The Big Book of Makerspace Projects is definitely the next book you should add to both your school and personal library. Colleen Graves and Aaron Graves offer up 51 awesome makerspace projects in this book that are fun and doable no matter what level you’re at.
Why The Big Book of Makerspace Projects should be on your shelf
(Disclosure: I’m currently writing a book with Colleen and Aaron and they are both friends of mine. But even if they weren’t, I would still recommend this book because it’s awesome. I also received a copy of this book for free from the publisher to review.)
As I was getting ready to write this review, I had a copy of The Big Book of Makerspace Projects on my desk at work. One of my students walked up to my desk with a greedy look in his eye, pointed at the book and asked “Is that ready for checkout yet?” I think this is a testament to the power that this book can have with students.
Here’s some of my favorite things about this awesome book:
The Projects
This book contains 51 different projects! They range from Brush Bots to LED origami to DIY musical instruments to 3D printing. No matter what area of makerspaces you’re interested in, there will be projects for you.
Supply Lists
Every project has a suggested supplies list. It gives you what the materials are and where to find them. I love how flexible many of these lists are and how many of the projects offer ideas for reusing recycled materials. Most of the supplies are very affordable, and those that aren’t are likely materials that you already have at your school (or that you could write a grant or create a DonorsChoose project for).
Challenges
My favorite aspect of the book is definitely the challenges at the end of each project. When reading a book of project instructions, it can be easy to fall into the trap of just making each project exactly as described. Colleen and Aaron counter that by offering suggested challenges. These help to spur on the design thinking and creativity of your students (or yourself!). I definitely plan on adapting some of these to use with my students.
Images
If a technique or skill is new to you, it can be hard to follow along sometimes. That’s why I like that every project has lots of great projects detailing the steps. This makes it much easier to follow along. The pictures are fantastic and help to clearly depict what is going on in the step.
I’ve only tried out a handful of the projects in this book so far, but I’m already planning on creating design challenges around several of them for my afterschool Maker’s Club in January.
Check out The Big Book of Makerspace Projects
The Big Book of Makerspace Projects is an amazing resource for teachers, librarians, parents and anyone interested in building up their maker skills. It offers up easy to follow instructions with lots of room to grow and add your own dose of creativity.
Have you read The Big Book of Makerspace Projects yet? Which is your favorite project that you’ve tried so far?
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