Product Design

“Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” –Steve Jobs

PHILOSOPHY AND VISION

Everything around us, unless natural has been designed. From the clothes you wear, to the car you travel in to the buildings you visit for work or leisure. For years items have been invented, reinvented, developed and improved. This would not be possible if people did not have a strong understanding of materials and their characteristics, a fascination for how things work or could work, an ability to create beyond our comfort zones and the ability to use technologies old and new to make and build their visions. Product Design gives students an opportunity to experiment with their ideas, to understand the world around them and develops design thinkers and makers.

Design and technology (Product Design) is a practical and valuable subject. It enables children and young people to actively contribute to the creativity, culture, wealth and well-being of themselves, their community and their nation. It teaches how to take risks and so become more resourceful, innovative, enterprising and capable. Students develop a critical understanding of the impact of design and technology on daily life and the wider world.

Turning imagination into reality, creating the world of tomorrow.

Year 7

'Gifts Project' incorporating - Health and safety in the workshop before taking part in practical activities. Students will use scroll saws, a disc sander and pillar drill to make their own products. Students take ideas from a 2D format and create them in 3D. Students work with wood, metals and plastics learning their properties and capabilities. Students will learn skills in Computer Aided Design and will laser cut outcomes to produce high quality products as well as hand made.

Year 8

Biomorphism night light, Children’s Themed Bookend & Desk Tidy projects – students investigate, develop designs and create 3D models using craft knives, modelling equipment and corrugated card. Computer aided design and manufacturing is taught as well as how to build electronic circuits. Students work with soldering irons, PCB drills, the laser machine and other workshop machinery. Students journey through the design process and turn their ideas into reality.

Year 9

Students will undertake both engineering and product design activities. Within engineering, students will complete a number of team based activities focused around transport systems, triangulation and bridge building and mechanisms projects. Within product design, students will complete a design, model and make project centred around an after shave bottle, using artist research, techniques and processes within the workshop. Students continue to use Computer Aided Design and Modeling (CAD/CAM) to add accuracy to their designs. Skills will be developed using Scroll Saw and Laser Cutter as part of the manufacturing process.

Year 10

Art & Design Practice – students respond to themes and a design brief, for example travel or British landmarks. Students investigate past student’s and existing products, completing analysis. Student’s complete primary research, emulating artists research as part of the design process. Students explore and experiment with practical methods such as block printing, poly printing and stencilling. Isometric drawing, orthographic drawing and 3D modelling. All work is presented in a portfolio.

Year 11

Art & Design Practice - developing practical skills in art & design in response to an exam brief. Students experiment and improve their work whilst using a variety of machines, processes and materials such as comb joint, vacuum forming and line bending, lamination, laser cutting and pewter casting. Each experiment is recorded as a practice and review for students to work towards and build their own 3D final project and portfolio for their final exam.

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