3D Printed Junior School Progressions Part Two

Challenge: For novice and junior (seven year old) students to show progression with designs

Background: As detailed on this blog we have students who are junior in our school system as young as seven years old.  One of the perceptions was that designing using CAD software might be somewhat beyond them, however as has been stated many times over the past two years this is simply not the case.  The students have shown time and time again they they have the concepts and ability to do exactly this.   Using Tinkercad as a design tool  to either design from scratch or taking common designs from the main interface to then take them and personalise and add details to them.   At a basic level for some of the students who are Y3, moving into the classroom for the first time to use the designs that can be created by a single click as a starting point.   The designs shown above left are simple forty minute prints.  Built into the design is the opening and closing mechanism.

The design left came from these early sessions and then the student involved wanted to look at expanding the design and including additional elements in the design.  Clearly this was destined for another family member, and the student wanted to experiment by adding something extra.  Similar to how she was able to select the locket design, she then added the text, added a star and a heart to complete the design.   Once the student had combined all of these elements she made the decision to upscale the design from the two different versions of the same print shown above.  In the above designs each was a forty minute print.   By upscaling the design below, and adding the elements the student design was increased to one that had a two hour print time.

One lesson the student learned from the project was the need to enlarge both portions of the design.  She upscaled the base, which contained the name, but did not do likewise with the top.  This meant that the design was lop sided and needed further adjustment but this is excellent practical experience for the student at a small scale.

The student working on the unique junior dragon as detailed previously on this blog has continued to refine her design.  This is an example of a more challenging project, but again the student involved is a junior, that is a student who is eight years old.  It is her second year completing CAD design projects having been creative in her previous year this project is designed to push her skills.  Each version of this dragon is taking about an hour to print, the initial version, shown left with the adaptation is taking about an hour to print.    

As you can see the student has opted to significantly shift the location of the wings, incorporate spikes into the design.   The student has been encouraged to continue to do so - the design has elements that are evolving and she has been encouraged to look at art and creations in literature to add elements and further parts to the design.  The next stage is the student reshaping and redesigning the head and in particular the mouth area, she is being encouraged to think about the length of the head and sculpting and shaping the teeth, which while it is challenging it is encouraging to see the motivation and the effort that she is putting in to completing this.

3D Printing: Progressions (Junior School)

Challenge: To show clear progression as designs are reworked and remade.

Background:  We wanted to demonstrate an example of how a student might progress through their designs, or take a design and move it forward with different elements.  This student is a Y4 student who has shown a design element to her work in Tinkercad.  She was able to complete this activity independently in all three stages, in under one hour.

In the first instance she took a basic design (a heart) and then duplicated it three times before resizing the different stages.   She then added a personalisation with her name, and then further details with the star.   

The initial timeframe for this was forty minutes.   She created a design that was 20mm, 30mm and 40mm across, was 80mm high and had a thickness of 10mm.  This took forty minutes to complete.   

When the question was posed to the student - 'what was the purpose of this print?' or how could we develop this idea further the student then brainstormed and went onto step two - she decided to take the basic shapes and create a pair of earrings that could be worn.   To do this she took her base design and added holes which she felt would be appropriate for attaching to ear ring hooks.

She created a pair based around the initial design.   The pair measured 30mm, 40mm and 50mm across, was 80mm high and had the width of the next stage of the print reduced to 5mm.  As a consequence of these changes the print time remained the same (just under one hour).   

The student wanted to keep the designs plain however it should be noted that it would have been a basic and simple matter to take the design and create geometric patterns or shape and apply them to the base.

For the third stage when the student was asked to show progression again the student opted to take the design and make a holder for her stationary.  To do this she started with the base design, and then modified it by increasing its size substantially (to ensure that the weight of the designs would support pens or pencils going into the design).   

The student also wanted a potential holder for either a eraser or a pencil sharpener.  To do this she hollowed out a further section by the front left of the design. 

The design in this format measured 30mm wide at the top section, 40mm wide at the middle section and 60mm wide at the last section.   The design had the three visible holes sunk into it and was 90mm long.   The design was 30mm high as the student wanted this height to act as an anchor so it would be able to hold pencils and pens.

The student was looking at other potential uses for this design and shape however given a one hour timeframe, her iPad and Tinkercad this was what she was able to come up with.