iPads, MakerEd and More in Education

One evening last week, I collapsed into bed after homework was finished, lunches were packed, and bedtime stories were read and happened upon an impassioned Los Angeles Times op-ed by high school political science teacher Jeremy Adams. In it, Adams decries his students’ lack of interest in reading and places the blame squarely on smartphones. My kids are still young, but I’m always thinking of how to instill in them a passion for books, so I read on...on my smartphone.

There are still many disagreements about how to improve the education system so that children graduate with the skills and dispositions they will need to succeed in life. Education reform discussions often center on how to tweak existing mechanisms, but what if the system itself is creating the problems educators and policymakers are trying to solve? That’s the theory favored by author and TED-talk sensation Sir Ken Robinson.

School libraries are starting makerspaces all over the world. It’s an exciting time in education as we rediscover the power of creativity. But many schools rush to start makerspaces so quickly that they neglect building the maker culture. Developing a maker culture is a lot like developing a love of reading, it takes time and persistence and it’s totally worth it. Here’s a few ways that you can work to cultivate a love of making and creativity in your students.

How do you build a making culture within your school? This was the question we were left to ponder after a year in our brand new makerspace. We felt that the space was ready. We had stocked the shelves with everything from cardboard to hot glue sticks and we had purchased the tools to program, cut, build and break. We had even rearranged the physical space to invite creation…. BUT we were missing a crucial piece, the MAKERS.

In Nick Provenzano’s book, Your Starter Guide to Makerspaces, he makes the case that a maker space can start a movement inside your school. I agree wholeheartedly.

There are many folks who have been saying to “stop” using the word Makerspace, and it shouldn’t only be one space. But sometimes this space is the seed that plants a maker movement into a maker culture.

At Centennial School District (where I’m the Director of Tech and Innovation) we’ve been slowly beginning to build a maker culture out of maker spaces. It is a process and one that doesn’t happen overnight. Here is a few things/ideas we’ve done that have jumpstarted the movement towards a culture:

Think your library needs a renovation? You might be right, but before spending unnecessary money on a major overhaul, you might want to think again. I receive inquiries all of the time from schools whose library's are not used, and thought that renovating their space was going to do the trick. Oftentimes, even with a big referendum that allows for a state-of-the-art renovation, those spaces continue to be unused.

The solution to turning a library around is NOT a renovation, it is the culture.

Upon my arrival at New Milford High School, I walked into a library that was unused and that was referred to by my principal at the time, Eric Sheninger, as a barren wasteland.  We didn't have the luxury of a big sum of money to renovate our space, so we were forced to think of other ways to make changes in our space.  Those changes focused not on how the space looked, but on transforming the culture of the space.