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The makers' movement and FabLabs in education: experiences, technologies,

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Conference Paper · June 2013

DOI: 10.1145/2485760.2485884

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 The Makers’ Movement and FabLabs in Education:
Experiences, Technologies, and Research
Paulo Blikstein
Stanford University
520 Galvez Mall
Stanford, CA 94305-3096
+1 650 736-0966
paulob@stanford.edu
ABSTRACT
In this paper, we introduce the origins and applications of digital
fabrication and “making” in education, and discuss how they can
be implemented, researched, and developed in schools. Our
discussion is based on several papers and posters that we
summarize into three categories: research, technology
development, and experiences in formal and informal education.
Categories and Subject Descriptors
K.3.1 [Computers and Education]: Computer Uses in Education;
J.6 [Computer-aided engineering]
General Terms
Design, Human Factors, Experimentation, Theory.
Keywords
Digital Fabrication, Making, FabLabs, Constructionism,
Education.
1. INTRODUCTION
Every few decades, a new set of skills and intellectual activities
become crucial for work, conviviality, and citizenship. For
example, in the early seventies, computer programming emerged as
one of those new foundational skills. But computers in those years
were large and awkward machines, and the idea of using them in
K-12 education was unconceivable: programming was too difficult
for children and too disconnected from school curricula.
The Logo computer language [17] started to change that mindset.
In recent years, easier to learn programming tools such as Scratch
[22], Alice [5] and NetLogo [30] achieved unprecedented
popularity and made coding accessible to a large number of
students and teachers. They also made schools expand their
curricular boundaries to include new skills and abilities, such as
engineering, design, and computer coding. The world caught up
with the idea that computational media could be a vehicle for
powerful ideas in mathematics, engineering, and science.
Digital fabrication and ‘making’ is a new and major chapter in this
process of bringing powerful ideas and expressive media to
schoolchildren [2]. The analogy with programming is clear: the
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IDC '13, Jun 24-27 2013, New York, NY, USA
ACM 978-1-4503-1918-8/13/06.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2485760.2485884
Dennis Krannich
University Bremen
Bibliothekstraße 1
28325 Bremen
+49 421 218-64384
krannich@tzi.de
technology became better and more accessible, and the skills more
valued and important. What Logo did for programming—bringing
complex mathematics to the reach of schoolchildren—fabrication
laboratories (FabLabs) can do for design and engineering.
1.1 From technology “skills” to
computational literacy
Traditionally, at a policy level, engineering and technology were
considered as important “workplace skills” that needed to be
included in school curricula. However, in 1999, the National
Research Council issued a landmark report stating that technology
was changing too fast for this skill-based approach to be effective,
and called for a fluency approach. They suggested technological
education to include the development of adaptive, foundational
skills in technology and computation, in particular “[intellectual]
capabilities [to] empower people to manipulate the medium to their
advantage and to handle unintended and unexpected problems
when they arise” [15].
The same concerns were echoed in later reports [16] which
confirmed the demise of the “computer skills” approach and
recognized that decades had been lost teaching them to millions of
students. It called for a move from computer skills towards
computational fluency or literacy [6; 19] and broadening
“technological literacy” to include basic engineering knowledge,
the nature and limitations of the engineering design process, and
critical thought about the trade-offs of technology development and
implementation.
The report also introduced an important distinction, which
resonated with the concerns of Papert [18] and diSessa [6]: the
recognition of a difference between technological literacy (a
general set of skills and intellectual dispositions for all citizens) and
technical competence (in-depth knowledge that professional
engineers and scientists need to know to perform their work). It
identifies fluency with technology not anymore as a vocational skill
or a way train future workers, but knowledge valuable for every
citizen. Since then, several other developments in research,
technology and policy have further supported this vision. The once
dismissed idea of children programing computers was not only
embraced, but developed into a much larger vision of students
conducting sophisticated activities that were before restricted to
specialized professionals, such as robotics, environmental sensing,
data analysis, advanced science, and engineering design. Thus,
rather a sudden revolution, the now widespread acceptance of
“making” and digital fabrication in education owes much of its
popularity to these developments.
1.2 The Digital Fabrication Lab: the re-
intellectualization of the shop class
Notwithstanding the natural content overlaps amongst science and
engineering disciplines, they are fundamentally different. While a
scientific investigation is typically concerned with finding the one
law to explain many natural phenomena, a technological
investigation typically finds many solutions for the same problem
[1]. A typical school science lab is designed for rigorous,
disciplined, and scripted experiences in which students are guided
towards the re-discovery of a unifying principle. School science
labs are architected to facilitate and optimize such a process—but
would those spaces be appropriate for engineering and design?
Despite engineers’ dependence on basic scientific knowledge to do
their work, their epistemology even precedes science; humans have
been creating tools and altering their environment much before the
inception of the scientific method. In fact, engineers’ ‘ethos’ as
inventors and tinkerers, in both K-12 and college education,
survived up to the fifties and sixties, after which there was a
significant push towards analysis and mathematics, and away from
traditional “shop work” [11], which was overwhelmingly present
in curricula during the first half of the 20th century [7]. The
professional engineer of the first half of the 20th century became
the scientific engineer of the second half [29], partly motivated by
the end of the Apollo era funding – less expensive theoretical
classes prevailed over engineering labs or design work [9]. Over
time, this resulted in the removal of the engineering design
experience from not only college curriculum, but also from K-12
education. Shop class became “vocational education” for those who
supposedly could not handle ‘serious’ math or science.
Two independent processes started to reverse this trend. First,
around the eighties, faculty and employers started to feel that the
design-deprived engineering graduates were not well prepared do
to any real engineering design work, which had started to become
more important [25]. Second, in the early 2000s, prototyping
equipment, such as laser cutters and 3D printers, dramatically
dropped in price, and open source hardware further popularized
these technologies. Suddenly, corporate product development
moved towards a “studio” model in which groups of engineers and
industrial designers could create prototypes in days instead of
months: consequently, the nature of product engineering was
radically transformed. In 2002, a collaboration between the
Grassroots Invention Group and the Center for Bits and Atoms
(CBA) at MIT would bring digital fabrication to the masses.
Mikhak, Gershenfeld, and colleagues [10; 13] were the first to
package such equipment in a standardized low-cost lab and deploy
it in both community centers and universities around the globe: the
FabLab was born. The first FabLab sites were in Costa Rica and
India. In particular, Mikhak’s expertise is education and
constructionism had a considerable influence over the first
implementations, both in terms of activities and technologies. For
example, his group developed the Tower, a single board computer
that could not only be used as the “brain” of many fabrication
projects, but operate some of the machines in the lab themselves
[13]. In the following decade, a network of FabLabs spread in all
five continents, and spurred a vibrant global movement. However,
after the first years, the K-12 educational component of the FabLab
was partly replaced by a stronger focus on entrepreneurs and
college students.
In 2005, the MAKE Magazine, a monthly publication dedicated to
DIY enthusiasts and tinkerers was created, and soon after the Maker
Faire, a large science and engineering fair in California, launched
with great success [2]. At the same time, high-profile global science
fairs such as the Intel Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) started
to gain traction worldwide, generating interest from hundreds of
schools around the world in project-based science. Events like the
Maker Faire and the ISEF created even more demand, in schools,
for project-based learning, especially around STEM disciplines.
1.3 Digital fabrication, education, and the
IDC community
Mike Eisenberg was one of the early pioneers of advocating for
digital fabrication in education, having prepared the ground for
what would come next [8]. Around 2005, programs such as
“Learn2Teach, Teach2Learn” from MIT brought children into a
community center FabLab for the first time. Toward the end of the
2000s, researchers and educators started to consider a more
sustainable use of digital fabrication in education. In 2008, Stanford
University launched the FabLab@School project, and started
building FabLabs in K-12 schools around the world. In 2009 the
MC2STEM High School in Ohio (USA) opened its first digital
fabrication lab. In 2012, Maker Media launched the MENTOR
MakerSpace project with DARPA funding, hoping to install 1000
labs in 5 years. In 2011 and 2012 alone countless museums,
schools, community centers, and libraries announced plans to build
digital fabrication and ‘making’ facilities—it became mainstream.
Despite this resurgence of fabrication labs and “making” in formal
and informal settings, the ideas behind this movement are based on
three decade-old theoretical and pedagogical pillars: experiential
education, constructionism, and critical pedagogy.
These theoretical and pedagogical principles have also pervaded
the creation of the Interaction Design for Children community, so
bringing the “maker” movement, FabLabs, and digital fabrication
to the center stage of IDC is a natural fit. In fact, many
developments in the IDC community enabled or amplified the
maker/FabLab movement, such as hardware and software for
advanced scientific explorations [3], low-cost robotics [26; 27],
interactive textiles [4], electronic jewelry [20; 28], the creation of
videogames [12; 14], and new types of cybernetic creatures [21;
24]. These toolkits and technologies prepared the ground for the
popularity of the ‘maker’ movement and digital fabrication. They
showed that it was possible to engage children in complex uses of
technology, that those same children could actively construct with
technology rather than just consume technological products.
2. WORKSHOP CONTRIBUTIONS
In this workshop, we revisit the theoretical underpinnings of
constructivism, constructionism, and how they inform research and
development in the realm of digital fabrication in education,
“making,” and the “makers’ culture.” The papers and posters
analyze current initiatives in the field, examine the literature, and
create initial theoretical frameworks for research, assessment, and
design in this area, with roots in the learning sciences, HCI, critical
theory, and the cognitive sciences. The submission connect the
explosive on-the-ground work that is happening in schools,
museums, and after school programs, to theories, literatures, and
research around hands-on learning, project-based learning, tangible
interfaces. The contributions can be grouped into three different
categories. The first is mostly about how scholars and practitioners
are collecting data and doing research in this field. The second is
about narratives of experiences that are taking place in schools and
informal educational settings. The last category of papers and
poster is about new technological developments in hardware,
software, interface design, and system integration. In what follows,
we will describe each of the categories and their corresponding
submissions.
2.1 Technologies and human-computer
interaction in digital fabrication
The first contribution of this category is “Considering
Constructionism for Digital Fabrication Software Design” by
Zeising, Katterfeldt and Schelhowe. They argue for a new approach
for 3D-modeling applications for digital fabrication in educational
contexts. Based on playful constructionist learning, they propose an
initial framework to design such kind of software applications.
The second contribution, “The Spiro Inquiry,” by Hooper and
Freed, presents the design and implementation of a new software
tool called “Spirogator” for exploring the properties of
“spirograph” geometry, both on-screen and with digitally designed
and physically fabricated gears.
Also in the technology/HCI track, another contribution is the
“MakerCart” by McKay and Peppler. They present a mobile
FabLab for the classroom that is designed to address the space and
funding constraints of schools. They claim to improve the
integration of FabLabs to schools’ instructional and curricular
frameworks.
Sipitakiat, in his poster submission, discusses a new paradigm and
hardware platform (“PiTopping”) developed to highlight a new
physical computing programming model made possible by
miniature single-board computers such as the Raspberry Pi. Roque
presents the design of workshops to engage parents and their
children to “make” together using creative tools such as Scratch and
MaKey MaKey, and shares preliminary findings and lessons
learned from these experiences.
Chan and Pondicherry present LightUp, a constructionist toolkit for
learning about electronics, and explain in detail their design
principles for making electronics transparent and easy to
understand for children.
2.2 Experiences in formal and informal
education
In this category, one of the main contributions come from Wanyiri
and Ombatti, who discusses the impact of the “FabLab Robotics
Outreach Programme (FROP)” in marginalized areas in Kenya.
The aim of this project was to teach girls simple, basic and
elementary electronics, robotics, programming and automation in
different workshop sessions.
Telhan, Kafai, and Elinich’s poster present eCrafting Circles, a
platform for design, sharing, and learning built to support craft
communities. Milne introduces the Future Science Leaders, a high
school enrichment program run out of a science museum, which
uses project and problem-based learning to teach science and
technology. The poster describes successes and challenges from the
first two years of the program.
Druga and Kera describe a research framework for inquiry-based
learning activities for middle-school children, focusing on
motivation and knowledge transfer. They have designed several
activities, such as the “Wiki of Making” and “Challenge Hub,” and
use self-determination theory [23] as one of their theoretical basis.
Buckley’s poster describes a design-inspired project (“Tools for
Schools”) in which The School at Columbia University partnered
with a furniture manufacturer to implement a fabrication project in
an 8th grade classroom. Forty-four students were asked to create the
“classroom of the future” using their daily school environment as a
launching pad.
Zamarano and Jenkins present their CoLaboratory project at the
United Nations International School, focusing on ways to integrate
making and constructionism into teachers’ traditional curriculum.
2.3 Research
In the research cluster, Martin and Dixon report on how young
people involved in an out-of-school maker club think about
making, the maker movement, and themselves as makers. In their
paper “Youth Conceptions of Making and the Maker Movement”
the authors identify three general themes and present a description
of future research plans.
Flores and Springer describe research in the school fabrication lab
(iLab), and how they are trying to introduce self-directed, peer-
organized learning across several age groups. Norris’ poster
discusses a case study with nineteen 10th grade girls who worked
with their Geometry teacher to design artifacts that would assist
them with the development of positive self-perception. She frames
this design-thinking curriculum in terms of it constructionist roots,
and examines the process of identity formation through the
construction of physical artifacts.
Worsley presents three case studies of youth in a digital fabrication
lab, illustrating how such spaces must address a wide range of
interests and motivation levels. He describes in detail the learning
trajectories of different students, showing how even students from
the same school and same grade levels would behave very
differently in an open-ended environment, calling for careful
activity design in order to accommodate individual differences.
3. CHALLENGES, OPPORTUNITIES AND
CONCLUSION
3.1 Opportunities and possible actions
Starting from the submitted contributions and poster session, the
objective of the workshop is to discuss concrete next steps for
community building and dissemination of this work, such as:
 Tools for exchange of experiences between participants.
 A crash-course in some of the theoretical foundations in the
field.
 A web-repository of relevant literatures, research methods,
instruments, and institutions working in this field.
Digital fabrication and “making,” and the positive social movement
around them, could be an unprecedented opportunity for educators
to advance a progressive educational agenda in which project-
based, interest-driven, student-centered learning are at the center
stage of students’ educational experiences. However, we are still in
early stages of implementation of these technologies and spaces in
schools, and soon the “honeymoon” period will be over – results
will be demanded, evaluations will take place, and schools will
carefully analyze the cost-benefit of such initiatives. Educators and
researchers should be prepared for this next phase with good
activities and generative themes, sound research
instruments/methods, and comprehensive professional
development programs. The goal of this workshop is to start this
discussion and plan next steps in that direction.
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