Overview of Makerspaces?

For a brief overview of what Makerspaces visit my infographic, and explore.

What’s with Makerspaces?

Have you had a corner of your classroom that you just don’t know what to do with? If you do have one of those blessed classrooms with extra space, create a maker space. These are spaces that allow students the opportunity to explore using hands-on learning paired with higher-order problem-solving to solve real-world problems (Horizon Report K-12). With recent pushes to focus on a growth mindset, makerspaces are the perfect tool for the classroom. These spaces show that failure is an important aspect of learning, which drives students to self-reflect and alter their processes. This important life, and academic, skill is taught through these makerspace areas. By providing your students tools and materials, and saying “Answer this question” your students will begin to tinker with different objects until they have solved the problem, they may just find multiple ways to solve the same problem. In a time when there are many things already designed, it is becoming crucial to be innovative and find new and better ways to do things, which is what makerspaces are molding our young students to be. In the last 100 years, the number of makerspaces have multiplied by 14, are you up to the challenge to create the next innovative space? See what drove Jamie Leben to create a space for people for people to be creative.

Structured vs. Unstructured

The thought of students coming into the classroom and doing whatever they want is absolutely horrifying. This is the debate of structured vs. unstructured makerspace environments. In a fairy tale world, all the students come into the classroom, sit in their assigned seat, and independently read their Accelerated Reading book until further directions are given, without ever having the urge to talk to another student about what they did the night before. Is this type of structure really a necessity? There is a time and place for that, just as there is a time and place to let kids be kids and explore the resources they are given in class to support the question being asked. By laying down the ground rules of how the class will operate before the students enter the makerspace, it is possible create clear expectations, and model desired behaviors. The unstructured that we are referring to Is that students can work together and collaborate to solve problems using a strategy that works best for them. Be willing to let the students be thoughtful and discover new methods of thinking.

Thoughtful Environment

By taking the time in the beginning to successfully design and build a useful makerspace in the classroom, the students will see the determination that is expected in this classroom. According to the Horizon Report (2017/2018), makerspaces design should, “be maximized to support more collaboration, self-directed learning, and active learning, and inquiry and creation.” While creating these types of spaces in the classroom, thinking about enabling students to continue to try even when the going gets tuff, which can be a difficult concept to teach kids of all ages. When students come into this type of environment, they need to know that they are free to design, create, and collaborate with other students. Have you ever observed children playing with Legos or Kinex? Are they always following the directions to build the next best thing? If car designers didn’t try new ways of designing automobiles, all the vehicles we see would look the same. If someone didn’t take risks in the design process, all the vehicles would look and drive the same. This is the exact basis that makerspaces are built upon. Provide your students the materials needed, sit back and see the amazing things they come up.

References:

Freeman, A., Adams Becker, S., Cummins, M., Davis, A., and Hall Giesinger, C. (2017). NMC/CoSN Horizon Report: 2017 K–12 Edition. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.

West-Puckett, S. (2018). ReMaking Education: Designing Classroom Makerspaces for Transformative Learning | Edutopia. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/classroom-makerspaces-transformative-learning-stephanie-west-puckett