Teacher/Professor Introductions

[Pintstein]

I'm a substitute teacher with a startup company aiming to provide 3D printer education and repair services to schools, libraries and hobbyists. Before I dropped out of my PhD I taught university biology labs like anatomy and physiology but now I substitute teach High school and Middle school. I have purposely been getting experience repairing and recalibrating a wide range of FFF printers so that I can fix, recalibrate or at least diagnose the problem within two hours of seeing a machine for the first time. When I substitute teach there is often a planning period or two that I am imagining I could use to get machines in good working order.

The biggest problem with this business model is that 3D printing is difficult to learn and few teachers have the time to master it. In an attempt to solve that problem, I am hosting a Makeathon at Twin Cities Makerspace designed to give teachers the hands on experience they need to use a 3D printer in their classroom. Do you think a 28 hour party with access to five 3D printers and an instructor skilled in Blender, TinkerCAD, OpenSCAD and Fusion 360 would be sufficient to give teachers a base for exploring the world of 3D printing? http://pintsteinpro.com/make.html
If not, what else would you feel is required to get a foothold in the world of 3D printing?

[cyberluz]

I teach at the secondary level, grades 9-12. We are going to make custom parts for robotics competitions that are after-school or part of the class.

Spent the summer using some Crickets in a Maker Space. Good prep for the FlashForge Dreamer we just setup.

With free Autodesk access for staff and students, we have started there. ABS seems better for durability and the heated build platform gives us flexibility to use APS or PLA. Not impressed with PLA and it's fragility and brittleness.

The 28 hour party might be better in parts ... especially depending on dependability of your printers. People learn better over time ... get to know their peers.

As another new task for us just starting ... but the students are at the same level ... or you have some good starters ... as they do, I will learn as they go. Younger are often impulsive and don't analyze what happens and don't get as far as fast ... and they need time to process. 28-Hour marathon?

[taylor12]

You haven't found Autodesk to be to complex and difficult learning curve for grades 9-10?