Making and the Makers Movement
MakerKids in action
What is making?
The past few years have seen increased interest in making and makers. A maker is someone who makes something–from food to robots, wooden furniture to microcontroller-driven art installations. Makers are typically motivated by their curiosity for learning and creating new things, as well as by an interest in sharing their work and processes with others.
"The act of making encourages and gives people permission to tinker, hack, remake, and perhaps even change society. Maybe the urge to make manifests in putting a patch on a worn pair of jeans instead of buying new ones. Maybe it manifests in having friends over for a ‘pot-luck’ instead of meeting at a restaurant, as sharing food you have made is an immediate joy that is a long-standing tradition. These seemingly trivial actions are actually making activism, they are a way in the modern world that we can have some control over our own surroundings that is not dictated by the limit on our credit card.”
Paul describing how and electric motor and gear is attached to axle of battery powered car
Making is a way of encouraging intellectual curiosity. Not just saying, "I have to achieve task X," but being able to say, "Hey, that's an interesting thing. Or, I wonder what would happen if . . ." A lot of educators are concerned that we're beating that curiosity out of adults when they're kids. Making is about stimulating personal inquiry, enhancing curiosity, trying something you have never done before.
Bound up in the process of making is the concept of failure. When an engineer is designing something, it's not pass or fail, it's "Does it work yet?" And then it's "Does it work in the most efficient and effective way?" and "Does it do everything I wanted it to do?" Pass/fail goes out the window, and it's more about, well, "Whether it worked or not, what did I learn?" or, if it worked, "Can I make it better?"
Bound up in the process of making is the concept of failure. When an engineer is designing something, it's not pass or fail, it's "Does it work yet?" And then it's "Does it work in the most efficient and effective way?" and "Does it do everything I wanted it to do?" Pass/fail goes out the window, and it's more about, well, "Whether it worked or not, what did I learn?" or, if it worked, "Can I make it better?"
Happy recipient of 1st Prize for the Pasta Bridge Challenge post with mentors Peter, Paul and Nigel
It's the process that we really want to engage kids in, the doing. Sure answers are important, but they are far from everything. School tends to be about making kids successful by asking questions that we already know the answers to. Instead, what happens when we give them a real problem where they can be wrong and even get frustrated as they grope for the solution? If we offer challenging problems and provide the right kind of guidance, we're able to teach them a process. They can fail at something but figure out that's not the end state; it's not the end of the story. Someone–it might have been David Kelley of the noted design firm IDEO–is quoted as saying, "Fail faster to succeed sooner." Another memorable quote about failure goes something like, "If your not failing you're not trying hard enough." The point here is that we need to think of failure–and trying again, and again, and again–as part of the process of learning. Especially if it happen in the act of trying to create something new and original.
What is a Makerspace?
Makerspaces are community oriented physical places, where people with similar interests can meet to socialize, collaborate, share, and work on projects.
One view of our Makerspace
Makerspaces support learning in an informal, play-focused environment that can cultivate an interest in science, technology, and design. They often include elements of a high-tech lab, electronics workshop, machine shop, wood working shop, and art studio where creative minds can get together to share resources, tools, and knowledge to build new things. Members usually embody aspect of the DIY ethic and the spaces and members together are part of the larger Do It Yourself Movement.
Makerspaces come in all shapes and sizes. They all serve as a gathering point for tools, projects, mentors and expertise. A collection of tools does not define a Makerspace. Rather, we define it by what it enables: making. Someone who wants to do something because it is fun is more likely to find an activity to be meaningful than if that person is doing it as an assignment or for a reward. When one is engaged in a playful space, that person will learn more easily. Creating a playful information-based space allows the learner to explore and engage with content on their own terms is the goal of the makerspace builder.
MakerKids collaborate to solve a problem
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Viewed in this light, our makerspace is a learning environment rich with possibilities. As new hardware and software tools for making, digital design, and fabrication are emerging, our desire is to put these tools into the hands of both our students and our community. And challenge them to put the tools to creative uses.
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