Monday I visited a couple districts and realized I already own many of the items they were thinking of buying or had just bought for their Maker Spaces. So I decided to clean out my office (which had become a giant mess of storage) and turn it into an at-home Maker Space for my kids. So after some rearranging, digging through boxes, and organizing the last couple days, I present to you the Keehn Maker Space!
In the picture with Rylee (left), you will see the Chromebook hooked up to the MakeyMakey (although she's doing some design work in this photo), Squishy Circuits, MakeDo kits, markers, giant supply of cardboard, some other crafting things, etc. Then in the Aaden picture (below) you have the art supplies and more craft supplies, legos, laptop, and 3Doodler. In the last photo (below), because he was mad that there were no free computers, I let Easton paint on one of our "mess boards" which are the shelving pieces that came out of a closet we bought from Ikea that completely fell apart the second we built it. We repurposed the pieces as boards as portable hard surfaces for the kids to make messes on (painting, playdoh, etc).
With Christmas just around the corner we'll be making many new additions, but the kids and I are so excited about the start we have here! They even helped clean (willingly) to get it set up, and spent about 2 hours after dinner in here playing.
The Breakdown:
For those thinking "classroom applications" I would say that what you see here (minus the computers) cost under $500. It's a little hard to estimate, as many of the things we already had and I collected around the house. But a rough breakdown includes:
1 3Doodler ($100)
1 MakeyMakey ($60)
1 Squishy Circuit Kit ($25)
2 MakeDo Basic Kits ($50)
2 MakeDo Creation Kits (Play house and space ship) $40
Assorted legos (we already had)
Scrapbooking materials - stickers, paper
Cardboard (free from other stuff, obviously)
Fingerpaint/Paints ($40ish - we have a lot of paint)
Sharpie Markers ($10)
Assorted craft resources - tape, toothpicks, glue, cotton balls, plastic cord
Rubber Band Loom supplies ($50? - we have gotten several looms and refills over time)
Next Steps:
I feel short on robotics type materials. That may be the next place I invest some money.
The other thing I need to create a better space for is animation - stop motion, claymation type stuff. Our room is pretty full, but I think being creative with the space is one of the most important parts of a Maker Space! I also have a sheet hung up on the back wall as a "green screen" - but my sheet is blue, so I'd also like to invest in something that would allow us utilize that a little more fully. You can see some of the shortcomings of a "blue screen" in this video we made last fall.
In the picture with Rylee (left), you will see the Chromebook hooked up to the MakeyMakey (although she's doing some design work in this photo), Squishy Circuits, MakeDo kits, markers, giant supply of cardboard, some other crafting things, etc. Then in the Aaden picture (below) you have the art supplies and more craft supplies, legos, laptop, and 3Doodler. In the last photo (below), because he was mad that there were no free computers, I let Easton paint on one of our "mess boards" which are the shelving pieces that came out of a closet we bought from Ikea that completely fell apart the second we built it. We repurposed the pieces as boards as portable hard surfaces for the kids to make messes on (painting, playdoh, etc).
With Christmas just around the corner we'll be making many new additions, but the kids and I are so excited about the start we have here! They even helped clean (willingly) to get it set up, and spent about 2 hours after dinner in here playing.
The Breakdown:
For those thinking "classroom applications" I would say that what you see here (minus the computers) cost under $500. It's a little hard to estimate, as many of the things we already had and I collected around the house. But a rough breakdown includes:
1 3Doodler ($100)
1 MakeyMakey ($60)
1 Squishy Circuit Kit ($25)
2 MakeDo Basic Kits ($50)
2 MakeDo Creation Kits (Play house and space ship) $40
Assorted legos (we already had)
Scrapbooking materials - stickers, paper
Cardboard (free from other stuff, obviously)
Fingerpaint/Paints ($40ish - we have a lot of paint)
Sharpie Markers ($10)
Assorted craft resources - tape, toothpicks, glue, cotton balls, plastic cord
Rubber Band Loom supplies ($50? - we have gotten several looms and refills over time)
Next Steps:
I feel short on robotics type materials. That may be the next place I invest some money.
The other thing I need to create a better space for is animation - stop motion, claymation type stuff. Our room is pretty full, but I think being creative with the space is one of the most important parts of a Maker Space! I also have a sheet hung up on the back wall as a "green screen" - but my sheet is blue, so I'd also like to invest in something that would allow us utilize that a little more fully. You can see some of the shortcomings of a "blue screen" in this video we made last fall.
 |  |
RSS Feed
