Makeshop™

A creative space to play with ideas, explore materials, and tinker with tools.

Children's Museum of Pittsburgh

Dream Flight Adventures

IMG_1535

MAKESHOP was recently transformed into an interactive spaceship.  Gary Gardner and his Dream Flight Adventures prototype returned to MAKESHOP for another day of playtesting with our visitors.  He has already playtested his program at the Museum and a post describing that visit can be found here.  He brought with him a newer version of the flight simulator software that he…

Read more →

Indian Scouts and shopbots

IMG_0633

I had the opportunity to teach a Saturday workshop about electricity to a group of Indian Scouts.  The group consisted of fifteen kindergartners and fifteen dads.  I’m not sure who had more fun… me, the kids, or the dads. I think the dads did.  I gave the group the challenge to use some motors and batteries to make something… anything.  As usual,…

Read more →

Playtesting

IMG_0747

 A couple of Saturdays ago Gary and Sarah Gardiner of Dream Flight Adventures spent some time in MAKESHOP prototyping a new interactive, educational program.  Gary has been developing this interactive software for quite some time and recently he was asked to implement it into a classroom in Shaler Area School District.  The program is really fun to experience and I can…

Read more →

A year’s visit

IMG_0877

Thomas and Aiden visited the Museum with their dad a year ago.  The family is from Buffalo, NY and they visit Pittsburgh once a year. Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh is always one of their stops. I was fortunate to spend a lot of time with them during last year’s visit.  There is an older blog post that I wrote about…

Read more →

Guest puppet makers

IMG_0757

  A couple of weeks ago, we were visited by artists Zach Dorn and Murphi Cook. Zach and Murphi are two local artists. Zach was even a participant in the Museum’s Tough Art program two years ago.  This particular Saturday had the two of them making shadow puppets with our visitors.  They had a very simple set up with a…

Read more →

Knitting with YouthALIVE!

Knit the Bridge is a local art initiative by the Fiber Arts Guild to cover an entire Pittsburgh bridge with colorful knit (or crocheted) panels. MAKESHOP has hosted a KtB drop-off box, and we’ve had several visits in the past from guest KtB knitters. Last week, KtB brought a team of high school students from a KtB school residency to run a…

Read more →

Learning from teachers

IMG_0357

We don’t just serve children at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, we are also a resource for teachers.  We offer many professional development workshops for teachers.  Recently, we held a workshop to discuss the different options for early childhood educators to use the Museum.  We offered teachers an opportunity to reflect on certain areas of the Museum and how these…

Read more →

A classroom visit

IMG_0261

I recently had the privilege of completing a residency at a kindergarten class at the Environmental Charter School.  The class was exploring simple machines, such as pulleys, gears, inclined planes, wheels and axles, etc.  I was asked to help plan and co-teach with their teacher, Jen.  I always enjoy visiting schools.  Typically, classes come to the Museum to explore and…

Read more →

Puppets and technology

IMG_5432

How do you mix paper bag crafts with technology?  Our usual answer to a question like that is “put a light on it!”  Basically, we tried to figure out what we could add to a paper bag puppet to make it more “techy.”  Rebecca created a very cool example that combines a paper bag with an electronic circuit.  When you…

Read more →

Simple machines in MAKESHOP

IMG_0310

I recently had the opportunity to work with a kindergarten class from the Environmental Charter School.  We had a partnership with them that created a residency for two of our teaching artists to visit the school to plan and co-teach lessons.  Nick and I were asked to help with the first grade and a kindergarten classroom.  Nick helped the first…

Read more →