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Pine Crest School in Florida is an outstanding example of both the quality of education that its students are receiving, and the scale of operations at which the school is performing. A private school with a notable track record of student success, Pine Crest has two campuses, 17 miles apart: one in Boca Raton, and the other in Fort Lauderdale. They serve young people from Pre-K to grade 12, which leads to the Fort Lauderdale campus including an elementary school, a middle school, and a high school, while the Boca Raton campus has an elementary school and a middle school.
Pine Crest works hard to build rapport between the two campuses. This is no small feat with 2,699 students! With either location as a home base, teachers collaborate across these campuses, and are free to plan and create unique projects within the curriculum as well. We talked with Vicki Spitalnick, an innovation specialist and a robotics and engineering coach, to ask for details of what they’re doing in their three makerspaces. We have to say, we are impressed.
Pine Crest is operating at a higher plane than nearly any other K12 school. We’ve selected a handful of projects that demonstrate their commitment to academic excellence.
The 5th grade class at Pine Crest has recently wrapped up a project that made extensive use of 3D printing. They were learning about the differences between animal cells and plant cells, including all the functionality and components of a cell.
Instead of a traditional written assessment, the students designed a cell in Tinkercad and sent it to the 3D printer. Each member of the class then had to take their physical model to the teacher and explain which components they included, and what their function is.
As Vicki says, this hands-on learning provides young people with a sense of ownership of what they’re learning. They can use creativity instead of merely memorizing concepts, which is typically less interesting to children.
Teachers are given scope to add their flair to the curriculum, and the two campuses have slightly different versions of the cell project. This is the main 5th-grade project using 3D printers. It is one of the whole-class projects they do that relies heavily on 3DPrinterOS to send files to the printers at all times, from all locations.
Innovation Specialist at Pine Crest School
Vicki and Pine Crest’s team of innovation specialists have developed their curriculum over the past 10 years. It is constantly evolving, because so is technology and student ability. Projects that were appropriate at the 5th-grade level a few years ago can now be introduced in the 3rd grade, as pupils have skill growth and greater exposure to 3D printing.
This keeps the team constantly in professional development; constantly enriching their continuum of skills. They meet regularly with teachers at all grade levels, to understand how to develop projects that enhance what they’re teaching in the classroom.
And there’s a balancing act in any change. To keep curriculum and projects fresh is one side of the equation, so classes are not only repeating what older siblings have already done. On the other hand, younger siblings and parents can sometimes feel deprived if a well-loved project is changed or replaced.
There is a healthy mix of independent work and group projects at Pine Crest. Middle school is involved in competitive engineering teams, which are typically group projects with a heavy slant on 3D printing used for prototyping.
To make this work, the staff invests in a lot of skill-building for middle school at the start of the year. Grades 6, 7, and 8 use Cuttle or Adobe Illustrator, as well as Tinkercad, to discover how much they have access to and what they can do with it. It’s an eye-opening time and students get a sense of their potential.
While some youngsters want to just 3D print straight from Thingiverse, Vicki encourages them to edit the design in some way; to put their own spin on it. She has had success; students realize how fun it is, and some even purchase a 3D printer for at home so they can pursue their passion off-campus as well.
On campus, they build solar ovens, bottle rockets, generators. They compete locally with mousetrap cars, or solar-powered cars. Nearly every project includes a 3D-printed component. And these students are taking home prizes; some have even won themselves a 3D printer.
That passion translates tangibly to other interests. Students create models. They design and print unique chess pieces. One young musician – in grade 7 at the time – needed a new mouthpiece for his trombone, so 3D printed it for himself.
The bent of Pine Crest makerspace is to give access, to enable. As soon as students join the school, they are entered into the 3DPrinterOS database. If a student moves to the other campus, or as they move to the upper school, it’s very easy to allow access to a different set of 3D printers.
By high school, students can 3D print independently, as they have had so much exposure to 3D printing in elementary and middle school. These teens are using Fusion360 instead of Tinkercad, and their creations are limitless.
Vicki and Pine Crest’s team of innovation specialists have developed their curriculum over the past 10 years. It is constantly evolving, because so is technology and student ability. Projects that were appropriate at the 5th-grade level a few years ago can now be introduced in the 3rd grade, as pupils have skill growth and greater exposure to 3D printing.
This keeps the team constantly in professional development; constantly enriching their continuum of skills. They meet regularly with teachers at all grade levels, to understand how to develop projects that enhance what they’re teaching in the classroom.
And there’s a balancing act in any change. To keep curriculum and projects fresh is one side of the equation, so classes are not only repeating what older siblings have already done. On the other hand, younger siblings and parents can sometimes feel deprived if a well-loved project is changed or replaced.
Vicki and Pine Crest’s team of innovation specialists have developed their curriculum over the past 10 years. It is constantly evolving, because so is technology and student ability. Projects that were appropriate at the 5th-grade level a few years ago can now be introduced in the 3rd grade, as pupils have skill growth and greater exposure to 3D printing.
This keeps the team constantly in professional development; constantly enriching their continuum of skills. They meet regularly with teachers at all grade levels, to understand how to develop projects that enhance what they’re teaching in the classroom.
And there’s a balancing act in any change. To keep curriculum and projects fresh is one side of the equation, so classes are not only repeating what older siblings have already done. On the other hand, younger siblings and parents can sometimes feel deprived if a well-loved project is changed or replaced.
Pine Crest finds it invaluable to provide plenty of teacher training opportunities as well. This is no doubt one key to their notable achievement of 3D printing and the makerspace being so widely adopted by staff.
Teachers often ask Vicki for help to learn how to 3D print, and start with a keychain or similar simple project. They are welcome to 3D print small gifts for family members, and in doing so gain a greater understanding of how they can incorporate 3D printing into their classes.
Formal training is also provided. Sometimes Vicki invites staff in after school to learn how to use makerspace tools. Teachers are always interested in all the makerspace tools, and as well as 3D printers, Vicki shows them how the poster printer, laser cutter, and other equipment can be effectively used.
During the summer holidays, Pine Crest sometimes offers a full two-week course to train their staff on the makerspace equipment. And at the beginning of the new school year, through a program called “Teachers Teaching Teachers,” new teachers and staff can enjoy a walkthrough of the makerspace to explore its possibilities.
Vicki has found these possibilities and opportunities work in two directions: fresh eyes provide fresh insights. In a natural feedback loop, a piece of equipment will spark an idea in a staff member, and that person will ask Vicki if the idea is possible. She and her team will consider it, and realize it’s not only possible, it’s an idea to pursue and develop into something further.
She loves the level of detail the 3DPrinterOS gives about each 3D printer. It shows what color the print is. It tells how much filament is left.
Her advice to anyone starting a makerspace, is to start with 3DPrinterOS. She says she can hardly fathom the amount of time it would take to be running around with individual flash drives and plugging them into 3D printers.
Commenting on the scale of 3D printers they are running, she says, “The fact that we have technically four spaces that have printers. If I need to run a huge job, I can get 35 prints done simultaneously. And not just because I have the printers, but because I don’t have to leave my desk to be able to do that.”
She says, “Just being able to click a few buttons and set the prints going has been huge – and we can have multiple people doing it at the same time without stepping on each other’s toes. We’re not getting in each other’s way because it's organized for us.”
Summing up, Vicki says that if someone has more than one printer and multiple users, 3DPrinterOS is advantageous. She’s adamant that if she had to use USBs, Pine Crest would not be able to produce the way they do.
The 3D printed projects are often used as part of their grade or as an assessment. This encourages pupils to do their best the first time: they learn to be rigorous about following directions; ensuring their print is on the print bed; and checking they’ve completed all the steps.
But Pine Crest also teaches young people to work through troubleshooting and problem-solving. They build their resilience and learn not to get frustrated when something doesn’t work. Through the makerspace, students grasp that the first – second – third – and even the tenth prototype isn’t necessarily going to be the right one.
And what a fail-safe environment! In previous eras, students’ creations of wood or cardboard would have to be rebuilt from scratch if there was even a minor design flaw. Now they can make a change in Tinkercad and send it back to the 3D printer to try again. In less than a day a model airplane can have its wing dimensions adjusted, re-printed, and be ready for its next test flight.
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