MakerSpace offers digital benefits for local teachers

HURON – For a few hours Wednesday morning, a roomful of inquisitive youngsters peered into their collective futures as they played and created with new technologies.
Digital tools and toys brought to Huron Community Campus for what’s known as an Educational Technology MakerSpace exercise were the props for the second-through sixth-graders, but Dr. Greg Francom’s underlying reason for the activity was to benefit certified South Dakota teachers enrolled in a master’s degree cohort in Huron in partnership with Northern State University.
“This class is for my teachers who have come from all over the place, and they’re learning about educational technology so they can have it in their classrooms,” said Francom, an NSU educational technology professor.
Thirty-five K-12 teachers are taking the “Teaching Learning With Digital Technology” course this summer as they work to earn their master’s degrees.
About 17 of them teach in the Huron Public Schools.

“We want them to learn about some of the new technologies that are out there and new movements in education,” Francom said.
Of course, the kids were enjoying the morning as they played and created with the use of unique technology in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, activities.
“I thought it would be fun if, while we were down here doing our class, that we could have them put on a MakerSpace and invite some of the kids from the community to come and be a part of it,” he said.
His assignment for the teachers taking his class is to reflect on the experience and submit a paper describing what they saw in the way of constructive learning going on.
For those unfamiliar with MakerSpace, a new movement that he said is really catching on across the country, it is “this idea that we want to build the next Steve Jobs or the next very creative individuals in our community,” Francom said.
“We don’t just want our students in K-12 to be just followers of directions and kind of mindless drones in that kind of a thing,” he said. “We want them to build problem-solving skills, creativity, those kinds of things.”
Francom said a growing number of schools are setting aside time for students to work on new concepts, solve problems and learn how to master new skills.
“We find that most of the other countries in the world – though they might have higher test scores in the basic subject areas – they still can’t quite beat us with creativity, problem-solving and those kinds of things,” he said.
“That’s why they’re trying to scramble to become like us, while on the other side we try to scramble to become like them in some ways with getting higher test scores in math and science,” Francom said.
“I think we should play to our strengths instead, and build creativity instead, problem solving, those kinds of skills that can last a long time.”