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Remake Learning focuses on Pittsburgh’s leadership in the international movement to “remake learning” and create educational opportunities designed for our times, the Pittsburgh region’s need to prepare its young people for college and the work force by building on the basics and connecting students with hands-on learning experiences that develop relevant skills.This series of reports was made possible through a grant from the Grable Foundation.

Maker Spaces Take Kids Out Of The Traditional Classroom

One school of thought in adapting to a new generation of learners is to take students out of traditional classrooms where desks point toward an instructor.

To do that, educators create a maker space where students can explore and question content.

Libraries use maker spaces, the Carnegie Science Center has a new digital fabrication lab, and Mayor Bill Peduto held a roundtable discussion on the importance of them. Entrepreneurs use them to collaborate and have access to materials they otherwise couldn’t afford on their own.

Twenty-five Western Pennsylvania schools were each awarded a $20,000 STEAM grant to provide those types of spaces by the Allegheny Intermediate Unit, which oversees 42 school districts surrounding Pittsburgh.

“When we look at the traditional learning environment of schools, we understand that perhaps that’s not conducive to those fluid intelligent skills that companies, fortune 500 local companies, colleges, career readying that they’re looking for,” said Megan Cicconi, the director of instructional innovation for the AIU’s Center for Creativity. “

“We’re looking at spaces that really foster student engagement, allow students to think critically and problem solve. So you need a flexible space.”

It’s difficult to identify a maker space. It’s not solely a science lab, a woodshop, or an art room. It could be an empty room where students write and paint on the walls or a room full of computers and 3D printers.

Nina Unitas, principal of Wylandville Elementary in the Canon-McMillan School District, didn’t have space in her building, so she takes the kids outside to the school’s Living Classroom, a greenhouse.

“In education we’re sometimes on a gerbil wheel of taking something shiny and new and implementing, implementing, implementing. When in reality we just need to slow down,” she said.

Tracey Heffrom, one of three STEM instructors at Holiday Park Elementary School in the Plum School District, said the concept of a maker space lets the student drive his or her own learning.

“It’s an adjustment, you know, we want to teach. That’s what we went to school for. We are teachers. And the whole concept of the maker space and the movement that’s going on right now it’s a lot more of guidance and facilitating towards letting the students do that learning on their own.”

Heffron said technology doesn’t replace teaching – it enhances it.

“And it’s hard to step back and you want to tell them the right answer, you want to tell them, ‘before you make that next step on your program, you need to pick up the pen,’ but that’s not my job. My job is to facilitate that, asking them questions on how they could get it done instead of just telling them the answer.”

The Remake Learning Project is a collaboration of WESA, WQED, Pittsburgh Magazine and NEXTpittsburgh.