Tinkering for People with a disability

Tinkering for People with a disability?

People with a disability can learn many skills through tinkering learning experiences, whether these experiences take place inside or outside of makerspaces and tinkering studios. There is a genuine sense of cooperation and the growth of creative and critical thinking. While it is important to ensure adequate scaffolding is around the task, this type of learning is often unstructured, and the teacher becomes a facilitator rather than directly teaching. The facilitator ensures that the student has plenty of opportunity to try, reflect, and iterate. A current program in Nunawading is following this philosophy with a tinkering program for people with a disability. It takes as its basis The Tinkering Studio, part of the Exploratorium in San Francisco, which encourages tinkering, exploring, and creating. For example, one young man on the program enjoys fantasy. He walks with a cane and wants to create a staff that turns into a cane with lights and the ability to come to him. Breaking this down in a tinkering way, a prototype will be being built out of straws, and playdough, and there will be many iterations before the final product. Throughout the process; art, electronics, design thinking, fabrication will all be explored.????

Tinkering activities can be adapted for different disabilities. For example, making your own accessible buttons with Makey Makey and Playdough, providing visual aids and examples of the tinkering exercise, building on student’s prior interests and knowledge. The activities can also be run for a low cost using a mixture of things like cardboard, and Micro:Bits. Or build your own circuit blocks using TapeBlocks a local invention that encourages tinkering for all abilities.???

Within Victoria there are other pockets of excellent tinkering taking place in special schools; Bullen Heights School has its own makerspace and an amazing Tardis prop. Yarra Ranges Special Developmental School has been running its own digital channel for several years; Glenroy School uses Makey Makey to engage with students. There are a couple of interesting programs based on playing digital games; Next Level Collaboration, and Crank. Another good example is The Lab, where participants are in unstructured after school settings where they have mentors who are interested in gaming and technology.??

It is hoped that tinkering will become an important part of the learning process for?people with a disability in Melbourne and wider Australia. The skills that young people learn are the social, creative and critical thinking skills which people across Australia are being told are vital for their employment prospects.??

We have 5 tinkering programs at Nunawading