Project Thoughts and Considerations

My project has changed an immense amount over time. After countless failures, countless successes, countless changes of the mind, countless hours of research and learning, and more, I was left satisfied and proud of my project's state at the Expo. I had reached my realistic goal for the night, and I felt my idea was demonstrated and communicated well. My goal for the Expo was to have all the physical parts of the smart helmet and glove system working well and together, all while communicating with the IoT interface I designed and programmed within Blynk. After months of hard work, I achieved this goal right in the nick of time, and this was exactly what was on display during Expo night, along with informatory graphics, images of past work, and displays of past project iterations.

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When working on SMART_SHIELD, I faced countless challenges. The first challenge came when I realized I needed something stronger and more capable than a micro:bit or Circuit Playground. Making the switch to Arduino didn't catch me by surprise or anything, but the process was certainly challenging. I not only had to learn how to work with the hardware, but I also had to teach myself to code (like, real code, block-based coding doesn't count). It was a long process, but over time I got better and better at coding and became more comfortable with Arduino. The next biggest challenged arrived when I had to connect everything in my project to Blynk. Establishing a connection between Blynk and Arduino, especially over USB, was incredibly difficult. All the guides and examples online were either outdated or didn't work for me, so I had to do a lot of troubleshooting on my own to get everything to work. Once I did, I realized I had to do it all again, but this time via WiFi, as I had a new Arduino board coming in for my project. This was another challenge, but thankfully due to the experience I already had with Blynk at that point, I was able to overcome. Finally, the last challenge I faced involved getting all the sensors, the Arduino board, and Blynk all working together. I had to get everything functioning using the same code, which took a lot of troubleshooting and trial and error. I grinded away at it, making as much progress as I could. After taking the electronic components of my project home for the weekend, I worked for hours on this code, and finally figured it out after hours of work.

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While the challenges were tough, the rewarding successes made everything worth it. Understandably, much of the most rewarding moments happened when I eventually overcame my biggest struggles. When learning to code, any little step of progress I made felt great, and I truly felt I was learning a ton. Finally being able to set up Blynk felt incredibly rewarding, as I had to jump through countless hoops to get everything to work. Finally, tying everything together and showing my project off at the expo was amazing, and I felt proud of all the work I had put in to my project. 

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The past 4 years within the STEAM program have been amazing. I can't even begin to describe all the wonderful experiences I've had, all the friendships and bonds I've formed, and especially everything I've learned and the progress I've made as an individual. I've developed so many different skills, and I can confidently say that the STEAM program has been a major part of crafting me into the person I am today. It's allowed me to find myself and my passions within the world, and has inspired me to pursue a higher education and career within the realm of engineering. As far as SMART_SHIELD goes, I can promise that I'm not ending it here. I made this project because it’s something I not only cared about, but something I enjoyed working on. I would love to take this idea further and continue to improve SMART_SHIELD, and I hope that in the future I can take this idea far.