Construct 3D Presentations

"Active Learning at a Distance with Tinkercad" (July 2020)

Here are resources related to my webinar that explored ways to use 3D design and Tinkercad for deep, personalized, active learning at a distance. Many students and teachers will face a challenging and dynamic situation this fall, so the hope here is to provide resources to help teachers design and implement meaningful projects. Below I go over Why to do it, What to do, and How to do it. Google Slides presentation.

Why to do it: Reflections on potential benefits of 3D design projects

As students, parents, and educators head into the fall of 2020, we know that learning will likely involve a hybrid of in-person and distance scenarios, and perhaps 100% distance learning for some time. No matter the case, we want our students to be active learners who are given the agency to engage with course material and their learning journeys in ways that encourage ownership. When teachers craft projects in 3D design with open-ended solutions and flipped learning resources, students can drive their own learning.

Tinkercad is a great creation tool for this scenario. If a student has a any kind of computer plus internet access, then they have equitable access to this resource. While we sometimes think of Tinkerad as a tool to design 3D prints with, when we drop the requirement that a design be 3D printable, students become free to make all kinds of creations. There are also many tutorial resources available, so Tinkercad lends itself well to flipped learning; teachers don't need to be skilled in Tinkercad in order to create assignments using it. Instead, students can watch short videos, read blogs, and help each other, all while practicing their spatial reasoning skills as well as the skill of using resources to drive their learning.

What to do: Ideas for 3D Design Projects Across the Curriculum

Mouse over squares for details:

Art

Design an art museum for a specific artist or movement that reflects the subject
Create a non-representational sculpture that expresses an idea
Use Codeblocks to create a mosaic
Make a venue for public art, like a bus stop, park bench, or light pole
Create a basket sculpture using Codeblocks

Coding

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Find a design in nature or a structure to recreate with code
Learn about loops and variables and comment code to show understanding

Design

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Design a school space for easier social distancing
Create a scale "parklet," a 2 parking space-long street park
Create a bedroom, kitchen, office, living room for a user based on an interview
Make an ideal mode of urban transportation
Prototype a solution to a problem in your house, school, or community

History

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Build varied structures from an era
Portray a migration, war, or journey on a map
Show data in a graph
Trace a technology over time depicting it in 50 year increments
Construct a scale monument to a historical figure
Visually depict the factors that influenced an event

Language

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Interview a friend, design them a room
Narrate a tour of a town or house
Create a country's flag with Codeblocks
Create a chess set and play using vocabulary
Interview a native speaker then create a model of something from their story

Literature

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Build a room that's unique to a character
Recreate a work's significant setting
Create a non-representational sculpture that represents a theme or character
Portray the major elements of a plot's arc
Create a 3D sentence diagram
Visually portray the elements of an analytical paragraph

Math

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Make a scale model
Create fraction manipulatives
Display different kinds of data as graphs
See Steve Phelps' work with Codeblocks and Calculus: video, Twitter
Bisect 3D shapes

Science

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Show the structures of a cell
Depict different kinds of geologic faults
Create examples of sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous rocks
Build a volcano
Show migration patterns
Portray an ecosystem
Dramatize the water cycle
Depict a chemical reaction
Create a habitat for a specific animal's needs

How to do it: Basic steps considerations, Tinkercad resources, An example of a unit

Basic Steps:

Clarify the learning outcomes related to course content
Identify how students will be able to demonstrate mastery of those goals through a 3D design project
Consider the elements of the entire project such as:
- research or other pre-work
- learning and sharing learning about Tinkercad
- creating the design concept
- working with a team
- creating and revising the design
- presenting the design through live or recorded video, blog, web page, etc.
- reflecting on process
Decide on whether and how these elements will be evaluated via checklist, rubrics, etc.
Provide students with an overview of the project
Students complete research, idea-gathering pre-work
Have students individually or as a team design their concept using rough sketching--what story will their creation tell?
Give feedback on concept
Provide Tinkercad learning resources (see below)
- require that students engage with them ("Watch 3 of these 5 videos during the next 15 minutes")
- give practice time ("Build a basic practice house using some of the skills you've learned about")
- question time ("Share a question you have or a question you solved")
Individuals or teams work on design
- build in revision opportunities based on peer and/or teacher feedback
- reward students' asking technical questions and giving help ("Here's how I did that," or "There's a video for that")
- consider "exit ticket" feedback to gauge how students are feeling, what resources they need
Students present their work via live or recorded video, blog, web page, augmented reality, etc. (see below)

Tinkercad resources

Tinkercad Lightning Strikes

My short videos that look at a very specific skill

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Tinkercad Tips and More

My series of Tinkercad Tips videos, example projects, plus resources for Codeblocks

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John Umekubo's Tinkercad tutorials

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Eunny's Tinkercad tutorials

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Codeblocks

Codeblocks works on the same principle as standard Tinkercad in that you're adding shapes to a workplane, but you use code to do it. It's a great way to practice basic coding concepts like loops and variables, to stretch your spatial reasoning skills, and to create designs for both 2D and 3D export.

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Tinkercad's tutorials

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Tinkercad's Keyboard Shortcuts

Tinkercad's Tips and Tricks Blog

Tinkercad's Resources for Teachers

Tinkercad's Making at Home

This is a part collection of basic craft materials, like tissue tubes and chop sticks. Use them to simulate physical craft projects.

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PrintLab

Free and paid tutorials and lesson ideas for work in Tinkercad and Fusion 360.

Videos

Website:

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Collaborating on a Design

For creators to collaborate, begin making a design, then click "Send To."

Next, scroll down to "Invite People" in the pop-up box.

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Sharing finished projects

AR Tour of history museum model

Presenting one's model can play an important role in the learning process. A presentation might take the form of a slide show, a live tour of the project via screen share, a screencast recording, or an augmented reality tour if students have access to iPads (see below). A blog entry could be another way to go, or students could even create travel websites encouraging the viewer to visit the creation.

Directions for recording a screen on an IOS 11+ device:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207935

To view a design in Tinkercad's AR viewer on the iPad, just click the icon in the upper right of a project's screen. See video below for complete directions.

AR Tour of a historical site model

More of my ideas on evaluating projects with rubrics and other means

Complete directions for creating and recording an augmented reality tour of a Tinkercad model on an iPad.

An Example of a Unit

This unit walkthrough is based on a Monuments Project that Dr. Heather Pang has done for a number of years. Dr. Pang has had student create scale models with laser cut parts and interactive elements like lights and servo motors. This spring, I helped her pivot to a Tinkercad option.

Learning outcome: Students will deepen their understanding of a woman in history by designing a Washington DC-style monument that reflects important parts of her life's work in the experience it creates for visitors.
Project overview: research, experiment with Tinkercad, create and iterate monument, present via web page
Graded elements: Google Form questions, including paragraph response, based on research. Participation in Tinkercad learning by asking and/or answering questions. Creation of model based on rubric criteria. Useful feedback for other teams via Google Form. Presentation in the form of a Google Site web page for visitors of your monument based on rubric criteria.
Pairs of students pick a woman from history, conduct online research, fill out a Google Form with information about her life and work.
Student are given Tinkercad learning resources, required to engage with them, then make practice projects: a house, a tree, a sidewalk. Share, discuss techniques.
Pairs discuss their monument ideas, share hand sketches, agree on an approach, present to teacher for feedback, green light.
Pairs create draft of monument. Periodic question and answer sessions to "crowd source" solutions.
Students review monument grading rubric, share their draft monuments with peers in breakout rooms, give feedback.
Pairs make final revisions of monuments.
Pairs present monuments by creating web sites in Google Sites. These are meant to introduce visitors to the monument with 5-8 still shots and up to 150 words of text. The site presents the "journey" a visitor will experience as they move through the monument from start to finish.

Estimated Timing, 45 minute chunks of time (homework or classwork)

Project overview, review of research practices, select woman for research--1

Research, completion of Google Form--2

Review of Tinkercad resources, Tinkercad practice--1.5

Brainstorm of monument concept, drawing--.5

Monument work time--2

Peer feedback--.5

Finish Monument--1

Create of website for presentation--1.5

Total estimated time: 10 chunks of 45 minutes

"Easy Entry to the Wonders of Coding in 3D Design" (February 2020)

I gave this presentation and a coding walk-through at the 2020 Construct 3D conference at Rice University. I showed the various ways I have used Tinkercad's Codeblocks to create 2D and 3D designs.

Here is a link to the Slides deck.

"From Crash Tests to Martian Habs: 3D Printing in Middle and High School" (2018)

Presentation Resources

Some Benefits of CAD and 3D Printing