Tag Archives: maker

Traffic Lights – Ticket out of the door

Posted in Back to the Classroom by

In preparation for going back to the classroom I watched a lot of teacher preparation videos on The Teaching Channel. As I watched, The Spotlight Method: End of Lesson Assessment I love the idea of getting students to tell me where they are with their understanding of the lesson. The idea is there are 3 circles like a street light and the students fill out a sticky note completing the following statement: Today, I learned…(green circle) Today, I considered…(yellow circle) or Today, my learning stopped because… (red circle).

I made my signs today. I will laminate and hang tomorrow! They are about 11″ round so many kids can add sticky notes per class.

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If you want to watch the video from The Teaching Channel, here you go! The Spotlight Method

Creativity.

Posted in Crafts, Maker by
I’ve been thinking a lot about this word. Where does it come from? What inspires us? How can you use it? What defines creativity? What do we learn in the process of creating?
cre·a·tiv·i·ty – krēāˈtivədē/ noun: creativity – the use of the imagination or original ideas, especially in the production of an artistic work. (Google)
This past week creativity has been all around me. First, my step daughter is at the age she is exploring things online, living and breathing Minecraft and just very creative in general. She and her dad have decided to do a podcast called Ella’s Entry. The first episode is possibly the cutest thing I have ever heard. I am not biased or anything but I think it is. The podcast came out of her dad listening to podcasts with her in the car and a curiosity of how podcasts are made and why people listen to them.
IMG_1839On Friday night, I was packaging some things I sold on ebay and when I finished I had this overwhelming urge to make something.  This year, I want to take my crafting to another level. I want to start creating rubber stamps and I have played around a little but I’m not a professional by any means. So I pulled out some sheets of rubber and started looking around on Pinterest to see what I could find about carving or something that would inspire me. I decided to carve a branch and a flower on a vine.
As I finished carving, I started looking at what the stamp looks when used with ink.
IMG_1841They were not bad but I could definitely see where I could improve. What struck me was as I looked at the inked images I began to think about what I learned in carving the stamps. I tried numerous blades. I moved the blades in different directions. I noticed imperfections in my stamps. The leaves weren’t completely smooth. I even cut parts out I wasn’t supposed to cut.
This is where my creativity really started to kick in. My imperfections did not deter me from continuing. They actually threw me in to a plan of action and excitement about my next steps to improve. Maybe they are not steps but more like guidelines.
  1. Any design is ok.
  2. The more I design and carve the better.
  3. Always draw the design bigger to allow for carving in smaller spaces on the rubber.
  4. Try carving ANYTHING. No theme needed.
I also set two goals:
  1. I want to be able to carve script
  2. I need to carve weekly

All of this came from being inspired to pick up the carving tools when I was sitting in the craft room.

Today, my family and I were walking downtown on a photo walk. It’s one of our “family things” since my step daughter has taken an interest in photography. I find when I am on the photo walks, I deliberately try to see things in a creative way. When we walk around we talk about different ways we can take a photo to show different things. Before we started doing this, I really didn’t think about how creativity wasn’t just something inside you. Creativity can be deliberate. Creativity can be about perspective and lenses (literal or figurative).

So what do you say to people who claim, they don’t have a creative bone in themselves? I think it is awareness and listening to your inner voice. It’s the learned ability to look at things differently. That takes practice. It’s the willingness to try something different.
What are you doing that is creative?

Columbia Mini Maker Faire

Posted in Columbia, Maker by

PicMonkey Collage.jpg

Today we celebrated Father’s Day a little early at Edventure in Columbia. What a fun day! It was a great day for families. We played steel drums, made music with gum balls, felted, watched robots play catch and frisbee toss, rode a virtual ferris wheel, learned morse code, shot an air rocket… It was a BLAST! Excuse the pun.

This was the second year for the Maker Faire. Keep an eye out for it next year… take your family!

 

 

 

 

Need something? Make it.

Posted in Maker by

I am all packed and ready for my trip to Cedar Rapids for “Mother’s Day Madness” (aka I am flying to meet mom for a weekend of relaxing). I am trying to pack super light and want to take my Kindle. I keep it in my purse and it’s getting purse gunk on it. Every time I think about buying a case it’s either when I just get home from shopping or I am wasting time on Amazon and can’t decide what I want. So tonight I took matters in to my own hands. I made one! (The crowd shouts in rhythm) “Maker! Maker! Maker!”

It is a simple case with a little upcycle to it. I had the fabric all ready and as I was looking through my supplies I realized I didn’t have any batting. Oh, NO! But upcycling to the rescue! I used an old stocking that sits in my craft room. It was the perfect weight for my little case.

Upcycle

Upcycle

After measuring the Kindle it was pretty easy. Layer my fabric and sew….

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Fabric Sandwich

And 30 minutes later, I had this wonderful little pouch. 🙂

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Kindle in a pouch!

Why is blogging so hard?

Posted in change, Uncategorized by

I have been fake blogging for years. I have recently decided it was time to revisit what blogging really means to me. I have always kept separate blogs for the education part of life and the my crafting. I would post on occasion. I used to blog more and recently I have asked my myself why don’t I make the time anymore? Why is it so hard?

I have come to a few conclusions. 1. Since I started blogging social media have become a major part of the culture and my life. There isn’t as big of a ‘need’ for me to blog because I’m constantly microblogging – Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are my connections to my people. 2. I am used to keeping everything separate. Each topic I am interested has it’s own blog, webpage, Facebook page, twitter account, etc. Why? In my mind, everything needed to be separate. Work couldn’t mix with my personal life. But we all know, everything mixes together in life and it is ok for my online world to reflect this.

So welcome to the relaunch of my blog, Life is a Maker Faire. I have mashed up my blogs to create this one location to celebrate arts, crafts, education, and the Do-It-Yourself mindset. This blog will explore my work in technology education and my maker, DIY side. Who knows what will happen when these two worlds collide online! Hopefully it will be an interesting fun ride.