Term 3, 2024

Makerspace is a fun collaborative space. A place to make new friends, try new equipment, a place be creative and curious. Students can come to Makerspace before school and at lunchtime. Each week we have an activity where you can learn, or do your own creating and making.

Weeks 1 & 2 – NAIDOC week Desert Weaving

To celebrate NAIDOC week we learnt to weave following a technique learnt from the Tjanpi Desert Weavers. The group is part of the Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (NPY) Women’s Council, and works with First Nations women in the remote Central and Western deserts to earn an income from their spectacular art. Students had fun using the bright raffia to weave mats and fans!

NAIDOC week celebrates and recognises the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It is an opportunity to learn about First Nations culture and histories. This year’s theme is: Keep the Fire Burning! Blak, Loud & Proud.

Week 3 – Fonts and Lettering

Term 3 is Shark Tank time for year five. The students spend the term developing a new innovative product and present their invention at the end of term. To help the students get their displays ready we focused on fonts and lettering makerspace. Students used stencils and examples to create fun fonts and lettering. These funky styles are a great way to make any project or presentation unique and creative!

Week 4 – Friendship Bracelets

Friendship bracelet making is always a popular activity in Makerspace. We used clay beads, letters, numbers and wooden beans to create beautiful bracelets. The students also made calming beaded fidget tools.

Week 5 – Origami cat rings

Makerspace has been buzzing lately with students crafting their own wearable masterpieces. We’ve been busy braiding friendship bracelets and celebrating World Cat Day with some adorable origami rings. 🐱 Join in the fun every lunchtime in Makerspace!

Makerspace always has a puzzle going, and students take a much needed break working away at this “street foods of the world” puzzle that is tricky and provides interesting imagery, while teaching us about the unique foods around the globe.

Week 6 & 7 – Worry Dolls and Mindful Doodling

Student wellbeing is so important and Makerspace a wonderful place to escape and immerse yourself in creative and fun activities. This week we chased our worries away at Makerspace. Based on the Guatemalan tradition we made tiny worry dolls. The tradition is that Children tell their worries to the worry dolls, and place them under their pillow when they go to bed at night. By morning the dolls have gifted them with the wisdom and knowledge to eliminate their worries. We have also been stenciling letters in preparation for our ‘Sharktank’ displays and admiring lots of fabulous art works.

Week 8 – Pom-Pom garland

Makerspace students have been making pom pom garlands this week. Experimenting with methods, colours, and textures the students collaborated, problem solved and had a great time yarning! Lots of lovely Father’s Day cards have been created in Makerspace this week too! 

Week 9

Makerspace was packed with projects last week! Students were working on creative assessments like the year 5 Shark Tank presentations and the year 8 board game assignment. Other students were making beetles with a creative use of colour and symmetry!

Week 10

Belated Book Week celebrations and an author visit this week with Victoria Carless have inspired students to create their own books. Student are stitching in the sets of pages and making hardcovers for their books. The fabulous Victoria Carless spoke to our Years 5 and 6 students about the process of writing narrative fiction.

Term 2, 2024

Makerspace is a fun collaborative space. A place to make new friends, try new equipment, a place be creative and curious. Students can come to Makerspace before school and at lunchtime. Each week we have an activity where you can learn, or do your own creating and making.

Week 1 – Upcycled Braided Necklaces

We created upcycled braided necklaces in Makerspace to kick off Term 2.  Using strips of fabric, we braided them together and fastened them with knots and hot glue.  Then we cut out flower shapes out of the same fabric and used buttons as the centre piece to decorate our necklaces. 

To help us store works in progress, we are creating paper boxes out of old magazine paper.  Many of our students also enjoy sewing…pillows, clothing, and gifts! 

Week 2 – Poppies for ANZAC Day

Honouring all the people who have sacrificed their lives in past wars, our students have contributed to our display wreath of rosemary, with paper poppies for Anzac Day. 

We like to mix our learning with fun activities, but also mindful projects for those students who are wanting to take a break.  It took only days for us to finish this beautiful puzzle by artist Rachel Ignotofsky about “What’s inside a flower?”

Week 3 – Mother’s Day Origami Tulips

Origami is a very popular activity amongst our students, and recently, we made origami tulips and other paper flowers in preparation for Mother’s Day.  Other gifts are also being made for mum, or that special someone who has made an impact in our lives! All those lovely thoughts of the women in our lives were highlighted by a beautiful rainbow outside of Makerspace.

Week 4 – Pop Up 3D Cards

A perfect pairing to go with our flowers and other gifts, students made beautiful pop-up cards for mum, or a special loved one. 

Lettering, fine motor skills cutting out flowers and cute critters, and designing special elements for each card are skills honed this week. 

Makerspace always has a puzzle going, and students take a much needed break working away at this “street foods of the world” puzzle that is tricky and provides interesting imagery, while teaching us about the unique foods around the globe.

Week 5 – Marble Run

Some creative and interesting marble runs were made by students in Makerspace.  Using recycled materials, the students assembled impressive structures, while problem solving ways to prevent the marbles from getting stuck, falling over the edges, or landing in the wrong spot.

Week 6 – Mixed Media Bee Art and Sorry Day

The world celebrated World Bee Day on May 20th so we thought it fitting to create art inspired by such critical creatures to our ecosystem. Students used acrylic paint, bubble wrap, paper, a bee stencil, pastels and other tools to create beautiful mixed media bee art.

Week 7 – SPLAT Design Challenge

Makerspace was buzzing with many different activities, including art for National Reconciliation Week, finishing a 1000 piece jig saw puzzle, creating little critters out of pipe cleaners, and using our SPLAT 3D tools to create 3-D rooms, and designs. 

Sorry Day was May 26th and was followed by National Reconciliation Week (NRW). The theme for 2024 was “Now More Than Ever”. NRW is a time for all Australians to learn about our shared histories, cultures, and achievements, and to explore how each of us can contribute to achieving reconciliation in Australia.

Now more than ever, the fight for justice and the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people will continue.

Students acknowledged and celebrated NRW in Makerspace with watercolour paintings.

Week 8 – Animal Felt Bookmarks

Week 9 – Marshmallow Challenge

Our last week, and what a way to end the term!  We held a different marshmallow challenge every day and the students did a great job thinking about how to build the tallest structure, strongest bridge, something that rotates and something that is round in shape. Students ate their weight in marshmallows but what structures!

Term 1, 2024

Makerspace is a fun collaborative space. A place to make new friends, try new equipment, a place be creative and curious. Students can come to Makerspace before school and at lunchtime. Each week we have an activity where you can learn, or do your own creating and making.

Week 1 – Giant Colouring

To kick off Term 1, we enjoyed making new friends with collaborative activities, including giant colouring in. This was a great ice breaker for the students, new and old, to meet other students, reconnect with friends, and unwind with some meditative colouring.

Week 2 – Giant windball – Makedo

In Makerspace this week, we made giant Makedo windballs. We had fun designing and decorating each cardboard piece with school spirit or anything out of the students’ imagination. To assemble the pieces, we used the Makedo construction set, which includes screwdrivers and bolts. 

Week 3 – Friendship Bracelets

With a special someone visiting Australia, we thought it was good karma to celebrate with some friendship bracelets.  It took some fine motor skills to string the small beads onto the various types of string we had. We learned double sliding knots and single sliding knots too. The students made bracelets for themselves, their friends, their teachers and their sisters! This was a popular activity and we had many visitors every lunch period.

Week 4 – Valentines Waterfall Heart

A week of love celebrating Galentine’s Day inspired interactive card making with our love heart waterfall cards. This activity employed some fine motor skills, cutting out each heart, and following instructions on how to assemble the card so the hearts moved in a waterfall. Cards were made for friends, family and teachers!

Week 5 – Creative Critter – Makedo

Lots of creativity, structural designing, planning, problem solving and fun to be had in Makerspace with our Makedo Creative Critter competition. Students used recycled materials and our Makedo tools to assemble their critters, which ranged from animals, to mythical creatures. The only rules were: critters had to be no larger than a shoe box, no glue, staples or tape allowed. Assemblage was with recycled materials or with Makedo screws. There were some creative critters!

Week 6 – Recurring Pattern Making

We made recurring patterns, drawing whatever objects, or things, that inspired the students, onto one sheet of A4 paper, with the pattern continuing off all four edges by folding each of the edges over and into the centre of the page.  The paper was scanned and sent to their school emails. Once students received their scanned files, they could copy and paste into a document many times to create an ongoing pattern and print out onto A3 paper. Some students planned on using their patterns for cards, wrapping paper, or as a background layer for a piece of art. 

Week 7 – Scribble Bots

We created scribble bots using little motors and connecting them to batteries for power, learning about simple circuitry.  The students had to also figure out how much weight to attach to the motor, where to place the motor, and the position of the markers. We tried different types of batteries, and different types of writing tools.

This week was filled with many other activities as we prepared for our annual Open Day and brought out some fun kits for our students to try out, such as Makey Makey and Turing Tumble. Makey Makey encourages people to find creative ways to interact with their computers by using everyday objects, such as a banana or Play-Doh, as a replacement for keyboards and mice. This kit teaches students about conductivity and musical circuitry. Turing Tumble is a logic puzzle solving activity that mimics mechanical computing and challenges students to use bits and gears to figure out pathways for the marbles to move through.

Week 8 – Lego Architecture

Lego Architecture was very popular in Makerspace.  The students enjoyed assembling the Lincoln Memorial, Big Ben and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.  We also learned how to make mini origami plants, which were great landscape accompaniments to our buildings! 

Week9 – Easter Egg Sprouts

Preparing for Easter, the students used eggshells, cotton balls and cress seeds to plant their egg heads. Many fun faces and hairstyles were drawn onto the egg shells. The heads were watered so their hair would be reading for the Easter bunny!

Week 10 – Easter Egg Baskets

Students needed something to help carry their egg heads home with them so little baskets made from paper cups were cut and folded using a little bit of hot glue for the handles. Needless to say, their little egg heads looked happy!

For those who made egg heads and still wanted to do an Easter activity, we had bunnies to decorate with patterns and eye glasses. Designing patterns on the bunny was meant to be a relaxing end of year activity, which the students enjoyed.

As always, we like to encourage creativity and are open to various activities throughout Makerspace every week. This week was no different, as we had some birthday card making, puzzling, and sewing going on.