My first cohort of makers is in! We’ve been working for a couple of weeks (sorry for not posting photos). The kids have been rapidly prototyping for my unit on picking up something “dangerous”. This unit was intentionally low-tech and was filled with prototyping materials that were by and large recycled. The key material that supplied for the kids was cardboard. I was worried they wouldn’t really like it, but boy were my fears in vain. They loved it! You know something is right when your students ask to come in and keep working on their projects during lunch time.
In the pictures above, you can see the kids showing one another their prototypes for fun. They’ve finished planning and trying to put together their very first prototypes. Soon we will have our first formative challenge when the kids have to pick up various mystery materials yet to be decided.
I’ve promised them one thing: I will choose materials that will make each of their designs fail (an integral part of being a designer). I’m doing this for two reasons (a) I want them to get comfortable with failing. It’s OK! It’s part of learning! (b) When something doesn’t work the way you planned in a product design, how will you iterate?
Thanks for reading 🙂
