3D Printed Christmas Tree: Junior School Exemplar

 

Challenge: To produce a unique, original Christmas decoration, suitable for display or a tree.

Background:   Its a current classroom challenge, involving our Y3 and Y4 students with a design brief to create something unique for Christmas.  The students are using Tinkercad in their student classroom accounts.   Previous designs in this series have included the Christmas Angel as posted on this blog.

This students is a Y4 student who has been using Tinkercad for a relative short time, since half way through the year.   The design was completed in a short space of time using the main interface.   The details were added to the tree.

Level of Difficulty: Medium - the main interface was used and manipulated and the design that as created was done so quickly and creatively by the student involved.   The timeframe for this original design was under five minutes from the start to the completion.   There was no teacher input.

Size: The tree measured 80mm high and was 70mm wide at the base of the tree, narrowing as it reached the top.   The star was added to the design to signify the tree and also had an insert to allow it to be attached to the tree.

Timeframe: On the basic default settings for the print the time was two and a half hours.  The student wanted this to be successful and an eye catching design as it was.

What we would do differently/next steps for the students: The star at the top of the tree had a narrow point of contact, which needed the teacher to remove the gap, ideally if it had been structured differently the student would have been able to pop it out himself.   The trunk/base of the tree as you can see from the design shown in the photograph is not centre, the student wanted to shift its position.   Finally the student wanted to print it out using the filament that had the shimmer affect.

Finally as per usual with a design like this there is opportunity for it to run through a range of filters to alter its design and display.  We have been doing this in both the original Tinkercad design, but also using additional web based programs such as Pixton and iPad Apps such as Pic Collage.

3D Print School: Christmas 2022 Decorations

Challenge: For a student to create an original Christmas themed decoration

Background: A student who has had limited input and creations with 3D printing was very keen to produce something with a Christmas theme.   They had experience before prior with Tinkercad but in a passing way rather than being someone who had made epic or complicated prints.

By using Tinkercads main interface and the 3D objects that are readily available and visible the student was quickly about to produce this design and print.   When it was originally shown to the teacher the name was not present so after a brief conversation it was added to the final result.

The student produced this independently within a time frame of ten minutes and sized everything successfully.  The student was thrilled with the result and is looking at options to spray paint and further decorate the design.

Level of Difficulty: Low - this is a basic design with basic shapes.

Size: The print measured 90mm in height was 45mm across and was only 8mm thick.   For the purpose of an introductory print, where we wanted the student to experiment before we look at trying to extend them or have them create a more detailed print 

Time: This is an hour and a half print - given the dimensions etc and the purpose of the print it wouldn't really be feasible to print this any bigger, there could have perhaps been some additional lettering.

What we would do differently/next step for students: Nil - print designed (independently) by student, created within a reasonable size and goal, handed for the teacher to print and no adjustment required.

We have a range of prints from previous years which were listed in this post from a few days ago.

The design left, was created using the basic designs - a series of circles/spheres were created for the main part of the design, the scribble part of the design was used for the foliage, and a circle was used to link the design so it could be hung on a tree.   The total design time was less than ten minutes and the design took two hours to print.   The next step with it is to look at the spray painting of the design to look at appropriate colour.