Makerspace Resources and Programming ideas

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Maker Books You NEED ASAP

Check out these Great Blogs from other Makers

  • The Tinkering Studio Blog : This R&D lab on the floor of the Exploratorium is a maker’s dream! And they blog about all of the great work they are doing. Read and Re-read for great ideas!
  • Renovated Learning : Diana Rendina is an amazing maker librarian with frequent makerspace posts! Follow her blog and get an almost daily dose of awesome ideas for your library makerspace.  Check out Diana’s Makerspace resource page, Tips on Writing Donors Choose Projects, The Value of Guided Projects in Makerspaces.
  • Makered.org : Every Child a Maker
  • Josh Burker : Josh is a maker extraordinaire, he’s always making cool stuff and sharing project ideas. PLUS, he wrote the awesome Invent to Learn’s Guide to Fun.
  • Expect the Miraculous : Andy Plemmons is a genius about connecting his young makers with mentors. Plus, he’s just an all around phenomenal librarian. (When I grow up, I hope to be like him! )
  • UNCG SELF Design Studio : I interviewed Matt and Sarah for my Librarian’s Guide to littleBits, they always have amazing stuff going on, so go give them a like on Facebook to keep up with them! Check out this blog post about them over at makeymakey.com too!
  • Makerology : Krissy Venosdale is the founder of the #elemaker tag. Need I say more?
  • Design Saunders : David is another awesome elemaker I met working on the Librarian’s Guide to littleBits. He’s a makerspace mash-up of fun!
  • Worlds of Learning : Eric Sheninger hired Laura Fleming to renovate his highschool library and create an innovative learning space for students.
  • Design Make Teach : Another great maker educator with a flow of great ideas!
  • Daring Librarian : Gwyneth Jones is an avid sharer of great ideas! Follow this blog ASAP!
  • Library as an Incubator : Great blog with tons of information for school and public libraries alike!
  • Makerspaces.com : Andrew is pretty great at curating free resources for you!
  • Evolve Project : Brian Pichman is doing great work connecting libraries with makerspace resources.  Plus, he’s pretty great at finding out about the best cutting edge maker tools.
  • Innovation Lab (at St. Petersburg College ) : Chad Mairn is another rad maker librarian I met interviewing bitsters for the Librarian’s Guide to littleBits.  He’s got all the great stuff at his academic library!
  • Maker Bridge : This is a great resource for the maker community that helps us all get connected via resources, reviews, and a weekly blog!
  • Active Learning : Kristin Fontichiaro’s blog about making and libraries!

More Great Books for Your School Library Makerspace

Expensive resources storage

Twitter

I’ve learned so much from my Twitter PLN. Use Hashtags in your tweets and follow the conversation too!  

Makerspace Programming Ideas

Aaron and I have worked diligently to make, document, and write over 50 makerspace projects that you can implement with your makers.  The book will be available from McGraw Hill in Oct 2016. Below is an example of a full year of makerspace programming.  I hope to update this with what I did this year and what I’m planning for next year soon!

MAKER WORKSHOPS/ LESSONS FOR THE WHOLE YEAR – Example

Month Low Tech High Tech Cur Connections
August Origami LED Origami

Scribblebots

Brushbots

 Math/Angles/Art
September Duct tape projects Little Bits-space kit-synth kit

Snap Circuits

 Science/Music/Science
October Makedo- make something with cardboard (Caine’s Arcade) Frankentoys- make it light up or move, etc with Hummingbird

Great resource here or buy Sugru to make interchangeable toys

Rolly bot– Like Sphero but made with a brushbot

 Art/Science
November Nanowrimo http://nanowrimo.org/ Interactive book w Makey Makey

Scratch coding  -Use resources from Pursuitery. (See below)

  1. Chasing Game Challenge
  2. Maze Game Challenge
 English- Story writing/Science- Electricity, conductive materials, circuits
December Upcycle old picture books into coasters w Modge Podge (Find words and make your own magnetic poetry style coasters, or make story coasters.) LED Throwies

Hour of Code

#catapultchallenge

 English/Programming/Physics
Jan Cardboard Mazes w Makedo Game Controller Workshop w Makey Makey (from MakerJawn) o#MakeyMakeychallenge –Challenge them to create their own game and invent their own game controller. 

Logic Puzzle w Makey Makey

Digital Storytelling with Scratch

 Math- X/Y Axis, Equations, Computational Thinking/ English- Interactive Story idea changed into a logic puzzle
Feb Unmake stuff Get kids to bring old stuff Paper Circuits- Interactive Greeting Cards( Circuit Scribe or Bare Conductive)  #MakeyMakeychallenge cont. Science- Electricity, conductive materials, circuits
March Make your own Ukelele Arduino Music ProjectsSphero Obstacle Course using Macrolab or Sphero Chariot Challenge Music/Art/STEM
April Rube Goldberg Challenge – Motion projectsWind Turbine Challenge: http://challenge.kidwind.org/ –Animated Poems with Mozilla Webmaker–Hummingbird robot poems Makey Makey Maze w Brush Bot

Sphero – Chariot Challenge and Obstacle Course Challenge

 Poetry/English/Science/Engineering
May Upcycle a Day for the Month of May! – Coffee bag idea Raspberry Pi Photo booth  

Inventions for math “market”

 Math- Market /Science- Recycling, properties of materials

 

Last, here is a list of workshop ideas I created with Leah Mann in 2014. Lots of great FREE ideas:

FREE WORKSHOP IDEAS:
OTHER RESOURCES:

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