Making Makerspaces Accessible by Sara Zeller

 Making Makerspaces Accessible 

By Sara Zeller

 

“Ultimately, the outcome of maker education and educational makerspaces leads to determination, independence and creative problem solving, and an authentic preparation for the real world through simulating real-world challenges. In short, an educational makerspace is less of a classroom and more of a motivational speech without words” (Kurti et al., 2014, p. 11). 

    I remember the day first time my son saw a robotics team demonstration. We were at our local library and the high school robotics team was teaching a weekly class on the basics of robotics.  He was too young at the time to join this group but he was enraptured with the concept, that summer I signed him for a Lego robotics camp.  Fast forward to a few years he was old enough to join the class at the library, then join the team at his middle school as well as take the class as an elective.  Being witness to your own child’s discovery and learning style changes how you view the big picture.  It changed how we looked for high schools, how we incorporated “makerspaces” in our home, and most importantly what we championed when given a voice at our schools and in our communities.  

 

    Depending on where you live, the movement of charter schools, and magnet schools has changed the landscape of how you choose to educate your children and while you can specifically put your child in design thinking school the importance of having these spaces available to all schools is vital.  In an article entitled, What is the Maker Movement and Why Should I Careby Gary Stager he says, “Making is predicated on the desire that we all have to exert agency over our own lives, to solve our own problems. It recognizes that knowledge is a consequence of experience, and it seeks to democratize access to a vast range of experiences and expertise so that each child can engage in authentic problem solving.” We are fortunate that both our school and the local libraries have embraced the concept of makerspaces and design thinking and are providing the tools for our children to enjoy this type of learning!

 

Expenses:

    For those institutions that don’t yet have a makerspace, the sliding scale of on campus makerspaces can feel intimidating when you are looking at it from budgeting standpoint.  Immediately you may feel that you need a 3-D printer, a laser cutter, and so on, but at the classroom level most makerspaces can get by with donations. Once we were allowed back on campus my daughters 4^thgrade teacher asked us to donate old and or broken electronics so that the students could take them a part and create something new. Without using any money her teacher turned their classroom into a makerspace. In, What’s the Maker Movement and Why Should I Care?Stager says, “Even if you don’t have access to expensive (but increasingly affordable) hardware, every classroom can become a makerspace where kids and teachers learn together through direct experience with an assortment of high and low tech materials. The potential range, power, complexity and beauty of projects have never been greater thanks to new tool, materials, and ingenuity.  You can begin with found materials: buttons, bottle caps, string, clay construction paper, broken toys..Reusing materials is consistent with kids’ passion for environmentalism and is an n ideal of the maker movement. (Stager, Gary., 2014, p.44).  In the article, A Major Making Undertaking: A New Librarian Transforms A Middle School Library into a Makerspace Aligned to High School Career EndorsementsSheila Baker discusses the how the librarian at one middle school sought out audiences with the local pipeline high schools not only for advice but also for donations. “She then visited the career, technology, and engineering classrooms on the high school’s campus to learn more about them and to solicit any items the instructors would be willing to donate to her program. She felt it important to tap into the knowledge of teachers preparing students for life beyond high school. Teachers were eager to contribute items because the educators knew that the middle school students feeding into their school would enter high school already knowledgeable about the endorsement programs offered” (Baker, 2018).  The great thing about creating makerspace is the play as you learn mindset, combine that with the idea of “reduce, re-use, recycle” and you have the winning combination of turning one man’s trash into your students treasure.

For additional information on the Makermovement revival, check out this TED Talk by Jason Wik and Gabriel Wilkes. 

Works Cited:

Kurti, R. S., Kurti, D. L., & Flemming, L. (2014). The Philosophy of Educational Makerspaces: Part 1 of Making an Educational Makerspace. Teacher Librarian, 41(5), 8-11. 

Stager, G. (2014). What's the Maker Movement and Why Should I Care? Scholastic Administr@ator Magazine, (Winter 2014). http://www.inventtolearn.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Scholastic-Admin-Jan-2014.pdf

Therien, Janelle., Sverko, Catherine., Roffey, Trisha. (2016). ETEC 510 The Making of a Makerspace: Pedagogical and Physical Transformations of Teaching and Learning, (April 2016). https://www.iteea.org/File.aspx?id=133027&v=134a6d62

Baker, Sheila F., and Bonnie Alexander. “A Major Making Undertaking: A New Librarian Transforms A Middle School Library into a Makerspace Aligned to High School Career Endorsements.” Knowledge Quest, vol. 46, no. 5, Jan. 2018, pp. 64–69. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ1182647&site=ehost-live.

Hatch, M. (2014). The maker manifesto: Rules for innovation in the new world of crafters, hackers, and tinkerers. New York, NY: McGraw Hill. 

Irie, Natalie Roote, et al. “Makerspaces in Diverse Places: A Comparative Analysis of Distinctive National Discourses Surrounding the Maker Movement and Education in Four Countries.” TechTrends: Linking Research and Practice to Improve Learning, vol. 63, no. 4, July 2019, pp. 397–407. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ1219887&site=ehost-live.

"Robotics Regional Competition In St. Louis." UPI Photo Collection, 2010. Gale OneFile: Educator's Reference Complete, link.gale.com/apps/doc/CT4099918198/PROF?u=sddp_main&sid=PROF&xid=1b55c82b. Accessed 29 Apr. 2021.

“The Maker Movement in Schools: Jason Wik & Gabriel Wilkes: TEDxTokyoTeachers.” YouTube, 12 Jan. 2015, youtu.be/fpFnsCBVpH4.