Getting started – should I buy Arduinos for my classroom?

I get asked some variant of “what is the first thing I should buy for my classroom/makerspace?” almost every day! It’s great people are planning for maker-greatness, but there is some confusion out there because Arduinos and 3D printers have become the “go to” purchases for maker classrooms and other learning spaces.

In my opinion, neither of these would be my first choice for a beginning makerspace, especially one on a limited budget.

Today I got the question, “We were going to get some MaKe...