Let's be Fab@School (ISTE Gem #1)

Over the next several days, I'll be blogging about the things I saw at ISTE that I cannot wait to try in my classroom. The first of my ISTE gems is the Fab@School Maker Studio by FableVision Studios.

When I saw the title of this session ("Paper Prototyping Bootcamp") and the presenter (Paul Reynolds of FableVision), I made it a priority to attend. In fact, I was the fifth person into the room for the session! I have been a papercrafter since I was in middle school, so anything involving paper or cardstock automatically intrigues me. The Peter Reynolds book The Dot is one of my very favorites, so combine the Reynolds brand with papercrafting and this was destined to be a fave. 

Peter and Paul Reynolds are doing really cool things at FableVision Learning, the resource for creative educators. One of those cool things is Fab@School, a very easy-to-use maker studio software that is web-based, inexpensive, and appropriate for all ages.

In the video below, I demonstrate in two minutes how easy it is to model a cube that can be printed and cut out.

There are so many more options than what I demonstrated in that two minute video. There are simple things like copy and paste and rotate. You can add a graph paper background if you need one. You can free draw with a line tool. You can add text. You can hook many shapes together and then "weld" them into one big shape. You can also "unweld" shapes into component parts (including shapes from the Fab@School ready-made projects). And so much more.

When you have a project just the way you like it, you can print, cut and fold it. Or, and this is the part I really love, you can send your page to a Silhouette die-cutting machine ($150 on amazon.com today) and it will cut on the cut lines and perforate the fold lines. How awesome is that! Kids are using Fab@School in combination with Silhouette cutting machines to prototype everything from simple 2D masks to complicated, scaled models of their schools. Fab@School has a library of projects, lesson plans, and tutorials.

My sister got the Reynolds brothers to sign a book for me
at the NSBA conference. It's a treasure!

A single license for Fab@School costs $25, so for $175 plus the cost of some cardstock, you could have unlimited fun with paper! Where many typical Maker Space tools could cost thousands, these tools offer a low cost option for some seriously creative fun. Plus, if you are working with an economically disadvantaged population, ask for a discount on licenses. I bet you'll get it.

I'm hoping to incorporate a project this year where students design components of a chemical "scene" with Fab@School. Then we'll print them out and automate them with a coding or robotic component of some kind. Stay tuned. It's going to be awesome.