Youth Tech Series · AI & Electronics
Touch the World,
Talk to Code
Use Claude to build three fun electronics toys on your laptop — then bring them to life with a banana.
Chan Meng
AI & Electronics Workshop · SheSharp × Peyvand Academy × Ministry of Education
13 June 2026 · Fruitvale Primary School, Auckland
Welcome to the AI and Electronics Workshop, run by SheSharp with Peyvand Academy and the Ministry of Education. In the next 20 minutes we will build three little gadgets together, mixing the two things this workshop is about: a bit of electronics and a bit of AI. We will ask an AI called Claude to write them for us. By the end you will have toys you can play with your keyboard now, and with a banana in a few minutes. No coding experience needed.
First things first
Get online —
join the school WiFi
You will need internet to reach claude.ai. Connect your laptop or phone to one of the Fruitvale School networks below.
Recommended · internet for phones & devices
Password
Fru1TsTB@S1c
FRUITVALE Student · laptops needing server access
Password
Fru1TsTuD3nT
Passwords are case-sensitive — type them exactly, including the capital letters, numbers, and the @ symbol.
Before we touch any code, get everyone online — nothing today works without it. Put this slide up and read the recommended password out loud, character by character: capital F, r, u, the number one, capital T, s, capital T, capital B, the at sign, capital S, the number one, lowercase c. Remind them it is case-sensitive, which trips people up. The student network is the backup for any laptop that needs server access. Once the room can load claude.ai, move on. Do not start building until most hands are connected.
Big idea
What is the
Internet of Things?
It is just everyday objects that can talk to computers. You already use them every day.
01Your phone
Knows when you tilt or tap it.
02A smartwatch
Counts your steps and heartbeats.
03Smart lights
Turn on when you walk in.
04A game controller
Turns your moves into the game.
Real worldyou touch / move
→
Signala little message
→
Computerreads the message
→
It actssound, light, game
Keep this plain. The Internet of Things is everyday things connected to computers. Point at the four cards. Then walk the bottom strip left to right: something happens in the real world, it becomes a signal, the computer reads it, and the computer does something back. That loop is the whole idea. We are about to build the simplest possible version of it — three times.
The electronics part
Meet Makey Makey
— and its secret
A little board that turns a banana, some foil, playdough, or even your hand into a button.
Its secret: it pretends to be your keyboard.
So any app that works with keys already works with bananas. That means we can build our toys and play them today with just the keyboard — no board needed yet.
↑
↓
←
→
Space
W
A
S
D
F
G
This is the heart of the talk. Hold up the board if you have one. Makey Makey does one clever trick: to the computer it looks exactly like a keyboard. Touching a banana is the same as pressing the Space bar. These are the keys it can send. Because of that secret, we do not need the hardware to start. We can build our toys now and test them with the keyboard, and later the very same toys will work when you clip on a banana. Nothing in the code has to change.
The AI part
Meet Claude,
our AI builder
You do not need to know how to code. You ask Claude what you want, in plain English, and it writes the app for you.
A
Free in your browser
Open claude.ai and sign in for free. Nothing to install — great on school laptops.
B
Watch it build live
As Claude writes, your app appears in a preview panel beside the chat. That panel is called an Artifact — click it and play straight away.
Open claude.ai now. We will build three toys together — typing the words live each time.
Reassure them: you are not expected to write code. You describe what you want and Claude writes it. Tell them to open claude.ai in the browser and sign in — the free plan is enough and there is nothing to install, which is ideal on school laptops. The key thing to show: when Claude writes a web app, it renders live in the Artifact preview panel right next to the chat, so you see and play your toy immediately. Get everyone to claude.ai now. We are about to build three toys in a row, and they type the prompt with me each time.
Build 1 of 3 · Music●○○ Easy
A Banana Piano
The warm-up: press a key, hear a note, watch a big button flash. Type this with me.
Type this into Claude
Make a fun web-page piano. When I press Space, the arrow keys, or W A S D F G, play a different musical note and flash a big colourful button for that key. Make it work with a normal keyboard.
Read the prompt out loud slowly while everyone types it into Claude. Keep it exactly this short — it is enough. Stress the last sentence, make it work with a normal keyboard, because that is what lets them play it without the board. Press enter and watch the Artifact panel build the piano live. Play a few keys so the room hears it. If anyone falls behind or the network is slow, open the finished piano with the orange button — it always works. This first build is the longest because you are also teaching the rhythm of ask, watch, play.
Build 2 of 3 · Memory●●○ Medium
A Memory Game
A step up: now the app has to remember. Watch a growing colour-and-sound sequence, then repeat it with the arrow keys.
Type this into Claude
Make a memory game like Simon Says. Show four big coloured pads for the Up, Down, Left and Right arrow keys, each with its own sound. Flash a sequence of pads that gets one longer each round, and I repeat it with the arrow keys. Show the round number, and say game over if I press the wrong one. Make it work with a normal keyboard.
The first real step up: the app now has to remember a sequence, not just react. That is the jump from a toy that responds to one with rules you can win or lose. Read the prompt slowly while they type. Build it live, do one round together, then let two students take turns — one watches, one repeats. The four arrow pads are exactly four bananas later. Backup is the orange button.
Build 3 of 3 · A game●●● Challenge
A Catch & Dodge Game
The challenge: a real game loop. Move a basket with the Left and Right arrow keys to catch the falling fruit for points — but dodge the bombs.
Type this into Claude
Make a simple web game. Good fruit and bombs fall from the top. I move a basket with the Left and Right arrow keys to catch the fruit for points but dodge the bombs. Catching a bomb costs a life, and the game speeds up over time. Show the score and lives. Make it work with a normal keyboard.
The challenge build: a full game loop with fruit falling, a basket to steer, and a choice — grab the fruit, dodge the bombs. Still only the arrow keys, so it is perfect for a banana joystick later. Build it live and play one quick round so they see the score climb and a bomb cost a life. By now they should believe they can ask Claude for almost anything. Backup is the orange button. If short on time, keep this one briefest.
Bonus · not a build — just to show off★ Showcase
And one we made
with the pro tools
You built three toys on the free claude.ai. Here is the ceiling: a playable Super Mario level — every pixel and sound drawn in code, no image or sound files at all.
The whole prompt — one sentence
Create a Mario mini-game with high fidelity and precision, and make it look visually appealing.
This one was made with Fable 5, one of Claude's paid models, driven through Claude Code — a developer tool, not the browser chat. So you are not expected to rebuild it today. It plays with the same arrows, Space, and Click, so a Makey Makey runs it too.
Optional crowd-pleaser — skip it the moment you are tight on the clock; it sits outside the 20-minute budget. The point is honesty about tools: the three toys they just built came from the free claude.ai in the browser, and that is genuinely enough. This Mario level is the ceiling — same idea, talk to an AI and get a toy, but made with a paid model called Fable 5 driven through Claude Code, a developer tool rather than the chat box. Read the one-sentence prompt out loud and let it land that the whole game came from that single line. Stress that nothing is a downloaded asset: every pixel and every sound is generated in code. Then play ten seconds — jump on a Goomba, hit a question block. Tie it back: it still runs on the same arrow keys, Space, and Click, so a banana would drive Mario just like the other three. Do not ask them to recreate it; that needs paid tooling. Use it to inspire, then move on.
The bridge
Now add a banana
Clip Makey Makey to fruit, foil, or playdough and those keys become things you can touch. Same toys, same code — just a new way to press the keys.
That is the bridge between the real world and code: your touch becomes a tiny signal, the computer reads it, and your toy responds — piano, memory game, catch game, even Mario.
- Bananas on the arrow keys turn the catch game into a body controller.
- Four bananas become the four pads of the memory game.
- Ask Claude for one more change — your own sounds, new colours, a high score.
Connect back to the IoT loop from slide two: real world, signal, computer, action. The big reveal is that adding the hardware changes nothing in the code — the banana just presses Space or an arrow for you. In a moment they will get the boards and do exactly this with any of the three toys. Plant ideas so the hands-on time has direction: turn the game into a banana joystick, wire four bananas to the memory game, or ask Claude to change the sounds. Encourage them to keep asking Claude for small changes.
Over to you
Your turn
- 1. Open claude.ai and type a prompt.
- 2. Play your toy with the keyboard.
- 3. Clip on a banana and make it yours.
All three prompts are on the handout. Next: grab a Makey Makey board and make a toy real. Safety first — only fruit, foil, and playdough. Hold the metal Earth bar so the circuit works. Never use mains electricity.
Thank you — Chan Meng · chanmeng.org · github.com/ChanMeng666
Youth Tech Series · AI & Electronics Workshop · SheSharp × Peyvand Academy × Ministry of Education
Recap the three steps so anyone can repeat this at home with Claude. Point them to the handout, which has all three prompts. Read the safety line clearly before handing out the boards: conductive food and foil only, hold the Earth bar to complete the circuit, never anything connected to mains power. Then thank them and hand over to the hands-on session. Leave the demos and handout links on screen.