10/31/2017. It was a busy week for the maker club. The day began with a club sponsored field trip to the Marbles Science Museum. The trip was planned by school leads, Mary Clay Vick and Deborah Dupree as a recruiting tactic for iNEST. The sixth grade students enjoyed a half day at Marbles where they got to explore the STEM learning stations and attend an IMAX 3D movie about Extreme Weather by National Geographic. One student described her favorite learning station as one where you were challenged to build a house on a table that could simulate earthquakes. She explained that the design and engineering choices in building the house made a difference in how the house was able to withstand the simulated earthquakes.
Back at the club meeting, students continued the fabrication process for their paper coasters. As you can see, the cutting is almost complete and students are beginning to construct the components of their coasters. The groups were beginning to plan the themes behind their coaster design and making plans for how the components are going to be placed. Some groups even began testing some of their components with marbles in order to make adjustments as they build. Next week we may see some paper coasters taking shape! 10/24/2017. The iNEST club this week began its work with paper coasters. After a brief video explaining the basics of building paper coasters, students were divided into teams of three and began to cut out the cardstock pieces needed to build each coaster--brackets, beams, track, etc. This project will continue for several weeks, building to a coaster competition with scoring and prizes for top teams.
In the background, the school leads, Mary Clay Vick and Deborah Dupree, have begun planning for the club's spring field trip to the USA Science and Engineering Festival in DC, with travel planning--coach, hotel, etc. Dr. Oliver will be submitting a school showcase proposal to the NC-TIES conference to give several girls a chance to co-present and share what they are working on in the club, should the proposal be accepted. Next week, the club is sponsoring a field trip to the Marbles Science Museum for the field trip, as a recruiting tactic. 10/17/2017. This week in the iNEST maker club, we welcomed members of the TechnoWolves FIRST Robotics team from the Wake STEM Early College High School across the street from the Wake Young Women's Leadership Academy. TechnoWolves were recruiting new high school members for their community-based team that is affiliated with NC State. The spokespersons gave a presentation on their work in FIRST Robotics, and demonstrated their large robot built for a recent competition. After this exciting demo, the girls picked up new paper circuit cards Jennifer printed for the Halloween season. Students quickly completed their copper foil circuits building on skills from previous copper foil projects and submitted video reflections on our FlipGrid board for circuitry projects. A few students completed work on their soft circuit pins from last week's club meeting.
10/10/2017. This week in the iNEST maker club, Dr. Oliver and Jennifer introduced a new project area in the form of soft circuits. Soft circuits are circuits incorporated into clothing and accessories, often with a light-up element using LEDs of varying sizes. Students were able to choose from pre-cut felt pieces in seasonal holiday shapes or floral/leaf patterns with which to make a light-up pin. We were impressed with the club member's ingenuity and ambition as they performed beyond expectations in lighting up not just one LED on their pins, but in many cases, two LEDs involving more complicated parallel circuits. For many students, this was their first chance to sew with a needle, and after some basic tips, everyone was able to sew down to their felt either sewable LEDs or regular LEDs with coiled legs. We will continue with soft circuits one more week before moving on to another project area. Dr. Oliver has ordered further holiday cut-outs, including Thanksgiving and Christmas shapes for students who would like to make further holiday pins or ornaments this holiday season.
10/3/2017. In today's iNEST maker club meeting, students finished up their Wintercroft mask projects. The meeting started with the usual snack time followed by one of last year's club members, Samantha, sharing her knowledge of the Wintercroft mask project for which she won a Wake County art award. Dr. Oliver, Jennifer, and Nina spent part of the club meeting sorting the Hummingbird robotics kits for use in a future club meeting. Many students took their masks into the hallway and recorded short FlipGrid videos to reflect on their designs. Next week, students will be working on soft circuit pins with a Halloween theme for the upcoming holiday. Pictures from today's club meeting are shown below:
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Purpose:Dr. Oliver's weekly update of activities in the iNEST Maker Club. Archives
April 2019
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