Episode 22: What is Maker Learning?

Are you doing these critical things to help your child succeed academically? Take the quiz now to find out the important actions you can take to enhance your child's education. Go to my website, liberationthrougheducation.com quiz and.

Take the quiz today. Foreign welcome to another episode of K12 Education Untangled. My name is Dr. Kim Fields, former corporate manager turned educational researcher and advocate, and I'm the host of this podcast. I got into this space after dealing with some frustrating interactions with school educators and administrators, as well as the micro discriminations that I faced while raising my two kids who were in the public school system. I really wanted to understand how teachers were trained and what the research provided about the challenges of the public education system. If you're looking to find out more about curriculum, current topics in education that could affect you or your children, then you're in the right place. In today's episode, I'll be discussing what maker learning or maker education is and whether it benefits all students. When you think about education and educational settings, some of the things that might come to mind are standardized testing, regimented schedules, and institutional policies. Within that framework, there's an adherence to the Framework for how students should learn. That framework limits the use of creativity and critical thinking to solve problems. This led to the rise of the maker movement, in which students would use creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration to solve problems. It gets back to the basics of a tool that children used to use on a regular basis. Their imagination so what is maker learning or sometimes referred to as maker education or makerspaces? Let's start out with the definition of what maker learning is, and then I'll delve into the background of this movement, followed by a discussion about current issues and concerns. Benjamin Herald, in an article in the Ad Week Market Brief in April of 2016, indicated that Maker education generally refers to using a variety of hands on activities like computer programming, sewing, or constructing an artifact in order to support academic learning. It is thought to play a role in the development of a mindset that values playfulness and experimentation through growth, iteration and collaboration within a learning community. The making of the project involves attempting to solve a particular problem and then sharing the solution or to that problem with a larger audience. The focus is typically on a process more than on the results. The maker movement didn't initially start out in schools, but was more typically found in science museums and other informal activities that people typically participated in on a daily basis for generations. This movement became more popular over a decade ago. Specifically in 2005, the first maker Faire was held in San Francisco bay area in 2006. Due to the popularity of this concept, former President Barack Obama hosted Maker Faires at the White House in 2014. The effort to bring makerspaces into the K12 schools is still a fairly novel concept. This movement has raised a number of questions by a researcher and these researchers. Questions include whether the maker movement, which highlights unstructured creativity and exploration, will be diluted due to a school's regimented scheduling practices. Concerns about the corporatization of maker education, in which schools and policymakers embraced the movement in order to promote STEM preparation. Questions arose whether the maker education can help boost student learning outcomes, including standardized test scores, as well as questions surrounding the attempt to find answers as to what counts as learning. The maker movement and maker education are basically getting back to the basics and that kids used to use in their daily lives and that is to build things with their hands. Children used to build model cars, hammer scraps together from leftover materials they found in the yard, sew with yarn and paper or fabric scraps, anything basically that used their imagination and produced a physical object. When video games and other electronic devices became the norm, kids weren't required to use much imagination to create and build things. A couple of consumer manufacturers have created devices to push the maker movement into one on one environment. For example, Littlebits Education, produced by a company called Littlebits, is a line of products aimed at bringing modular electronic components to schools and libraries. In the school setting, this would mean that the product, which are basically electronic building block kits, will be distributed to all students in grades K through 6. Another product, the Raspberry PI, which is a $25 microcomputer that's the size of a credit card and that plugs into a monitor and uses standard keyboard and mouse from which students can learn to code and program as well as interact with outside devices. Many educators are against the idea of this one to one distribution environments because the school may be putting too much emphasis on one particular type of maker product for every student. Also, there's a possibility that it could stifle creativity. The main issue seems to be how educators will figure out how best to use these devices, these toolkits that could be used in order to Reinforce Learning. In 2015, the Clean Independent School District in Texas was the first school system in the United States to use maker kits from the Littlebits company and test it with a district wide library makerspace program. The feedback and results from this implementation are are not readily available, so here's how this applies to K12 education. One of the biggest challenges to embracing the maker movement in K12 schools is the need to understand, standardize and define how it works for learning. The keys to turning making into a valid learning experience hinges on having affordable digital tools that students can use in new ways to interact with physical materials, having community infrastructure that cultivates the sharing of ideas, and having a maker mindset that encourages students to believe that they can learn to do anything. The extant empirical evidence is specifically pertaining to making and it is limited. The needs and experiences of students of color are often ignored and devalued in maker education. The efforts around equity for students are often focused on bringing them into unfamiliar or unwelcoming spaces rather than modifying the spaces themselves. The students need to be able to draw from their own internal skills and experiences as well as the experiences from others in their communities. It would be helpful for the schools that plan to incorporate maker education to to ensure that it is available to all schools, not just well resourced schools. Makerspaces should not be thought of as panaceas that can instantaneously be inserted into the classroom as autonomous fixes for failing schools or at risk students. Many African American girls do not identify as scientists and often end up excluded from higher level science courses. In order to change this, physical spaces need to be provided where girls have experienced a prior sense of belonging as well as giving them the freedom to choose their own projects and partners. These girls also need to have access to power tools, laptops, computing devices and digital hardware as well as having the ability to help each other on their projects. There are ways to have low tech or no tech makerspaces by including inexpensive items like cardboard, glue guns, screwdrivers, tape measures, straight edges for cutting, safety goggles, and empty paper towel cylinders and toilet paper cylinders. These low tech and no tech tools are quite useful for building projects. Makerspaces often promote a can do induced spirit in the kids who participate in them, providing them with a sense of agency or I can do that. A learning spirit of willingness to try, invoking curiosity, persistence and creativity is what the makerspaces are intended to usher in. This promotes a core concept of maker empowerment which has been defined as having sensitivity to the designing and building of objects and systems as well as the capacity and inclination to shape one's world by building, tinkering, redesigning or hacking. It's an extension of the do it yourself culture that can be provided within the educational system. One of the upsides of makerspaces are the skills that are acquired by learning, especially when that learning relates to computer science and programming. This builds on STEM skills in a unique way. There are some great makerspaces education focused resources like Tinker's programming courses designed to engage students 7 years old and up. Kids can learn to code by controlling Sphero and ollie robots, creating games with LEGO WEDO 2.0 as well as programming parrot drones. A makerspace provides an environment for the development of 21st century learning skills such as teamwork, creativity, imagination, innovation as well as connection to social emotional learning created by the relationship between the instructor and the student. So what makes an ideal makerspace in a classroom or library? First, they generally are focused around a particular learning style. The aim is to create an environment for hands on learning for the users. They encourage collaborative learning that focuses on interpersonal and small group skills as well as instilling a sense of accountability. The makerspace should consider the age of the participants. Second, the size of the space available is an important consideration, especially noting how any equipment and materials will be used. It's not necessary to have a space set aside specifically just for the makerspace. Third, the right equipment needs to be selected. Although expensive equipment is not always required, it depends on how specialized the makerspace will be. Some spaces may include computer technology, soldering irons and power tools, while other spaces may include 3D printers and laser engravers. The most important requirement for creating a makerspace is the creativity of the student. Many school districts across the country have brought or are looking into bringing maker education into their schools, but the process is often messy, unclear and in some cases unsupported. Here are this episode's takeaways. Make a Learning is based on the idea of students who will be engaged in learning by encouraging interest driven problem solving and hands on and activities. In other words, learning by doing. It's a do it yourself educational approach that focuses on iterative trial and error and views failure as an opportunity to learn and improve. The focus in maker education is on learning rather than on teaching. Students typically follow their own interests and test their own solutions. Currently, there's very little data that is hard data available on the market to answer any questions about the maker movement, with the main concern being identifying its connection to meaningful learning. Researchers Berkowitz and Myers, in an Education week article in June 2016 indicated that makerspaces will contribute to widening the achievement gap. Because of the selectivity of the students who participate in the makerspaces, only some students will have the time and get the invitation to participate in those spaces. These spaces often do not consider students who don't have access to technology at home, those who are often absent or those who need extra time to learn. The researchers main argument is that makerspaces and other new technologies are insufficient for closing their cheeks achievement gap in the K12 setting unless there are changes to the entire highly regulated structure of schools such as the policies, schedules and standards, the Common Core and the maker movement are not exactly compatible. Common Core focuses on standards that are contained in the centralized body of knowledge that all kids need to learn, which is contradictory contradictory to the learning that occurs in makerspaces, which tends to be more fluid, more collaborative and more personal. It's not just about learning skills that are required to get a job, it's about preparing children to solve problems that have yet to be anticipated. On the other hand, the maker movement could be considered a natural extension of the kind of deep critical thinking that's required to perform the Common Core standards. In the end, I think that the maker education movement is noteworthy. I think there's still a number of questions and issues to be resolved, especially those centering around the application of the type of learning that's occurring in the makerspace and how that can be applied to standardized testing outcomes. It seems that this movement is just another trend that gets introduced into the K12 space. But but the reality of who is served by maker education movement tends to be white middle class students, especially male students, and not children of color, especially girls. I think it's important to understand what maker education is all about, and if the makerspace is introduced into your child's school, you'll at least be aware of the ideals behind it. As is the case with most things in life, what's old becomes new again, and the maker movement is one example of this. The concept of a child using his or her imagination to learn, to build things, to figure things out and to persist has existed for generations. If this is the type of subject matter and discussion that resonates with you, please subscribe to my podcast or whatever service you're listening to this. Also, I'd love to hear from you, so please leave me a message, a rating or a comment, as well as any review and share this episode with anyone that you think would find it valuable. Be sure to tell your friends, family and community about my podcast. Additionally, you can connect with me on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook with the handle kimjfields. Thanks for listening today. I hope you'll come back for more K12 educational discussions with even more exciting topics to untangle. By the way, if you have a burning question about a current issue or a specific topic that you'd like for me to explore and discuss? Shoot me a quick email@kimiberationthrougheducation.com to let me know what your question is. Anyone who's Question question is selected to be discussed on one podcast episode will receive a $25 gift card. Be sure to stay tuned. On the next episode of my podcast, I'll be discussing K12 public school student expression. Until next time, aim to learn something new every day. Foreign subscriber. You can subscribe for as little as $3 per month. Just go to HTTPs://forward/tinyurl.com forward/podcast support. There's no contractual obligation. You can cancel at any time. If you choose to subscribe, I'll give you a special shout out thanking you in an upcoming episode. Remember, that's tinyurl.com podcastsupport to subscribe.