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in his classroom enables students to “chuck out non-functional ideas.” Two
years ago, he installed a consumer level 3D printer in his classroom.
I learned from Dave that students rarely 3D print their entire project. Instead,
usually the classroom 3D printer is a support tool for a larger, more complex
product, perhaps parts for a robot or a body of a model race car. Students use
the classroom 3D printer to make custom parts they can't ind anywhere else.
Two high school students in the United Kingdom work with a RapMan 3D printer
Dave's popular design class requires students to design and then 3D print
some kind of working object that people can use. Dave explained, “I found
that having students make their digital design into the real thing taught them
a lot. An object that looks great on the computer screen frequently comes out
of the printer looking wrong, or much larger or clunkier than intended.”
Dave described the experience of one student who designed an iPod holder
that would be clamped onto bicycle handlebars. “On the computer screen, his
iPod holder looked great. But then he printed it out and discovered it wasn't
very suited for the handlebars of a bicycle—it was too big and not very aero-
dynamic.” The student returned to the software drawing board and adjusted
his iPod holder to make it more streamlined and user-friendly.
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