Tag Archives: Ian Klapper

September 24, 2019 · 4:03 pm

Photos from @sarahrothberg’s interactive presentation at the 5th Avenue Apple store last night… #ArtEdTech #MakerEd #STEAM

Ian Klapper (@ian32one) invited me to join him for an evening at the Apple Store on 5th Avenue to hear from artist Sarah Rothberg (@sarahrothberg on Twitter and @rothbergrothberg on Instagram). Explore some of Sarah’s work on her website: https://sarahrothberg.com/

Ian has explored AR (augmented reality) on his own and with students. While I embraced Aurasma years ago, Google Cardboard left me underwhelmed. Why hold an irradiated device in a cardboard box up to your eyeballs when you can more safely hold an iPad at arm’s length? I tried to appreciate CoSpaces, and maybe I didn’t give it enough of a chance. I’ve heard awesome things about Unity, and I’ve seen really lovely and impressive student projects — I just imagine it would require a time commitment for the learning curve and a set of really good goggles (Oculus) and haptic gloves. I believe AR and VR (virtual reality) can increase empathy or change perceptions by offering the user an enhanced or immersive experience. I just worry a lot of classroom AR/VR use is gimmicky. Ian’s words and Sarah’s presentation reminded me AR can also simply be fun and that there is value to bringing surprise, joy, and beauty with a user.

More info about the event, [AR]T Lab: AR Experiences Co-created with Sarah Rothberg here:

What happens when a lemon and a traffic cone collide? Using artist Sarah Rothberg’s creative approach and art, you’ll learn to code an augmented reality experience. Whether it’s happy, wacky, or weird, you’ll combine AR elements in Swift Playgrounds on iPad. Our Apple Creatives will take you through creative and coding exercises. Recommended for beginners ages 12 and up. Devices will be provided.

More info about other AR integrative art via collaborations with other artists and Apple: https://www.apple.com/today/collection/ar-experiences

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September 25, 2017 · 12:35 pm

Yes, I actually spent time gathering my tweets from @MakerFaire NYC weekend. #MFNY17 #MakerEd

Since I can’t get Storify to embed properly into a WordPress.com site, and I still do not self-host a WordPress.org site, I am gathering below my tweets from the last few days at Maker Faire NYC and some Maker Faire meetups.

Thursday, September 21

I went to the Maker Faire NY “Real World 3D Printing” Panel at Fat Cat Fab Lab hosted by Matterhackers and Ultimaker. It was great to reunite with other independent school technologists and fellow Ultimaker Pioneers, Ian Klapper (@ian32one), Rurik Nackerud (@okay2fail), and Sarah Rolle (@artdabbler13). I’m ever grateful to Liz Arum (@lizarum), the fabulous Education Community Strategist at Ultimaker North America), for suggesting I join the Pioneers, sending me updates about awesome meetups and conferences, and encouraging me to submit a 3D project for the inaugural Design Challenge Starter Pack. I love that my 3D Mandarin Seals project is immortalized in print among other inspiring projects from educators and artists! Here are some of  my posts from the evening:

#NYCIST friends at this @MatterHackers @Ultimaker Pre-@MakerFaire 3D-Mixer. #MakerEd

A post shared by Karen (@karenblumberg) on

Friday, September 22

I attended the 3rd (and my 3rd) annual Make: Education Forum at the NY Hall of Science where I reunited with teacher friends from the NYC Department of Education, technologists from other independent schools in New York and around the country, and exhibitors I met previously at previous Maker Faires or conferences. At the forum, Dale Dougherty, CEO and Founder of Make, exuded inspiration, genuine excitement, and kindness as he launched the day, introduced each speaker, and moderated the Q&As. Here is the schedule of speakers from the day. As per previous years, Dale offered attendees a backstage tour of the Maker Faire after the forum. Below is the description from the website — it’s a great event to attend if you can swing it!

Co-hosted with our partner, New York Hall of Science (NYSCI), the event is Friday, September 22, at the New York Hall of Science, home of World Maker Faire New York, from 10am to 4pm. This year, our focus will be on computational making, rethinking professional development for maker education and how making is not just about creating a makerspace but creating a maker culture.

Hear from educators, makerspace organizers, librarians, local and federal state department representatives, and youth organizations who have developed models and platforms to serve this agenda. If you are an individual who is either formally or informally supporting and/or creating project-based learning programs for kids that support general STEM areas, as educational policy makers, superintendents and principals, or youth programing coordinators, please join us.

Here are the tweets I shared during the day:

After the Make: Education Forum, I made it to a Maker Educator Meetup  hosted/sponsored by Maker Promise, Autodesk, and MackinMaker at NYU Tandon School of Engineering’s Makerspace. Here a tweet with photographic evidence via Mara Hitner (@3DPrintGirl):

Sunday, September 24

I made it to another Maker Faire NYC! Every year, I try to organize a block of tickets (through the Technology Department budget) for colleagues to visit the Maker Faire on Sunday, as there is a reduced Sunday group rate of 4 tickets for a total of $100. I also recommended people use their personal Professional Development monies if they want to get their own ticket to attend on Saturday. Additionally, I suggest they volunteer and attend for free (!) via the Make Faire Traveler Program. Here are my tweets from Sunday’s Maker Faire:

PS. I want to keep track of these tweets from others as well:

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May 25, 2017 · 1:43 pm

3D designing & printing Xingming Yin (personal name seals) in Class 8 Mandarin. @BrearleyNYC #MakerEd #NYCISTk6

I’m currently working with Yue Tang and Yusi Gao, Class VIII Mandarin teachers at The Brearley School, on a Xingming Yin (personal name seals) project. Historically and currently, a yin is a seal or stamp used to “prove identity on documents, contracts, art, or similar items where authorship is considered important.” After learning about Ian Klapper’s medieval seals and “moveable type” projects at Construct3D conference, I was inspired to suggest this to the Mandarin teachers.

Yue and Yusi allotted three class periods for students to design a seal in Tinkercad, print their stamp on our Makerbot printers, and try using the finished product. The steps involved are:

  • Create a hand-drawn design
  • Use Photoshop to isolate the ink
  • Flip the image horizontally
  • Export as JPG
  • Convert JPG to SVG (with online converter)
  • Import SVG to Tinkercad
  • Place SVG onto a box
  • 3D print

Here are the slides I shared with the Brearley girls to help them navigate the Photoshop and Tinkercad steps at their own pace:

Today, I’m going to run to a stationery store to purchase sealing wax (which melts via an embedded wick like a candle) and wax glue sticks that can be heating through a glue gun. With better planning, I would have ordered these three items below via Amazon:

Here are my slides from a presentation about this project at a NYCISTk6 meetup with other technology teachers from NYC independent schools:

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May 7, 2017 · 11:57 am

Notes from Day 3 of #Construct3D — can’t wait for the next event! #MakerEd #STEMed #STEAM

Keynote, Sallye Coyle of Shopbot shared the story of the company – primarily her husband wanted/needed a tool to help him build a boat, and initially they intended to sell to garage hobbyists. As it turned out, they now help Boeing, NASA, communities, machine shops, schools, and self-employed folks design and manufacture parts.

Darlene Farris-LaBar‘s session, Empowering Creative Minds with 3D Printing for Art & Design, including gorgeous examples of her art and inspirations. She is a co-founder of East Stroudsburg University’s G3D Super Lab. She shared many lovely examples of pieces printed with a Stratasys full color, multi-material 3D printer – they are just awe-inspiring.

Next, Jennifer Grayburn and Veronica Ikeshoji-Orlati led a session, Remaking the Past: Teaching Art History and Material Culture Through 3D Printing. They talked about having students locate, analyze, and print monuments and other works of art and how the process is most important (similar to what Corinne shared yesterday).

My friend, Ian Klapper of City and Country School, led a session on Visualizing the Past Into the Present and Future. He talked about the constraints of space in a NYC independent school located in Greenwich Village causing him to integrate and bring things into the classroom rather than have the luxury of a designated “Makerspace” — I too am very familiar with this workaround. At C&C, 3D printing is primarily done in Grades 5 and 6, but Ian has been working with teachers to 3D print with younger students too. He shared projects including Viking chess pieces, Medieval wax seals, Mesopotamia cylinder seals, Islamic clay tiles, Renaissance architecture, game pieces, Lenape legends, and moveable type for C&C’s printing press. Three more resources shared at Ian’s session: Thingiverse’s Universal Connectors Kit, Reflow recycled filament, and Mcor ARKe 3D printer which uses paper rather than plastic to form models.

And finally, the last session I attended was an energetic and remarkable share by Chris Sweeney entitled, 3D Printing and Digital Fabrication in the Design Classroom. Chris shared tons of tips, ideas, and photos of student projects including TurtleArt, MakeMakey cardboard instruments, Community Chess pieces, prosthetic tools for a student with cerebral palsy, and more. He also mentioned algae filament, Trnio (a phone scanning app), and using rock tumblers to smooth and polish 3D prints. Chris’s slides from the session are here: https://schd.ws/hosted_files/construct3d2017/db/3D%20Printing%20and%20Digital%20Fabrication%20in%20the%20Design%20Classroom.pdf

After Chris’s session, I caught the last two minutes of Exploring 3D Design Software and Best Practices consisting of panelists Matthew Borgatti, Sean Charlesworth, Michael Curry, Darlene Farris-LaBar, Eric Schimelpfenig, and Laura Taalman and moderated by Matt Griffin of Ultimaker.

Because I can’t remember things like I used to, here are some links from Sarah O’Rourke King, Consumer Youth Marketing Manager at Autodesk, of sites and people I want to follow up on:

Finally, the ever-inspiring Corinne Takara suggested getting ideas and motivation from these sources:

Corinne also honored me with one of her mycelium lights – she even gave it to me in a plastic corsage box! I told her I would absolutely go to prom with her — luckily she laughed. 🙂

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