A first-year engineering course at the University of New Haven was redesigned to add the benefits of learning in the makerspace into an existing design and customer-awareness term project. This modification allowed students to be curious about new technology and create better prototypes to then test and collect feedback from selected stakeholders, enhancing their ability to make connections and create value. 

Overview

Student teams were tasked with developing a puzzle to meet the interests of a chosen market segment while highlighting STEM through the inclusion of various technologies in the manufacturing process. The term "puzzle" was used very generically and was explained as any hands-on game or entertainment that required intellectual thought appropriate for the selected age group. This resulted in jigsaw puzzles, 3D shape puzzles, and maze-style games. The available market segments included: elementary school students, high school students, college students, working professionals, and senior citizens. In a class vote, the students allocated "extra-credit points" to the customer segments that would be the hardest to collect feedback from, and then selected the segment they wanted knowing the difficulty and "extra credit" possibility. 

EM integration

In this structured project, teams completed initial market research by identifying various stakeholder groups for their customers and interviewing them. After creating their customer musts/wants, students brainstormed ideas to create a puzzle to meet their market interest.  In order to prototype their project, students were expected to design and manufacture a prototype using the campus makerspace. Students finish the project with customer testing and a sales pitch of their project.

Makerspace Integration

The original version of this project had each student create a 3D printed puzzle that the class teaching assistants and makerspace staff would print on behalf of the student. The revision of this project presented in this card focused on students learning about various technology (laser cutting, hand tools, 3D printing, and Arduino) as they relate to rapid prototyping and design, and requiring students to use all 4 technologies themselves to develop their team prototype. 

Logistics

This card includes the project documentation which incorporated the makerspace into the existing project. The overall project takes ~6 weeks from start to finish, of which approximately four 100-minute class periods are devoted to the project and the rest is out-of-class work. Incorporating the makerspace training adds an additional 3 class periods to the in-class project time and is recommended to be complete prior to the start of the project assignment. 

The card focusing on the specific makerspace classroom training materials and activities for 3D printing, laser cutting, and Arduino) is available in the card #Prototyping via Makerspace Training in First Year Engineering, available here.