Category: makerspaces

Posted in 21st Century life, design and problem solving, maker movement, makerspaces, parents and technology

Innovation & Coding — Fine Tuning the Mission

Posted on by Marti Weston
Screen Shot 2016-07-17 at 2.32.11 PM
Created at http://www.tagxedo.com.

How can we ensure that young people, who enthusiastically embrace innovation, creating, and coding, also associate their work with the fundamental concepts of empathy, humility, and conscience?

As we adults thrill to help children learn, imagine, ideate, explore, and make things, we also need to define a compelling mission for each of our innovation and maker spaces — a mission that emphasizes the significant values that young people should apply to the problems they identify and try to solve. An innovation mission provides a foundation for children, illuminating important issues and providing benchmarks that help them to consider and choose problems. It should also help young learners differentiate between the significant problems that need to be solved from those that are insignificant.

Continue reading “Innovation & Coding — Fine Tuning the Mission” →

Posted in 21st Century Learning, electronics, innovation, maker movement, makerspaces, parents and technology

Electronics Tutorial Helps Parents & Teachers Gain Deeper Understanding

Posted on by Marti Weston
Click on this icon at the top left of the webpage to access the tutorial.
Click on this icon at the top left of Paul Mirel’s webpage to access the tutorial.

As exciting makerspaces spring up all over the place, I wonder how much attention is given to leveling the makerspace playing field in order to ensure that everyone in a 21st Century group, class, or school community has the basic knowledge for exploring and innovating.

Take understanding basic electricity, for instance. At a conference that I attended last year — an amazing event filled with countless maker opportunities —  some people seemed to understood electricity’s basics and lots of others did not. The people without the knowledge, the “have-nots,” frequently appeared to lurk on the periphery of projects.

A friend and former colleague, physics teacher Paul Mirel, recently developed an introductory electronics tutorial for his art students at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in Baltimore, MD. It’s written in a way that is easy to understand and also easy to follow. He thinks that his students need an elementary understanding of basic electronics if they are to fine tune their maker skills. Check it out!               Continue reading “Electronics Tutorial Helps Parents & Teachers Gain Deeper Understanding” →