3D Pritned Junior Progressions Summary - Badge

 

The classroom this year consists of students who are a mix of Y3 and Y4 in New Zealand, that is students who are seven and eight years old.   The eight year olds have the experience of being in the classroom for a calendar year and have used Tinkercad to design and make the 3D Projects that are featured on this blog.

Blending in the new designs is something like this design shown left, which has a basic shape and lettering.   Twenty minutes to print, student designed it independently (we have four 3D printers as school so I do need to be mindful of other classrooms and what is being designed and printed.

An extension task following on for this is something like adding additional features and working out how to insert a hole into the design to create a way to tie the design to an object.  The students typically experiment with getting the size correct, typically starting with something simple as shown left, which was developed by a new student this year for his second actual print.   Dimensions were worked on by the student, including measuring it up.

Furthermore we then look at adding an object into the design - there is a full range of objects that can easily be added from the main design page, in this case it is a rugby ball.   Students experiment with the depth of the objects and lettering, typically when they start both tend to be extending out from the design to a point that they compromise the design itself.  In this progression shown left the student has the lettering coming out 3mm from the design and the ball a similar length.  This print measured 100mm long was 60mm high and was 5mm thick with the default settings on the print this took just over three hours.

Another second tier design is shown left, this by a second year student, who has developed his skills during the past twelve months.   As an eight year old in under ten minutes the student is able to design a label from scratch, attach a name to it and two additional images to go with it.

The student was able to present this design for printing, without any input from the teacher, based on his design experience last year.

The final challenge at this stage with the more experienced students and the students who are designing for the first time but excelling was to look at inverting the writing so instead of it featuring on the outside of the design it instead was on the inside but sunk into the design.

The students designing this kind of item can be reassured that the item has a significant shelf life.  The earliest prints from ten years ago, when we first started printing are still in existence as has been evidenced by our outside print.

We have also used a box of inspiration featuring some old projects and while students are waiting for their initial designs to print, we have utilised Tinkercads AR/VR feature to image their creations.

You can see ten years of examples on this site by using the search bar on the right hand side as we have tagged 'badges' 'labels' and 'exemplars'.

3D Printed Junior Tinkercad Progression Design

 

Challenge: To produce a label that is suitable for a adult to use to attach to a gear bag, designed, reshaped and redesigned by a junior.

Background: One of the things that we like to do with the 3D Printer is to try and get the students using Tinkercad and revising, remodelling and improving their design until it has changed significantly or served its purpose.   An example with the process, involving a seven year old (Y3) student designing independently without the input or supervision of a teacher.

The task was straight forward and relatively easy, involving creating a tag for a bag.  We actually took a photograph the cow tag (shown above left, yellow) and used Markup to draw the design.  This gave us a starting point for the student to take the design and bring it into Tinkercad.  We also had the object to refer to the student to ensure that the size was correct.   While he did use the measurement aspect of Tinkercad clearly when the student created prototype (shown above) was compared to the original object in terms of size it was clearly not the correct dimensions - It was 60mm long and 30mm high.

The second design, when revised came from the feedback that was created for person who wanted to use it.   The tag design was more clearly evident and also the top of the design, with a narrow neck for the first one wasn't considered robust enough for a high use object.  Again as can be seen by the example shown left, the dimensions again were not as intended and therefore the shape was requested to be redesigned.   The student was again able to redesign the shape - it should be mentioned that the redesign here is very basic as the student is grouping different designs with lettering and the basic shape with a hole inserted - three basic steps.

The final form of the design was then created by the student.  Again using the tag as the guide this produced a result which finally reflected the dimensions that were originally intended.

The final completed version is as shown left.  In this example the dimensions are correct, while not exactly perfect these were close enough in the range to ensure that the person the design was intended for was happy.

Size: The final design measured 60mm across and was 80mm high.  This design was 5mm thick which significantly allowed a number of the final designs to be published.

Timeframe: Forty five minutes to complete the print.  This allowed multiple versions of the same print to be printed.

What we would do differently/next steps for the students: This print was able to be reshaped and redesigned several times and was shown to the student as a way of having it in their hands to ensure that they understood the changes that needed to be made.   Tinkercad is perfect for junior students to use in this instance to work independently on design - we didn't AR/VR this example before printing it but of course this is something else that could have been done.

Junior Progressions: Earrings to Stationary Holder

 

Challenge: To show progression with a series of print to increase their difficulty and show development of ideas.

Background: This series of prints started with a earring design, which was printed in a pair (as seen far right in the photo). The student was then asked to think about how they could develop this ideas into a storage item.   They developed the star shape into a stationary holder.   He deliberately oversized the holes so that they could have multiple items held in each of the holes.   

The third iteration of this design featured additional storage in the shape of a rectangle that was inserted into the middle of the base.   The overall size of the shape was also increased at every step.

As shown left the next stage of the project is the decoration.  The spray painting of each of the shapes.

They were designed by a Y4 student (someone who is eight years old) who is developing his design skills in Tinkercad.   They were able to develop each of the designs without any teacher input.

Level of Difficulty: Medium - each of the designs in sequence is essentially based around the main interface shapes.   There could have been additional features added such as a personalisation of the design by including lettering or a name on the outside of the design.  We have been encouraging students to look at sinking the lettering into the design instead of having it stand out to ensure that it looks effective.

Timeframe: There are three distinct prints in this series.   The first is the earring which featured the shape that was to be developed.   This took thirty minutes.   The second or third prints was considerably longer.  The second (red) print was four hours and the largest print (the yellow print) was five and a half hours.

Size: Obviously there are three very distinct designs.  The earrings, which was the first stage is 45mm across and was 15mm thick.   The second container (which is red as shown above) was 60mm high and was 70mm across.   The final design included additional space for the pencil sharpener and was 100mm across.   Given the dimensions of what the student intended and the stability of the print this suited it perfectly.

What we would do differently/next steps for the students: As noted the design could have potentially had some form of personalisation.  We have started looking at adding small button LED lights into designs, and this would have been a great project to complete this.

3D Printed Phone Stand Junior Printing Challenge 2 Update

Challenge Update - Phone Stand

As detailed previously we have our students for the second challenge this term to create and make a phone stand.   The original stands which were featured on this blog involved a basic design however as they have developed their skills - other features were then introduced.   In the example shown left while the dimensions have remained similar the student decided to sink the writing through the entire base of the design, as he did with the heart.

The students design was printed, took three and a half hours and then was decorated by senior students at the school who then completed the spray painting.    We have previously detailed these on our blog over the years.

Most of the students have now completed this design and we have started the process of printing the remaining student stands.

Challenge Update: Reproducing a 'commercial' print

We have continued to look at students ability to reproduce and print a series of prints that are available commercially.   A number of local craft markets and online sources have a variety of animals available - dragons in particular are a particular favourite.  We previously had an entire range of printed animals available that were a significant part of our School Market Day.

This turtle shown left was found by a student who had purchased it, via their family.  It was then broken as a result of an accident.  The student wanted to try and repair the print, and in doing so the original .stl was found online.   The entire print took four hours - it was a excellent teaching point during printing as the legs were printed the first and then the as the print progressed it printed over the top of the legs and this then held them in place, allowing them to rotate.

3D Printed Earrings - Part Three Additional Designs

 

Challenge/Background: As detailed in a series of posts that have been detailed on this blog the students have started the term in New Zealand with an individual design challenge to customise a pair of earrings designed using Tinkercad.

In the designs shown left the student created two seperate designs, one for themselves and another which was intended as a gift.  They had similarities in design featuring a heart, a name and a star design on the base.  Each of these prints measured 60mm high, was 50mm across and 10mm thick,   As a consequence of this the print time of each of the prints was forty five minutes.  A discussion was made about whether or not these earrings were in fact not suitable for purpose as they were too large.   The student did not think so however it was commented by another student 'that they would make a great Christmas star' which was a reflection of its size.    The student is at this stage not intending to redesign the project as she believes it has been completed.  The student concerned is a Y3 student who is seven years old who is 3D Printing in her classroom for the first time this year.

A similar design was completed by the student who design the pair on the left.   They were crated in the main Tinkercad interface

Again as the design above there were three main components to the design.   The background or base of the design, the name that was applied and the hole that was inserted into the design to hang the earring.  Significantly the time to print each of these designs was reduced by nearly half of the ones above as they were 5mm thick.   The student who design these prints was a Y4 who has worked on a number of projects in the classroom this year and last.

She was able to complete this task independently from any teacher input and the result was just printed by the teacher.   

In the third example shown left this student opted to create a minimalist design - she had experience with earrings and wanted to make sure that they were as small and thin as practically possible.  

The print time for these designs were only 12 minutes for each earring, they were 50mm high and crucially 5mm thick.   The student used the 'scribble' design to make the shape of the star shown left.   The student enjoyed the fact that these were unique.  She considered putting additional details into the design however was very concerned with applying a basic level of detail to ensure that the design was light-weight and was able to be printed in a extremely short time frame.  Again a student, in this case eight years old who was able to complete the design independently and the teachers role in this instance was again to just print the finished product.