Thank you for your visit.

 

This page is being run out of a wonderful rural school from South Taranaki, New Zealand.   While we are very fortunate to be an ADS School with some wonderful resources this is each year the ideas and creations from a fantasist group of students that we like to share and showcase.

Recently we have been expanding our digital footprint by increasing our scope.   While we don't necessarily complete our work for the benefit of page numbers and view etc it is noticeable that we have achieved in the month just ended the best thirty day period for a blog that has been running since 2015.  

The photo above is a view from our school field - while we are a rural school we have core values based around innovation and engaging with technology for our learners.

Our students have just completed the first term of four here in New Zealand and are currently on a two week term break we will return Monday 20th April.  

In the meantime you are always welcome to email the teacher running the site at myles.webb@gmail.com. You can also view our 'Facebook' page for this site by visiting it here.

3D Printed Minecraft Axolotl

 

Challenge: To produce a unique copy of a Minecraft item or creature using an iPad, Tinkercad App and Minecraft Education.

Background: This task has been detailed over the past week or so occurring in our classroom with our Year Four students (seven and eight year olds) in different forms.

The original tasks dates back to September 2026 and you can also click here to view a summary of last years Minecraft themed posts.   As the term is coming to an end its one of the challenges that we have decided to revisit with our classroom of students this year, some of which had the opportunity to complete this challenge last year as a seven year old.  Minecraft Education was the starting point where we tasked the students with locating and making effective screenshots of a range of animals contained within the program.   They were challenged to select one of the animals that they had a screenshot of and replicate the animal using the Tinkercad App on their iPads.

Depending on the animal there were certain challenges that were associated with replicating the object or animal in Tinkercad.  The design needed to have clear recognition factor and be an accurate representation of the original.

This student attempted to complete the axolotl.  We have previously featured the early versions of this design where the student was using AR/VR to project the design around the school and also test its viability and its likelihood of success if it was printed.

Level of Diffculty: Hard this had elements that needed to be completed and completed accurately the student who is involved in this is a cohort two student who has already demonstrated some exceptional design skills this year, as in his own time he was responsible for producing this bottle.   This is arguably the hardest kind of animal that he could have selected to replicate.

Size: The print measures 160mm by 60mm for the main body and has legs that are an additional 40mm from the base of the animal.  Of note is the width of the tail piece which is 1mm wide as is the line dividing the back of the creature.

Cost/Price: According to Bambu Lab Studios the print design used 70g of PLA to produce at a cost of $1.73.

Timeframe: The print took two hours and five minutes to produce on regular Bambu lab print settings.

What we would do differently/next steps for the students: The biggest issue of this design moving forward we be the purpose of the design, other than a novelty toy, which is something its potentially not suited to, owing to the thin spine and the tail.   Storage is the obvious answer and the student is going to explore looking at introducing either holes or a box shape into the back of the design.  They also want to spray paint the design so that it matches the colour shown in the AR/VR design.

Revised School Improvements V3.0

 

We have been detailing here on this blog a series of school improvements, details which the students have used their iPads and Tinkercad to design a three dimensional object and then used the Tinkercad App to go to a potential location and 'project' the image into a space that it could potentially be placed in.

In earlier instances the students were able to complete basic designs but we worked on having them thinking critically about what they have made and created.  The mat outside of the office which we have detailed previously has now undergone a change of colour, to reflect the school colours and a message from the school has been placed on the mat itself.  In this instance there has never been an intention to complete the printing of designs in these sequences as seen in our selection of non printing 3D printing projects.

We are also expanding our Digital Footprint to include other formats, including a Facebook Page.  This features a selection of posts from this blog, such as this one, but includes additional details and media include a range of photos from this sequence.  You can click on the link to this page here.

We thank you for your visit to this site - our intention this year is to break the posting record for this site and essentially post everyday.   We also are looking to expand the digital footprint and increase the traffic on the site, which we are in the process of doing but we do appreciate people who link it to other locations or pass on the connection so we can continue to showcase the work of our wonderful students and hopefully encourage a range of creations and creativity at your school or educational site.   If you want to contact us you can do so via the email under 'site information'.