Naomi Meredith [00:00:00]:

3D printing isn’t just for older kids. Little kids can 3D print too. And I am talking more than just keychains for every grade here. The actual design of the print might not be as complicated as the older students, but this is a great opportunity you don’t have to miss out on in your classroom. And your students aren’t missing out on either. Make sure to check out the last episode if you haven’t already, episode 104, and I talk all about 3D printing there as well. Also, this isn’t the first time I have talked about 3D printing on this podcast. I have a free podcast playlist that is dedicated to all the episodes about 3D printing, and you can get that for absolutely free.

Naomi Meredith [00:00:45]:

And a whole spreadsheet with all of the other podcast playlists that I have, along with all the timestamps, and you can keep track of your professional development. You can grab that naomimeredith.com/podcastplaylist. While the audio from this episode has never been heard here before on this podcast, this is a presentation I did at a past online summit. In this session, I’ll be sharing with you practical ways on how you can get started with 3D printing with your primary students.

Naomi Meredith [00:01:46]:

Easy as one two 3D printing with primary students. It’s not as scary as you think. And I think by the end of this session, you will feel confident and excited to try 3D printing with those little ones in your classroom. Let’s face it, they are some of the most creative kids that I have in my class. So harness that creativity, and let’s get them to 3D printing. So before we get started, a brief introduction. I am Naomi Meredith. I am a current K through five STEM teacher and coach, and I love helping teachers navigate STEM and technology in their own K through five classrooms.

Naomi Meredith [00:02:26]:

So wherever you are, you are in the right place, even if you’ve never 3D printed before. I had never 3D printed before two years ago, and I have learned so much. So definitely stick with me because you can learn a ton of ideas to help you with this 3D printing journey. I am also a dog mom to my little boy Frederick, and that is my boyfriend right there, my teacher, honey. He is also a teacher, like I said. He teaches high school Spanish, so we have a fun mix in our house. So why in the world should you 3D print with the littles? Well, like I said, they are so creative.

Naomi Meredith [00:03:08]:

They have such awesome ideas. So we want to harness that creativity and also build that curiosity about new tools. Whenever I have the 3D printers going in my classroom, they are absolutely obsessed and memorized, and 3D printers actually, when you watch them, they are really calming. They go in layers. So there’s a great video by National Geographic kids that I always show in my classroom. It’s a couple of minutes long, but it talks about how 3D printers work, and it’s just like icing a cake. So it’s melting plastic and layers upon layers. So the kids love it.

Naomi Meredith [00:03:44]:

They think it’s super amazing and it is really cool. It’s super cool. Also, if you get started when they’re younger, and you’re thinking about being in your position for a while, whether you are a classroom teacher, a STEM teacher, or a library media specialist, and you know that you are going to have access to 3d printers, starting them younger will actually help them learn skills that can be built on year after year. So when I started in my K through 5 STEM position the first year, oh my goodness. We had to build up so many skills with not just 3D printing but a whole lot of other projects. But it has gotten a lot easier in a lot of ways because kids have those basics that they can apply to new projects. So it might be hard at first, but like I always say, everything new is hard at first. So this is a great time to get started.

Naomi Meredith [00:04:35]:

And also, once you have those 3D prints done, there is so much pride in their work. It’s pretty amazing seeing what the kids have created digitally, and then it’s sent to a printer and then printed it out. It really brings their work to life. Yes, we do a lot of hands-on building in my classroom and digital designing in other ways. But it’s not always, of course, 3D printed. So that’s pretty amazing seeing your design come to life. So when you’re getting started to set up a 3D print lesson, these are the things that have really guided me through the process. I do 3D printing from kindergarten through fifth grade and with my younger students.

Naomi Meredith [00:05:17]:

These are the things that have really helped me. First of all, of course, we are trying to connect those standards and integrate them in meaningful ways. I’m really big on that, even in the STEM classroom. So when I am planning my 3D print lessons, I’m always looking at the standards keywords. So not everything works for 3D printing. Let’s be honest. Not everything works for engineering, design, process, or the scientific method. But when it comes to that 3D printing, here are some keywords I typically look for when I’m brainstorming lesson ideas.

Naomi Meredith [00:05:48]:

So, create, make a model, and design a solution. Those types of words really lend themselves to a 3D print project. Also, with the little kids, especially if this is your first time, create something simple. They’re still going to be proud of themselves. It doesn’t need to be complicated, but it can still be a meaningful lesson. So if you are purposeful in your planning, if you are backward planning, yes, backward planning in STEM, then your actual design with kids doesn’t need to take a whole week. In fact, the lessons that I teach don’t take the full week. But we’re still working on those course concepts as a whole.

Naomi Meredith [00:06:28]:

So I’ll show you some examples in the next slide. Also, taking that classroom teacher experience that I have is that creating a small group is very helpful with 3D printing. I have tried, sorry, whole group instruction when it comes to 3D design, but that was kind of a disaster. So I highly recommend, once the students have planned their designs, pull small groups to work with you to create those 3D designs. This could be over a span of a couple of days, and it will be a lot more successful, with less frustration between the students and with you. So let’s look at some examples of what I’ve done in the primary grades. On the far left, we have a little keychain, and the standard talks about communicating ways to take care of the earth, a brief version of that Next Generation Science Standard.

Naomi Meredith [00:07:27]:

So during the week, we talked about ways that we can take care of the earth. We read lots of different books, and watched videos. We even one day created a recycling plant separate from this 3D print. And then, by the end of the week, we planned our 3D print designs. And I did pull small groups to draw their design. We will talk about different platforms in just a bit. So, hold on, I know you want to know what did you use? What did you use to make this? So with that little earth keychain, they actually did draw their design. So that was what a student created.

Naomi Meredith [00:08:00]:

You notice around that earth, there is that weird flat part that is called a raft in 3D printing. So that is a base layer that I can choose to get printed before their actual design goes. This is really helpful for this project because they are drawing with their finger on the iPad is what I used. And so all of their stuff doesn’t fall apart. If I had more time, this is during this weird COVID year. I didn’t see the kids. This is the last project we did this year. But if I were to see them again, I would actually have them add details using Sharpies and paint markers.

Naomi Meredith [00:08:37]:

You notice that in the second example, the students had time to do that. For the keychain, I used one of those little leather pole punchers. It’s for making jewelry. So I was hammering in the raft, and then I added in a keychain. So the kids are really excited about that. So they have a charm to remember about their communication. For the second one, it’s talking about for the first-grade Next Generation Science Standard about animal babies and their adults and what traits they have that are similar and different. So again, we researched throughout the week.

Naomi Meredith [00:09:12]:

We used a lot of epic books. We looked at webcams of different zoos and different pictures that I pulled of animal babies and their adults. Again, lots of videos. So we researched a lot. Again, like for kindergarten, in a different way, we researched a lot about the animal of their choice, and then they planned the animal they wanted to create. And they had to write about things that the animal babies had that were the same as their adults and things that they had that were different because it just depends on the animal. There are a lot of similarities and differences. So we built upon that vocabulary.

Naomi Meredith [00:09:49]:

I then printed their drawings again. So they drew these on the iPads. We did do this in small groups, and these printed really fast. So, something to keep in mind. This is part of the tips. Keep your 3D prints really small because you can actually get it all done. I keep all of my prints K through five to about an hour of print time per kid that is still in my school. Over 500 hours of printing.

Naomi Meredith [00:10:13]:

But I was able to get it done with no problem. I have pretty good printers. So these little guys are really small, they can fit in the palm of their hands, and they were very excited that they could play with them. So that was their final design. The third one is a second-grade example, the little bird. I actually found that design online, so a kid did not make that. However, I could have kids make a bird, but their goal was to it’s talking about animal patterns and things in your area, something like that, for second grade. So we looked at different examples of birdhouses that were natural and also man-made.

Naomi Meredith [00:10:52]:

And students designed and then created a prototype of a birdhouse that they could actually build in real life. So a lot of kids were really excited once they got their little design. They were excited to take this home and it inspired them to build it out of real materials. So, big question. You’re probably wondering what tools you are using for kindergarten in first grade. At the time. I am using Doodle 3d Transform. As of right now. I know that it is an iPad app.

Naomi Meredith [00:11:22]:

I was doing a little bit more research on it. I was able to find it on the computer. So, what’s really cool about this Doodle 3D is that on the left-hand side, students draw their designs, and then simultaneously, on the right-hand side, they can see what their print is going to look like in 3D. So it helps them build that math vocabulary. The difference between 2D and 3D. They can add colors to their design. And we’re going to talk about some tips. It doesn’t actually print in color unless you are fancy and get some filament that plastic you put in the printer that has lots of colors.

Naomi Meredith [00:11:58]:

I usually try to print in lighter colors that they could color with real markers. So 3D Doodle design has been really successful. You can pull the prints off of the iPad into the 3D print file of your choice. So my 3D printers use STL. That’s the one it prefers. So I’m able to download it that way. The other app that is really great for elementary students as a whole, so I use this for second through fifth grade, is Tinkercad. This is a free doodle.

Naomi Meredith [00:12:30]:

3D is a little bit paid. It’s not expensive, but it’s worth the money, especially if you’re going to use it a lot. And a lot Tinkercad is free. It is a little difficult for second graders, especially if it’s their first time. However, they are capable. And like I said, if you’re starting Tinkercad at minimum at second-grade level, by the time they get to fifth grade, they’re going to be creating really detailed projects. So I was really excited for my second graders this year because they were building upon those skills. So Tinkercad is free.

Naomi Meredith [00:13:00]:

They can sign up with their Google account, but you don’t have to have a Google account to use it. There is now an iPad app, but also it is a web-based version as well. So whatever they work on at school, they can also work on at home. And it saves multiple projects, which is super great. And you can also, again, download their designs and then send it to your printer when you’re thinking about using Doodle 3D. Here are some tips that I have found. I’ve done this app with hundreds of students, so here is what I have noticed. Make sure that the drawings are flat on their surface.

Naomi Meredith [00:13:33]:

You can get more detail. They make things pop out. But in the examples that I showed you, the designs were flat, and then they still had a thickness to make them 3D. Also, make sure that all lines are connected. When we made those baby animals, we did an outline of the animal, and then they filled it in with the paint bucket so that it could be solid and draw the little details later on. There’s a little tool in there. When they’re drawing, there’s a pencil, which is the automatic default. I actually recommend using the paintbrush.

Naomi Meredith [00:14:06]:

The paintbrush produces a thicker line, and it prints a lot better. The pencil makes this line that’s really skinny and breaks easily. So have them make sure they use the paintbrush. You can use the colors of the rainbow to help visualize the design. A lot of kids actually like doing that to make sure that they added details, but they don’t need to color it in the app. It’s just an extra bonus. Just to help with that visualization, there is a camera to take a photo of the paper design. I have tried this.

Naomi Meredith [00:14:36]:

I haven’t found it super successful. The kids actually get more frustrated tracing what they took a picture of. So we actually still plan on a piece of paper for everybody, k through five. We still plan on paper, and then we end up drawing or designing in the digital platform. If you’re thinking about using Tinkercad here again, you could sign up with Google, but you don’t have to. It’s very helpful, especially if you’re going to have the same kids year after year. If they stay with that same email address, all of their work actually saves over the years, and they just have to put in a class code. So that’s really helpful to gain access to their work, especially if this is your first time.

Naomi Meredith [00:15:19]:

Allow students time to explore and look at all the options. Tinkercad is more difficult than Doodle 3D. I would not use Doodle 3D beyond first grade unless you need some students with some accommodations. Tinkercad has a lot of tools, so the kids really like looking through everything and trying stuff out. And I don’t give it all away the first day. They often will figure stuff out on their own, but I will give them some guidance. So once we have some exploration time, I’ll teach a new skill each day that they can apply to their design. So maybe the first day, I’m talking about stacking shapes, and the next day, I’m talking about how to add a hole in their shape.

Naomi Meredith [00:15:56]:

The next one is flipping their designs, so adding that gradual release in there is super helpful. Also, having clay available for you as a teacher to model the concepts that you are teaching, or also to have students build on the side what they’re trying to build on the computer, is super helpful. I have done so many demonstrations with clay and the kids. Having that physical model in front of them is extremely helpful in visualizing that abstractness on the computer. And a really big thing before you get things printed, make sure you check every single design as a teacher with the students, that everything is smushed together. So just like when you are using real clay, if you’re firing it in a kiln, you don’t want things just side by side. You want them smushed together so that all the pieces stick. Managing 3D prints can be a lot, but my tip for this is that I would save their designs with their first name and then their teacher’s name after it.

Naomi Meredith [00:17:01]:

Just in case something gets messed up, you have to print it again. You have it all ready to go. Keep all of the prints together in a folder on a device. So have each folder for a class. You can AirDrop or email from that 3D Doodle app. So I will do that with my iMac and our MacBook Pro, and I will AirDrop to everything and then keep their planning sheets to organize prints so I’ll have a class list when I am printing, and then I will put their planning sheet on top of the printer if that’s the one that’s getting printed. When the print is finished, I’ll put the planning sheet and their final design in a bag. Keep all the bags together for one class, and then I’ll keep them when I see them again or deliver them depending on what we are doing.

Naomi Meredith [00:17:45]:

So I made for you guys a resource to help you get started. Remember all of these apps and some other little things to try out. So if you go to that link, it’s been on every slide. It’s naomimeeritis.com 3d printpresent. You will have all of these slides that I’m using right now to help you with the notes and also a separate document that will give you some more tips, tools to try, planning sheets for the kids, and planning sheets for you as a teacher. Thank you so much for joining me today. I’m so excited for you. Even if you’ve done 3D printing before or if this is your first time, just dive right in.

Naomi Meredith [00:18:22]:

The biggest thing actually is learning your printers, and that’s a whole other session, but hopefully, this will give you some guidance when you are working with your primary students to help them be successful. Of course, reach out if you have any questions about 3D printing or even STEM and Tech in general. My email is contact naomimeredith@gmail.com. I also have my website Naomimeredis.com. I love me some Instagram, so it’s at NaomiMeredith_ and if you want to follow me on my Teachers Pay Teacher Shop, Naomi Meredith from the STEM Tech Co. You can get updated when new STEM and Tech lessons, including my 3D print lessons, will be posted, and you can implement that in your classroom. Thank you so much again, and I hope to hear from you soon. This presentation had a ton of visuals, and I bet you are dying to see all of the examples and handouts.

Naomi Meredith [00:19:15]:

You can grab the video recording of this episode, the video slides I referenced throughout, student examples, and bonuses for only $5. That’s less than a fancy coffee drink. This will all be linked in the show notes, and you can check it all out here naomimeredith.com/pdreplay