3-D Printing and Coding
I have worked in a library with 3-D printers and never have I played around with the websites to create something. I have been fascinated by seeing them print a student creation in the library. I have been excited alongside students as they see their creation being formed and finally get to handle the final product and walk away with it. I have also been seriously annoyed by the constant buzzing sound of the printer printing as I have worked in the library alongside them. This Sandbox got me into Tinkercad to experiment with 3-D printing, and I will continue to experiment more with my students in the future.
I have access to a Makerbot 3-D printer at my school library. My colleague has a little more experience with it, and she runs the 3-D printer at my school. I don’t believe it is really her forte either. There are a series of modules in Schoology that students must complete on their own in order to use the school 3-D printer in the library. There are also several size constraints as well for students. Other than that, students can make anything they want (that is school appropriate). I appreciated what the Libraries Ready to Code article said about Computational Thinking (CT), “when youth practice CT they find new ways to communicate their ideas, express themselves, and practice problem solving” (Libraries, 2018). I have seen varying instances of success with students working with 3-D designs and coding, and it is exciting to see.
I played around in Tinkercad for the first time ever, and honestly, I did not find it super easy to use. I thought for my first attempt, I should use a template with the directions. I attempted to make a basic ring and this is my screenshot after thirty minutes of tinkering. I still haven’t figured out how to cut the hole in it even though the darker center is the hole I sized to the orange cylinder (actual ring).
For my next thirty minutes, I tried a different template, the coral. This had many more directions and was way more complicated than the ring template. I did not feel very successful at either template. I struggled to figure out how to rotate the cone which was to become one of the “leaves” of the coral. I also could not figure out how to duplicate the leaf as the directions told me to. I think there need to be tutorials that highlight the tools, or point to the places to click for the very new beginners, like myself. I could not find the tools that the directions asked me to use. I had issues rotating my shapes the way I wanted to. I think I will need a lot more practice before I get a decent printable item to show.
I taught at a middle school in Colorado, and one year the whole school took time for an Hour of Code as it was a part of “President Barack Obama’s Computer Science for All initiative” (Moen, 2016). As a STEM school, this was important for us to participate on a national level with other schools and organizations. We also offered coding classes and robotics in our elective tech ed classes. Sixth graders were introduced to many topics in a nine-week quarter. In 7th and 8th graders could elect to take a tech ed course for a whole semester. Many teachers, including myself, were quite nervous about teaching an Hour of Code, but we all tried to have open minds and explored with a new group of students for that time. I would say teachers and “librarians who are on the coding bandwagon have the dispositions to be comfortable with the discomfort of taking risks and letting go of control” (Moen, 2016). This takes practice and effort as an educator. We have to be willing to fail at something and suffer some disappointments alongside our students, in order to hopefully learn something new along the way.
References
Libraries Ready to Code. (2018, November 26). How computational thinking fits within library services. American Library Association.
https://www.ala.org/tools/readytocode/how-computational-thinking-fits-within-library-services
Moen, M. (2016, September 30). Computer coding and literacy: Librarians lead the connection. International Literacy Association.
I had a hard time finding some of the tools in the tutorial too. I am glad to know I was not the only one struggling with those tutorials!
You were not alone in the struggle! I was thinking – and middle schoolers do this all the time… I should be able to figure this out!
The coral sounds really challenging! It sounds like you are a coding pro! Now I know who to call when I get confused!
Coral sounded fun, but way too complicated! I am no coding expert! LOL! I’m not sure where you got the impression. 🙂
That is cool that you’ve been able to see the 3D printer first hand at your school. I have seen what the students create and have been really impressed, but I have never seen the behind the scenes. After playing with Tinkercad, I agree it was hard! I really struggled with it and can’t even believe what students have been able to make when I could barely create anything. It’s also nice that you’ve had experience with hour of code too. It’s something that I probably should have experience with, but it wasn’t really explained or taught to us at my school.