Making Space for Community and Student Well-Being

EDTECH: What does the makerspace look like in your school?

HANESKI: The beauty of a makerspace is that it can be as low-tech as crocheting and DIY up to high-tech robotics. We have soft seating and some high-top tables with chairs and cabinets that open up to store the things you need. I have three tables that you can fit five stools around, and on the end of each is a large Promethean board. The collaborative tables are U-shaped, so picture putting YouTube or a digital magazine on the Promethean board to help you work through a project. Then, the other side of the Promethean board is a whiteboard.

KREINESS: We are in the process of setting up a makerspace, but we do have a 3D printing club with a handful of students. They have two 3D printers in a classroom, and I helped the school order an additional 3D printer that is housed in our library media center.

Our middle school is part of a grant program with Heart of America, which works in conjunction with Arizona State University to design and renovate a space in the school to become an innovation lab. Last year was the first year the innovation lab was open to students.

BONGIORNO: I was chosen to open up a new STEM magnet school in Atlanta, Ga., and we built our three-floor library along with students from the ground up, including different makerspace areas. We have a prototyping makerspace; a podcast studio; and a little art area with painting stations, sewing machines, a Glowforge and other 3D printers.

DIVE DEEPER: Flexible furniture creates more opportunities for collaboration.

STUMPENHORST: I have 3D printers, which are running 24/7. We have esports with Nintendo Switches and Raspberry Pi devices. We have robots, we have Legos, we have soldering irons, we have button makers, we have a laser cutter, we have a CNC machine, I have a cart that’s just craft materials. We also do jewelry repair, which has become, oddly, a rather steady industry for us. The space is always messy, which is a good thing.

EDTECH: How do you decide what projects or technologies to include in your spaces?

BONGIORNO: We visited several local, Atlanta-area makerspaces to see what worked for them and then adapted that for our own needs. It was a learning opportunity for everybody to develop a program that worked for us, with no preconceived notions. We also let students lead projects because libraries are spaces for communities, for students to feel seen and heard and valued. At the end of the day, it’s getting their input that’s going to do that, whether it’s through a makerspace or a book club.

STUMPENHORST: Pretty much everything we have in our space is because a kid came to me and said, “Hey, can we do this?” Three years ago, it was all about 3D printing. Now, it’s video games. Last year, it was Rubik’s Cubes.

HANESKI: I have a makerspace club with kids that meets twice a month, and I ask them to come up with ideas that the other kids would like. Even though it’s something I could do, I empower the kids to do it. You don’t have to be the expert, especially if you’re in a high school, because the kids can embrace it. If you’re in an elementary or middle school and you can’t do it yourself, or the kids can’t, then get a parent volunteer.

KREINESS: A lot of the 3D printing we’ve done is around incentives for students, either allowing students to design and print models as an incentive for behavior or attendance, or having the teachers print things to give to the students, like tokens, tickets and rewards.

EXPLORE: Which 3D printer is right for your K–12 makerspace?

EDTECH: How does this space promote student well-being and the building of life skills?

STUMPENHORST: School sucks for a lot of kids. We have these kids that don’t fit in traditional boxes, so I created my schedule to provide opportunities for kids to come to the library. Schools always obsess over reading and math scores, but in the library, there are no grades, there’s no assessment, there’s no judgment. We have a fair number of kids that say the library is their safe space.

With kids this age, identity is a big thing, so with esports and video gaming, for example, some kids have to learn to lose and be bad at something. That’s not a junior high skill; that’s a skill I hope will stick with them throughout their lives.

KREINESS: It’s not enough to have cool, emerging technologies without really understanding how they fit into education and educating the whole child. Take small steps to infuse design thinking and growth mindset skills into the culture at your school. If you establish that first, by the time you get to 3D printing, learning the technical stuff will probably frustrate students less. Instead, it teaches them about learning from their mistakes, persevering through their mistakes and being able to tackle it again.

BONGIORNO: Even at the smallest level of creating, you’re putting yourself out there. You’re learning about yourself through creation, but you’re also stepping outside your comfort zone to share that with another person. That really helps you become a little more vulnerable and connect with people on a deeper level.

I have taught all grades, kindergarten through 12th grade. Our littles are more willing to open up and be vulnerable and talk about feelings. In high school, it takes a lot of relationship-building. The makerspace activities are a way to sit next to each other and start chatting and then slowly open up more and more.

HANESKI: Kids sometimes show stress in their hands, such as when they’re fidgeting, but when they’re focusing on the art or the creation of something, their hands are busy, and the breathing gets better. Anytime I do this work, I’m always doing it for the kids, but I end up feeling better.

People can carve out a little space for a quiet corner and that can benefit from the marriage of the technology and the feeling better. Using Canva, for example, you can create mindfulness cards that help students focus on their breathing by tracing shapes. You don’t have to have a lot of money; you can print them on a color printer and then laminate them.

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EDTECH: How does your makerspace tie into the larger school community?

KREINESS: One of my first and biggest design thinking opportunities with 3D printing was when the assistive technology department in my district reached out and tasked us with designing key guards, which fit on top of tablets to make a grid. This allows students who are nonverbal or otherwise have communication disorders to better see and isolate the different buttons on the applications they use to communicate.

HANESKI: It’s nice if you can do a good deed with the things you’re making. Make things that can be donated or given to teachers for Teacher Appreciation Week, or have a writing station with stationery and have people write letters.

BONGIORNO: We did Mindful Maker Mondays, where we combine making and creating with purpose. We looked at how to make something to help another person or help our community in some way, like making quilts for our homeless shelters or pottery for plants on Earth Day.

EDTECH: How do you fund the projects and technologies your students are interested in?

KREINESS: My school and some of the others in my district belong to the Verizon Innovative Learning Schools grant program, so much of what I do is helping to oversee and manage that grant initiative.

LEARN MORE: How will funding changes impact schools this year?

BONGIORNO: It helps to have a good relationship with your PTA — and with your local Home Depot or Lowe’s. We had a hardware store in town that was very gracious with their time and effort and monetary donations.

STUMPENHORST: I had a great partnership with a local woodworker, a cabinet maker, and he donated a lot of wood and materials that we use on our laser cutter and CNC machine. We also have a fantastic education foundation in town that I write grant applications to every single year. I have been awarded funding over the past 10 years to get our laser cutter, more 3D printers and the video gaming systems.

HANESKI: The furniture and equipment in our space are thanks to a grant we received from the Orange Bowl Committee. Try to get a grant for something, or ask for donations. All I have to do is let people know that we crochet, and all of a sudden, you get some donations because so many people start crocheting projects and don’t finish them.