On March 9th, eight girls from the Junior and Senior school, went to London to take part in a Techathon at South Hampstead High School. The subject of this year’s was music and computing and the task for us was to create and promote a product combining Music and Technology.

At after much discussion, we decided to put together our ideas to create MIV - Music In Vision. The idea behind the product was to allow deaf people and hearing people share the experience of music. After downloading the app you could purchase the robot ’MIV’ (a fully interactive music bot) to enjoy a visual music experience. When the music plays, MIV moves, showing the pitch, instruments, beat and he also has a handheld sensor allowing the ‘listener’ to feel the Music. MIV also has a concert setting so when you take him to concerts, he shows the music through lights, screen projections and movement.

Safety considerations included the robot glowing red when the volume was too loud so that it would not damage the ears of people around. “Why can’t everyone experience music in the same way?” asked Eloisa (Year 8) - and MIV certainly allows that to happen. A carefully-designed app ensured that the whole user experience was enjoyable and, included in the app, was the option to compose music, allowing deaf people to create and listen to their own tunes.

As part of the day, workshops were included allowing Junior pupils to explore’ samplr’, which allows everyday sounds to be turned into awesome music, whilst Senior girls explored the ‘Algoraves’ which explored the world of ‘social coding’. The final products were judged at 2.15pm and we were all amazed by the creativity and originality shown by all the schools present. We thoroughly enjoyed our day and all that we achieved in such a short space of time. Using a range of software such as SketchUp, Green Screen and iMovie we were able to create a professional presentation to explain and promote our product, along with its own logo (see below).

A huge thank you to all the staff who enabled this to happen and for South Hampstead High for hosting us so well.

By Amelie and Lola (Year 6)