Workshops
There will be two workshop periods during PLAYfest. Registered attendees can sign up for (free) interactive experiences to participate in. Below are some offerings that will be occurring.
Workshop A
Cardboard Animals with Mathieu Penot
Using only cardboard and scissors, you will explore how to easily build a 3D model of your favorite animal!
Materials Needed: Cardboard, Scissors, and Markers (optional).
Superhero in the Making with Ateba Gaines, Founder of Unreasonable Kids
Do you desire to become a superhero? This interactive course with a hands-on teaching approach will help you discover the inner superhero through social entrepreneurship education. Superheroes in the making will learn social entrepreneurial principles while understanding how to solve problems in a fun and creative online atmosphere! The workshop is an social entrepreneurship learning experience that will include fun lectures, video, and a mask/ cape making art project to help each student become a real-life Superhero.
Materials Needed: A sheet or material for cape, yarn, scissors, stapler, piece of paper (blank) and markers or crayons.
Sweet! Rainbow Candy Without Food Coloring with Margot Vigeant
Let’s play with food and physics at the same time! In this play-along workshop, we’ll make simple classic hard-candy, such as you may have seen in lollipops and lemon drops. We’ll talk a little about the science behind candy and how from two simple ingredients, we can get so much interesting flavor. AND (if you have a diffraction grating handy), we’ll turn our clear hard candy into a rainbow without adding a single additional ingredient! Still fun (and tasty) without the diffraction grating, so don’t let that stop you from joining in!
Materials Needed: A stove or cooktop; a saucepan; a heat resistant spoon or spatula; sugar; corn syrup; water; a cookie sheet or foil; and a reasonably heat-resistant diffraction grating such as this one: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007FZT3Y2/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o08_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Math Playdate with Christopher Danielson
Two playful math activities that will require paper, scissors, a writing implement. We will mail a Public Math postcard to those who register in advance, and make the file available to print for those who don't register in time. Our activities will flow from these postcards.
Materials Needed: Paper, scissors, writing implement, and either the postcard we'll send you, or one you've printed yourself (with a pdf we'll share a link to).
7 Wonders of Your World with Caroline Little
Come explore how to find the wonder in your life! We will use everyday items and apply the lens of wonder to bring curiosity into the ordinary.
Materials Needed: Please bring items that excite one of the five senses : taste, touch, see, smell, or hear. Bring five different items, or one item that you can explore all five with. Bring something that stirs your curiosity, or something you interact with every day. And, since I am a middle-school teacher….remember all items you select should be appropriate to share on screen with others!
Get your Sketchnoting On! with Kristin Welch
Get your favorite pen, pencil or stylus and a piece of paper and let's sketchnote. It's easy and fun! Resources will be shared so you can continue your sketchnoting journey afterwards.
Materials Needed: Pencil/pen/marker/Stylus and paper/tablet.
Creating Puzzles– Create Your First Puzzle with Roy Leban
If you love solving puzzles, you just might find you enjoy creating them even more. We’ll start with a brief introduction on why people solve puzzles, and the keys to creating enjoyable, satisfying puzzles. Then, with nothing more than pencil and paper (and your brain), you’ll create your very first complete puzzle which will be solved then and there by other participants. Your very first puzzle won’t set the world on fire. But I hope it sets you on fire, with a passion to create more.
Materials Needed: Paper and pen/pencil, (graph paper would be helpful).
Word Play!– Unlocking Combinations, Mini Sagas and Writing Games with Matt Coonan
This workshop will be a play intervention with the power of words. From 2 Words to Mini Sagas, this workshop will be an exercise in convergent and divergent thinking, all while creating in collaborative groups. All that is needed is an improvisational mindset- suspend any judgmental thinking, and operate from a "yes and..." mentality. This exercise is not just for classrooms- if you use writing or words in any field, you will enjoy this activity. We will reflect on how to apply this concept to any field, and life. Divergent thinkers, artists, scientists and/or writers, unite! Word Play calls…
Materials Needed: Paper and writing utensils; improvisational mindset.
NASA’s Eyes on the Solar System with Rachel Zimmerman Brachman
Come play with the planets and the NASA spacecraft that explore them. Learn to use free NASA software you can download and play with at home at https://eyes.nasa.gov
Materials Needed: Computer with internet access.
Animate the Arts: Developing Artistic Literacy with Media Arts with Jeremy Holien
Learn how media arts can ignite creativity for students of all levels, through digital storytelling and animation production processes, within this hands-on learning opportunity! Explore a variety of techniques using readily-available platforms to engage student voice and choice within active learning through media art-making!
Materials Needed: A smartphone with Stop Motion app https://www.cateater.com/try.html and FlipaClip app installed: http://www.flipaclip.net/
Purposeful Play With LEGO with Aaron Maurer
This session will explore how to infuse some hands on learning and play using LEGO in your classroom to as we navigate the waters of online, hybrid, and face to face. We will learn about play, learning space environments and attempt to complete two hands on activities.
Materials Needed: some LEGO bricks
Workshop B
Learning Math, Science and Coding with OpenSCAD with Joan Horvath and Rich Cameron
We will introduce the free, open-source CAD program OpenSCAD (www.openscad.org). OpenSCAD is a code-based CAD program that is particularly well-suited for mathematical and scientific 3D modeling. Since models are developed in a language like those in the C/Java/Python family it is also a good platform to teach coding. We will give a quick rundown of how the program thinks and a getting-started tutorial. We will also show a few of the math and science models from our "3D Printed Science Projects" books to show what is possible. Participants should download and install the program ahead of time from openscad.org.
Materials Needed: Download and install OpenSCAD from OpenSCAD.org
Creating a Video Poem with Tim Needles
Participants will learn how to write, create, and share a short video poem using free software. We’ll look at some different styles and examples then write and film a short video poem together as an example. Next we’ll each create our own video poems and share some of what we created.
Materials Needed: Any device with a camera (smart phone, tablet, computer) that can film. It’s also recommended that participants download the free app Adobe Spark Video (or any other video editing app).
Send a Postcard to Space with Erika Wagner
Have you ever touched something that has been to space? Join us for a discussion about the future of living and working in space, and create your very own piece of space art/poetry/ephemera for launch aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket. When it returns to Earth, we'll mark it as official #SpaceMail and return it to you or a recipient of your choosing. https://www.clubforfuture.org/missions
Materials Needed: One envelope, a blank postcard (or index card, card stock, cardboard, etc. -- rectangular, 3.5-4.25" high x 5-6" long, no more than 0.016" thick), and materials for coloring/painting/decorating.
Cardboard Box Puppet Theater with Sam Patterson
You will learn how to make a simple cardboard box theater for small puppets and toys.
Materials Needed: A rectangular cardboad box, a box cutter, tape, glue, and optional felt.
Doodling Builds Character with Scott T. Cook
Doodles typically are thought of as a drawing made while a person's attention is otherwise occupied. What if we tried to capture the essence of an idea or likeness in a doodle? Let’s explore some beloved Disney character likenesses in six steps or less; being mindful of shapes, their relationships to each other, and what makes a likeness successful. This workshop is intended for anyone who can hold a pencil and follow along!
Materials Needed: Pencil or drawing utensil, and something to write on.
Find Your Purpose with Planet Pilot with Diana Bernal
Dare to dig into your dreams and recall what you always wanted to do! Planet Pilot is inviting you to fly to the moon and back in a Quest to (re?) discover your Purpose. Buckle up as we'll be travelling through inner and outer worlds, playing with our thoughts, memories and stories to design a map of our personal life mission. Planet Pilot Crew member Diana cannot wait to guide you in this adventure! Five-four-three…
Materials Needed: A notebook and old-school or digital one.
Making Short Films for School and Beyond with Elizabeth Hummer
Video is ubiquitous. Let’s harness that power! This workshop is a quick exploration on how to make short films in the classroom ... empowering students to express themselves academically as individuals and as a team. Stop frame animation included.
Materials needed: A smart phone. Stop Motion Studio (free app) downloaded helpful though not necessary.
Playing with Paper with Peter Hoh
Let’s play with paper! I've been toying around with paper construction and have developed simple methods for making small tubes and boxes. These shapes can be combined in lots of ways to make practical and whimsical things. I’ll demonstrate a few of the things I’ve made, but the primary focus will be on free-building with the boxes and tubes you make.
Materials needed: 6 sheets of copy paper, 6 sheets of cardstock (about as stiff as an index card), ruler, pencil, ball-point pen, scissors, liquid glue, AA battery, paper towel tube, 2 marbles (optional), 2 wooden toothpicks (optional). Before the workshop, please cut 4 sheets of paper and 4 sheets of cardstock into strips that are 2, 3, and 4 inches wide and 8.5 inches long.
Pixel Art with Karl Koehle
Mosaics have been around for hundreds or years, but the digital medium is still rather new. It was with the creation of imagery for early video consoles, and the requirements of working within size and color constraints in which “Pixel art” emerged. Participants will be introduced to a set of basic tools within the free online program “Piskel” and encouraged to "design within a constraint" to make digital mosaic images of their own. Attendees who want additional challenge may choose to work on a larger canvas size, create an 8-bit style animation, or even use analog media from home.
Materials needed: A pencil and paper may be useful, but is not required.
Making Maths Fun in the Early Years with Dr Paul Swan & Heather Welch
Maths is an international language, it should be fun and engaging for children especially in their early years, many children have negative experiences with maths and then find it difficult to learn the foundation concepts. so lets make it fun and engaging….. Making maths fun, bringing maths on the floor, outside or even to the kitchen tables we will be using cubes, blocks, counters we are going to look at different ways for children to play and learn in the early years. Cubes are more than just a construction manipulative. Cubes will be featured in a variety of activities from addition to geometric problem solving. If participants have 2cm Linking cubes or a similar manipulative they can follow along with the tasks and activities
Materials needed: Linking cube, blocks, and lego.
