and many more.

Each project is mapped with classroom concepts, 21st century skills, UN sustainable development goals and interests/careers to not only focus on holistic development of a child but help them identify their calling by giving them exposure to problems that exist in the real world.

Why Project-Based Learning

Project-Based Learning has the potential to solve many of the learning problems we see today beyond foundational literacy.

  • Ownership: Learners have complete ownership on what they need to know to solve a problem and come up with the best solution in the best way. It can be a concept or a software tool or a skill. Kids involved in projects are never required to be told to study.

  • Interdisciplinary: Unlike traditional learning where subjects are taught in silos and learners develop a perception of liking or disliking a subject. In project based learning, the given problem is supreme and it may require to know something from maths, science and history together.

  • Experiential learning: We generally retain 75% of what we do as opposed to only 5% of what we hear and 10% of what we read, hence PBL helps kids retain what they learn.

  • Lifelong learning: The most important gift that PBL gives to its learners is to make them lifelong learners as this is the most required skill to lead a good life, personally & professionally.

  • Skills & Knowledge balance: Project-based learning doesn’t focus too much on memorizing information, rather it equally demands practising life skills to be able to do better in projects.

How Makershala Works

  • Parents and Kids who wish to start their journey with Makershala, are suggested to pick one interest area of the child and then choose a plan.

  • Parents and Kids after enrolling in a course based on their interest are assigned a batch. Each batch has 3-4 learners and 1 mentor.

  • Each course has 6 guided projects and 1 challenge project.

  • During the project, formative assessments are conducted to evaluate learner’s knowledge & skills.

  • On completion of a project parents and kids get a learning report which indicates the skills and knowledge developed/displayed by them.

  • Kids also build their portfolio which showcases problems solved, solutions created, skills developed, knowledge acquired and technologies learnt.

  • Kids earn rewards in the form of badges, points and coins for their performance in a project, course and overall.

  • Kids are maneuvered to take up courses and projects from different learning segments to gain more clarity on their interests. This eventually helps them in picking up a career.