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Engineering 101

Boys working with a 3D Printer
Engineering 101 is a new afterschool club at Saint David’s.

Each Wednesday, a remarkably passionate and imaginative group of fifth and sixth grade student-engineers are joined by one or more members of our technology department for an hour of project-based investigation, building, programming, testing, revising, and miscellaneous fun.

Since the club’s inception in January, student-engineers have built launchers and rockets. They have designed and programmed video games using SCRATCH, a LOGO-based programing environment that is a product of MIT’s Lifelong Kindergarten Lab. They have “met” and interacted with a visiting expert – a NAO robot, more customarily seen in graduate schools than in elementary schools.

Currently, the boys are building solar-powered propeller boats. In this week’s class these budding engineers printed  three-dimensional plastic parts to modify their boats’ designs, using virtual 3D design software and Saint David’s new 3D printers.

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