Overview
At Scraplabs, I was employed to design and develop activities and STEM kits for school kids. The Overall premise behind the company is to instil curiosity into their minds by providing them learning tools that are fun, engaging and have plenty of tinkering scope.
I proposed this project for students of 8th to 10th standards to give them an idea of Mechanics and Machines and how they can be realized using simple tools and objects. This project was supposed to compliment the ongoing projects and other DIY science kits related to Robotics and Electronics based on the using Arduino Environment.
The Problem
After working a few months at Scraplabs, I realised that the curriculum they had designed for students in 8th to 10th standards was mostly inclined to robotics and electronics. This was partly because it was thought that the concepts were a little tough at this age and also a little hard to develop based on the kind of learning model and kits that we were designing.
Infact, to learn robotics one has to understand the basics of mechanics and simple machines first.
It was also expected that the kit should be designed around the idea of Scraplabs that is- providing learning through tinkering
And using the components that we were providing in our other kits.
Challenges
1. Learn while having fun
To create learning activities through which students can better understand the relationships between different links and members in a fun and interactive activity.
2. Develop every part of a child’s brain
Designed to be the first in a line of other kits in the field of Mechanics for students. To teach them workings of “simple machines” that are ubiquitous and are behind the working of everything from a simple lever to the engine of an automobile.
3. Allow multiple activities and tinkering options
Students could tinker with different lengths of members to emulate different mechanisms and linkages.
4. Generate curiosity and deep thinking
To design in a way that engages the curiosity of a student and makes them think a bit deeper into the subject.
The Solution
Using simple nuts and bolts given along the kit, students can form hundreds of different kinematic chains each with their different characteristics and see how it affects their relative motion.
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The students were provided with informative placards and videos related to the workings of the components.
The placards contained the basic concepts about mechanics as well as the steps to create various member chains on the board.
Along with that, they were given the opportunity to go a step further by taking small quizzes and going through the links provided within the placards to better imbue the spirit of mechanics within them.