The OtherMill...Our New Addition

Right before we left on our Christmas Break, "Santa" came and gave us the OtherMill from Other Machine Company. We were able to set it up and get a first milling job done..."Hello World". Can't wait to get back and make some circuit board...and who knows what else.

First Grade Rainforest Creatures - Finished

After weeks of planning and creating, the first grade rainforest creatures are finished. Here are a few of them.

Kindergarten and First Grade Christmas Ornaments

Our kindergarteners and first graders make Christmas ornaments each year to send home. This year the teachers in these grades wanted to take advantage of the Lab so we came up with these two ideas.

The kindergarten students would draw their card on 3x5 cards. We brought them into the Lab, scanned them and I put them on the computer. We laser cut them out and the students took them back to their classroom to color and put their pictures on the back with "Mod Podge"

In first grade, we stared to get a little more "high tech." In computer class, the students worked with KidPix to design their ornament. Our computer teacher, Mr. Sue, printed each picture out in black and white. Next, I went into each classroom and using the iPad, had each student come up and use Vectorize It by Autodesk. This app allows the students to take a picture of their design, crop it, edit it and turn it into a vectored drawing. Then I put the drawings on the computer and laser cut them.

Intro to "Hour of Code" Activities

With the "Hour of Code" next week, we wanted to get the kindergarten through 6th grade students familiar with coding. We set up a 12 x 12 grid (3x3 feet squares), place obstacle in certain squares and created a type of maze. The object is for the students to get in groups of 2...on will be a "robot" and the other a "programmer". It is the job of the programmer to give verbal only directions to the robot and guide them through the maze the a target on the opposite side. Once they reach the target, the programmer gets a token (made on the laser cutter) and the students switch rolls and start again. For the 3rd-6th grade, we added a degree of difficulty and have the robot blind folded.

It's a kinesthetic activity to help the students understand coding. We followed a StarWars theme (like Hour of Code) and printed various "Darkside" figures on the laser cutter.