After participating in a workshop at Castilleja's Design, Do, Discover conference, I was determined to include paper circuits in my curriculum this year.  Paper circuits are electrical circuits made from copper tape, batteries, and LEDs.

My first attempts at paper circuits were not too successful.  I had trouble completing the circuit and my LEDs would not stay lit consistently.  Now I've found a video that offers a tip that made all the difference.  It is the Simple Circuit Demo video at http://www.nexmap.org/hacking-the-storybook.  The tip was to fold the copper foil tape at a 90° angle and then fold it back over itself and also to do this where the battery connection occurs.  I also plan to purchase circuit stickers since they are much larger and easier to work with than the tiny surface mount LEDs I had bought before.

Here are the results of my most recent effort to add a paper circuit to my handmade journal.  I plan to have my third grade IDEA Lab students do this soon to enhance their journals. 

— Tatian Greenleaf

The third graders made their own journals last week by combining card stock covers with stacks of lined paper and bookmark ribbons, along with a QR code to this very blog.  I then sewed all of the bindings so that they stay together.  I've made an Instructable that explains this process here.

The students will be using their journals throughout their IDEA Lab tinkering class to brainstorm, sketch, and take notes from their observations.  The first page of the journals has a wordle containing our theme this year, the 5 B's: Build, Beautiful, Bot, Burst, and Become.

— Tatian Greenleaf

Our 2nd, 3rd, and 4th graders are helping us kick off the global Cardboard Challenge at lunch time in the Open Lab:

 — Tatian Greenleaf

Another exciting tool just arrived in the Open Lab!  The first print, a small robot, took about 30 minutes.  It prints using biodegradable PLA.  Here is the very start of the process:

And some shots from our second printing session, a handy pair of tweezers from Thingiverse:

 — Tatian Greenleaf

Using these instructions from the Exploratorium, I built a marble run peg board.  We're hoping to use these with students in the Open Lab this year. 

Here's a video of my son explaining how it works and demonstrating a run:

It's hard to contain my excitement now that this box is sitting outside of the Open Lab.  Inside the box is the Epilog Helix Laser Cutter.  All summer long, I attended workshops where we designed and cut wonderful things (boxes, puzzles, rubber stamps, etc.) using a laser cutter.  We still have to set up the device, connect the ventilation system, and go through a training from Epilog but... it's going to be available for students and faculty to use soon!

If you're wondering what a laser cutter does, here are some links to various laser cut creations:

Laser cutting: 7 inspiring creations
Laser cut creations on Instructables
My own Self-Portrait Puzzle lesson on Instructables
Epiloglaser.com samples

And to see it in action, watch this.

And now that it's unboxed, here's another photo:

 — Tatian Greenleaf

Alasdair Allan gave a speech at the Maker Faire in Trondheim, Norway, about rapid prototyping and what the Maker movement means.  Audio and text of the speech can be found here. 

— Tatian Greenleaf