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" What are MakerSpaces? Makers build, fix, and create. They are students, teachers, tinkerers, cooks, technology buffs, architects, crafters, performers, hobbyists, builders, artists, engineers, scientists, and writers. They use the MakerSpace to solve real life problems with access to tools and materials. A MakerSpace is not confined to a school setting but can also be a community space like a public library where community members off all ages, means, and abilities can design, prototype, and create original works. On March 18th and 19th, we celebrated New Jersey Makers Day, and I had the opportunity to visit a number of different Maker events in various communities. These are some themes and big ideas that I noticed in my travels. Perhaps these big ideas will inspire you to create your own MakerSpace makeover in your own classroom, school, or local community."

"For our 50th issue of Make: (April/May 2016), we decided to talk to a number of people who have contributed to the magazine, shown at Maker Faire, written for the website, and who have basically been a huge part of the success of Maker Media, to share some of what they've been up to recently. We asked them about current projects they're working on, some of their favorite tips (on everything from practical shop workings to a maker pro's bottom line), and any inspiring memories they've had during their time in the maker movement. You can see the full feature piece in the magazine. We got responses from 28 people. As you can imagine, we received way more material than we could fit in the magazine. Since many of the tips were too good not to share, we decided to share the rest of them here on the website. Enjoy."

"In our innovative classrooms across America, students are using technology in ways that were unheard of just ten short years ago. In a small elementary school in Northwest Baltimore, students use their Makerspace to create 3D printed materials, learn to code and engage in other making activities. In another school in Philadelphia, a student fulfills his senior capstone project requirement by creating a "Smart Beehive" that uses sensors and a camera to track the health of a bee colony. While there are some schools of education that prepare pre-service teachers to excel in these types of technology-rich environments on their first day of in-service teaching, there is still room for growth in our teacher preparation programs as a whole, particularly as more schools shift towards digital learning. "Education-Creative Commons" by NEC Corporation of America licensed under CC BY 2.0" This is why the 2016 National Educational Technology Plan (NETP) asks us to refine educational technology's place in teacher preparation programs. It makes the bold statement that "no new teacher exiting a preparation program should require remediation by his or her hiring district."¹"

"Have you ever needed a short Ethernet cable, but all the ones in your closet are six feet long? You could just wrap up the excess, but for a cleaner look, you can shorten the cable yourself. With the right materials, you can even make your own custom-length network cables. By crimping your own Ethernet cables, you can make them in any length you want. Pre-made Ethernet cables only come in specific lengths, and you may need a size that isn't available. Again, you can always go longer than you need to, but it's mostly a waste."

"Recently SCAN journal published an article I wrote around our schools' experience in using iPads in learning and thought it would be timely to look at what was available for schools from educational journals to supplement material they find elsewhere on the web and to assist further in their decision making on whether to go with iPads as a learning tool and/or to get teaching and learning ideas."

in December they launched YouTube for Schools, a new initiative that strips away non-educational material to give teachers and students access to educational videos; and this week they launched a whole new lineup of educational channels.

"This is where the new Woodcraft app comes in, allowing you to not only design your next woodworking project but also create a bill of materials, plan for the tools you will need to use and visualize your project as well as carry it through to the finished product."

Nicholas Negroponte founded the MIT Media Lab (1980), WiReD Magazine (1990), and One Laptop per Child. Nicholas has recently launched a reading experiment to learn whether poor and remote kids (5-10 years old) can learn to read on their own with a solar powered, Android tablet suitably loaded with immersive and constructionist material.

"The following infographic from the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Minnesota offers 7 tips for the parents of struggling readers, conveniently structured around the apt acronym READING. Makes for useful source material that, combined with a few tips of your own, could be sent him a couple of times per year to support those parents looking for strategies and advice."

"Close reading is definitely a "survival skill" particularly in a world drowned in information. Close reading is all about reading differently, it is reading for deep understanding through paying attention to what others would normally oversight. Being a close reader entails focus and dedication to your reading material. It empowers readers to delve deeper into the latent meanings of text searching for cues that make the reading a totally different experience one that resembles the detective wok. Close reading is also about critical reading, reading that does not take things at face value but rather investigates for what is hidden between the lines."

"Interactive visuals are great learning and teaching materials to use with your students in the classroom. From explaining difficult processes to visual brainstorming, interactive graphics are a good way to consolidate students learning and promote their comprehension. Below are three of the web tools I would recommend for creating interactive visuals, I know there are several other titles to add to this list but the ones below are, in my view, more student-friendly and simpler to use."

"Pinterest is a visual bookmarking platform that has gained so much in popularity within the educational circles.Tons of teachers are now using it to organize, curate, and share teaching and learning materials. Pinterest has also made it easy for users to interact with the content they read via adding comments, liking , and joining others Pinboards ."

"Through the arts, students learn to observe, visualize, manipulate materials, and develop the creative confidence to imagine new possibilities. These skills and competencies are also essential to scientific thinking and provide a strong argument for transforming STEM education by integrating the arts"

""The single most important thing I learned in this class is that I don't have to have tons of homework to learn a lot." Mid-year or more frequently, I ask students to complete an evaluation form. I craft the questions carefully so simple answers are hard to write. Instead, I try to create specific, complex questions that cover the material, the classroom activities and the students-peers and the individual. Many teachers shake their heads and avoid these exercises. They scoff that students would actually take the forms seriously or that the students will say anything useful. But I find the nature of the questions often elicits a straight answer-short, but helpful."

"For the last ten years, we've worked one-on-one with students from elementary school through graduate school. No matter their age, no matter the material, when you ask what they're struggling with, students almost universally name a subject: "math," "English" or, in some instances, "school." Doubting that all of school is the issue, we then ask to see their last test. After some grumbling, the student digs down, deep into the dark, dank recesses of his or her backpack, and pulls out a balled-up, lunch-stained paper that, once smoothed out, turns out to be the latest exam. "

"These days, so much of the research students do is of the online variety. There's less time spent in the library, requesting materials, and reading through print journals. Online research enables students (and teachers) to get the information they need quickly and efficiently. But just because there is a lot of information out there, a simple Google search isn't necessarily going to yield you the best results. The handy infographic below takes a look at how to get the most out of Google when you're doing online research. So whether you're helping your students learn how to find the information they need, or if you're doing your own research for professional development or personal interests, you can be an effective, efficient researcher. Keep reading to learn more!"

"Using multimedia is part and parcel of students work in the classroom. Several classroom projects now include curating resources, using images and videos. However, the use of such media materials is regulated and does require complying by certain rules and guidelines. The wrong idea that many of our students hold about using media in class must change. They need to learn that something being accessible, downloadable and free does not mean it is ok to use it with no restrictions. For instance, when using images and pictures from the web, students need to learn how to properly give credit to their owners. The graphic below is a wonderful flow chart created byddd to help teachers teach their students about how to properly credit images they use. Enjoy"

"After posting about the "10 ways to get your students engaged" here is another good visual I learned about from Mindshift and which outlines different levels of engagement. As I have already argued elsewhere here in this blog, getting today's students deeply engaged (the first level of engagement below) in the learning experience taking place in class is not an easy task. Unless students see a direct relevance between what they are going to learn and how that information will help them them in their actual life , it becomes hard to hook and maintain their attention. Proponents of socio-cultural linguistics emphasize the importance of "context" in learning. Learning materials that are contextualized and tailored to speak to the immediate context of the learners are more likely to get students engaged and hence increase their rate of retention and comprehensibility."

"Education sprouts in many forms depending on how you look at it. Our views of what it should look like and how it should materialize depend on our value of it and our experience with it."