Patience

Patience

Everyone who has been to one of the mini maker fridays has seen chaos in tinkering. But they are called mini maker fridays for a reason. With real makers, the truth is much deeper. 

Today, we went up to the PRISM room for making, and guess what? We got packets on design thinking, not making! We started working on them, and sure enough, they were boring. We had to interview partners, state problems, all that boring stuff. Even with moral-boosters, it was booooring... until you got to step 8. Then it was... 

HAVE FUN BUILDING!!!! 

Design Thinking as taught at Stanford's d.school

Our middle school Maker Ambassadors are attempting to use Stanford's d.school philosophy of design thinking to their creations in order to explore out of the box thinking and empathy.  We are changing our mindset to focus on the process and emphasizing that we must incorporate diverse perspectives to solve human needs. As we work through the stages, the students will be blogging to share their experiences. It is going to be messy and we will push through it together. 

Looking for resources?

Design Thinking for Educators Toolkit

d school K-12 lab wiki

K-12 Lab Network Resource Guide 

They will be working through their first design challenge to construct a winter wonderland while raising awareness about an important issue. 

Maker Winter Wonderland 12.8-12.23

What visions come to mind when you think of winter?

Russian poet, Anna Akhmatova saw:

The city is caught in the grip of ice--
Trees, walls, snow, are as under glass.
Over crystals, I and the patterned sleighs 
Go our separate, unsteady ways.

For Robert Frost it was,

Whose woods these are I think I know. 
His house is in the village though; 
He will not see me stopping here 
To watch his woods fill up with snow. 

My little horse must think it queer 
To stop without a farmhouse near 
Between the woods and frozen lake 
The darkest evening of the year. 

He gives his harness bells a shake 
To ask if there is some mistake. 
The only other sound’s the sweep 
Of easy wind and downy flake. 

The woods are lovely, dark and deep, 
But I have promises to keep, 
And miles to go before I sleep, 
And miles to go before I sleep.

What do you see? Collaborate with a small group of 2-3 makers to create a winter scene that promotes awareness about an issue. Use the littleBits, Legos, Play-Doh, and anything else you might need to design our own Maker Winter Wonderland. The choices are yours and you can use items from the room and home. 

"Do you want to build a snowman?" I bet you can find some cool instructables. Now is the time to upcycle items we might normally thrown in a recycling container. 

What questions do you have for me and for your partners?

Draft out a quick KWLHAQ chart to brainstorm some ideas! We will be applying design thinking to this next week, but think about the different options. 

Hour of Code

Next week is Hour of Code. We are going to start today during Maker Friday and you can tinker around with all of the tutorials and lessons over the course of the week. Computers are here to stay. You use smart phones and computers all the time. Let's learn their language!

http://code.org/learn

http://code.org/learn/beyond

http://scratch.mit.edu/hoc2014/