Collab Lab 9 focused on evaluating success of makerspaces and FabLabs. We used three questions to guide the discussion:
- What does success look like?
- What makes it difficult to assess?
- How can those barriers be addressed?
Our discussion groups came up with these three big ideas to take home:
- We have to learn to be comfortable with failure (and willing to model it for our students).
- Makerspaces are a tool for developing a mindset
- Successful makerspaces are the definition of individualized learning — teachers have the opportunity for one on one interaction with students, students are able to follow their passions.
And as a bonus: If students aren’t having fun, you aren’t there yet.
Links to things people heard about at Collab Lab 9:
April 20th: Tour of Milwaukee Jewish Day School’s Innovation Hub
April 27th: Betty Brinn’s Making in Education Community of Practice
May 11th: Collab Lab 10: Building Resilience
NEXT.cc: NEXT.cc supports making across the curriculum with STEAM based project learning set to NEXT Generation Science, Art & Design, and North American Association for Environmental Education Standards. Scaffolding cognitive learning with discovery, NEXT.cc’s eLearning DESIGNopiedia introduces skills and integrates K12 classrooms with apps, virtual field trips, TEDed courses, free data sets, mapping, and science interactives bringing our youth into the future of lifelong learning.
21st Century Classrooms
Outdoor Classrooms
Makerspaces
Mark Keane’s architecture classes for high school students:
Draw to Build I & II
UWM SARUP now offers two dual enrollment Architecture courses for juniors and seniors in high school. They can be accessed via Youth Options or PLA. Contact Prof. Keane for more information: keane@uwm.edu. Here’s a brief piece on the course featuring Collab Lab attendee Cindy McClinn and her students: http://uwm.edu/news/area-students-explore-architecture-100-and-perhaps-a-career/
Notes from breakout groups:
Group 1: We have to learn to be comfortable with failure (and willing to model it for our students)
What does success look like?
Dewy — Congnition — Metacognition
Mistakes & Failure
Outputs: What does it look like? What does it sound like?
Growth Mindset
Common Process
Audience?
Economic?
Engagement
What makes it difficult to assess?
Teacher/Educator thinking
Tasks — What is authenticity?
Standardization
Questions are unwelcome
Grade based system
Lack of experience with failure/open tasks
Kids are trained to think about school in “school” ways
Behaviorist vs Constructivist
How can those barriers be addressed?
Common processes
Digital modeling
Community involvement
What is making?
Hope
Culture
Expertise
Group 2: Makerspaces are a tool for developing a mindset
What does success look like?
Passion for a career path
Meaningful collaboration
Focused engagement on task
Problem solving
Equality of ideas/contributions
Success is nurtured and progressive
Teachers as facilitators & learners
Learning through experimentation
High level of resilience to change
Authentic experiences
Makerspaces is a process/culture
Fun
Futuring
What makes it difficult to assess?
Traditional buildings
Lack of exposure/access to tech
“Accounting mindset” of leadership
How do I manage the learning process?
How do I track learning that takes place 24 x 7?
Gather the info that leadership needs
Kids don’t know how to self-assess/be accountable for their learning
There is not time to teach anything that doesn’t lead to a 22 on the ACT
Don’t know how to reach outside businesses for real higher level learning
Parents
Teacher education is not continuous and focused on designing engaging project opportunities
Tine to do something other than standardized tests
Group 3: Successful makerspaces are the definition of individualized learning — teachers have the opportunity for one on one interaction with students, students are able to follow their passions
What does success look like?
Start with purpose– of the space; of the school
For who? Student, teacher, school, community
Attendance up
Increased engagement– students and teachers
Growth
Leadership
Curiosity is sparked
Students (and teachers) are not afraid to fail
Becomes part of the culture of the the school/community
It is demonstrated
Craftsmanship
Ability to transfer and apply the skills learned
Hit high standards
Process
Finding one’s self
Be able to adapt/be responsible
Kids set their own expectations
Compliance does not equal success
Integrated with curriculum
Other teachers are comfortable using the space
Students understand how to be life long learners
Teachers have an individual connection with students
Fun
What makes it difficult to assess?
Who is asking– district, school, parent, student
Subjective
Individualized
Long time frame required to see the results
Figuring out what is important
Pressure for standardized testing
Students are handed off to someone else (for the makerspace work)
Changing expectations
Getting teachers to adopt a new role– mentor/guide
How can those barriers be addressed?
Agreement on what you want to see happen
Ask how the community can help
Ask students for self evaluations
Classroom teachers should work with students within a makerspace (rather than handing them off)
Show off the results of student efforts
Last night at Ward 4 The Commons revealed the teams for each of this semester’s challenges. After a getting-to-know-each-other exercise that involved great lengths of yarn and a couple of well placed metaphors, the teams got to work. Joost, Mike Cook and I walked our team through the challenge to find a sustainable way excess materials from area firms could be made available for Betty Brinn’s maker initiatives and the makerspaces/FabLabs within area schools. The team’s work for this week is to look at how other organizations have solved the problem.
