Inspirational Coasters - ESL lesson

thingiverse

The students craft and print coasters with motivational phrases. During the activity, the students acquire new vocabulary, select four distinct motivational words, and discuss the meaning of the words from their perspective. Why is the word motivational to her? What does the word signify for him? This activity teaches a 3D printing technique: utilizing the exposed infill as a design element. Inspired by Structured Clock by Ysoft_be3D - http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:557190 The concept of this lesson can be adapted to other topics and various age groups. For example: Vocabulary such as family member names: each family member is written on each coaster. Colors: each coaster is printed in a different hue with the name of the color written on it. Print Settings Printer Brand: MakerBot Printer: MakerBot Replicator (5th Generation) Rafts: No Supports: No Resolution: 0.3 Infill: Different densities and patterns Notes: Print with no roof and floor. Print with 6-10 shells. How I Designed This I used Tinkercad: Create a cylinder 80mm diameter and 5 mm height With the text tool, write the motivational phrase. Make the phrase as HOLE Align the phrase to the center of the cylinder Group the cylinder and phrase If the HOLE phrase created "separated islands" (for example, the letter O makes a circular "island" when cut from the cylinder), ensure to connect the "islands" to the cylinder. This is to avoid the "islands" from being isolated from the rest of the model after removing the model from the build plate of the printer. In MakerBot Desktop, Custom Settings/ Model Properties choose: a. Number of Shells = 6 (to create a thick contour) b. Roof Thickness = 0 c. Floor Thickness = 0 In Custom Settings/ Infill: a. select different infill percentage (15% to 20% recommended) b. select different infill patterns View Preview to see the expected result before printing. Overview and Background Background: Teaching abstract concepts in a foreign language can be challenging. This activity promotes the learning of abstract concepts (motivational words) in ESL (or any other foreign language class) through the design and printing of Inspirational Coasters. Overview: Students will work in pairs to choose and create four inspirational coasters. Students will create the coasters in TinkerCAD, adding a hollowed phrase to a flat cylinder. The cylinder will be printed exposing the infill (no roof and floor) as a design feature. Lesson Plan and Activity Duration of the lesson: 2 sessions of 45 minutes each. First session: In this session, the students work in pairs to choose motivational words and design the coasters. Choosing motivational words: Each pair of students selects four motivational words. If they don't know the English word for the chosen word, they can use a dictionary. Designing the coasters: After choosing four words, the students use Tinkercad to design the coasters. Please refer to the section "How I designed this" above for instructions. In MakerBot Desktop, the students select different infill patterns and density and number of shells to create various designs. See the attached photos of coasters with different infill patterns and density. The students export their files and save them as ".makerbot" files (for MakerBot 5th generation printers). Note: It is essential to save the file ready to be printed (sliced). The ".stl" file does not contain the complete design. If your school printer is from a different brand, please use the correct slicer program and G-code file. Between sessions: Print all the students' coasters and bring them to the next session. Second Session: Showing the coasters and discussing the words and design Class discussion: The students present their designs and explain: a. Why they chose the word? b. What the word means to them? Why it is motivational? c. How they designed the coaster. This part expands the English vocabulary to words like density, percentage, infill, whole, empty, roof, floor, etc. Each student takes two coasters home. Moroccanstar Hexagonal catfill Materials Needed 3D printer Tinkercad (computers with internet connection, Tinkercad accounts). Makerbot Desktop software. Skills Learned Vocabulary 3d printing Duration of Lesson 2 sessions of 45 minutes each.