7P2-Cardboard Project 

To make The Cardboard Garage Door Opener me and Lilli Edger, my partner, needed to follow the following steps. Gather our supplies which consisted of, lots of cardboard, cardboard scissors, regular scissors, string, hot glue, hot glue sticks, a pencil, and an iPad. After gathering our supplies we needed to assemble our box, for this we needed cardboard, cardboard scissors, and hot glue. Next, we made our gears, drew a single gear and cut it out, to make all the gears we needed we repeated this process multiple times. After that, we found a cardboard pipe and but that on our box as a handle on one side and a winch on the other, we attached the string onto the winch. Then, we made holes in each of our gears and inserted toothpicks into these holes. Finally, after making holes in our box as well, we secured our gears next to each other in between the winch and the handle.

Seeing as this was my first time making a cardboard garage door opener there were quite a few things to learn. First of all, there are different kinds of cardboard that is better for somethings that others. I also learned a new appreciation for materials other that cardboard as it is sometimes hard to handle. Interestingly enough, I did not know that you can reheat glue with the glue gun tip, so that made the project that much more enjoyable.

Of the 7 standards that Michigan Integrated Technology Competencies for Students has set (Empowered Learner, Digital Citizen, Knowledge Constructor, Innovative Designer, Computational Thinker, Creative Communicator, and Global Collaborator) I chose the standard of Innovative Designer to be connected to my project. In order to fulfill the standard of Innovative Designer you must come up with your own idea, you must work with someone to make something unique, you need to take unused materials and turn them into something functional, and lastly you must make your design appealing and useful.  I chose this standard because I came up with an original idea of creating a Cardboard Garage Opener. I worked with Lilli Edger to make this project. We turned the cardboard that was provided and made them into a garage door that opened, which in our everyday lives is very useful when in a bigger scale. Our project has a official look that can demonstrate how it works.

In this project there were many challenges that me and my partner had to overcome. For instance, some of the cardboard we had chosen to work with was very brittle and had to be dealt with carefully. Another challenge was that the space we worked in only provided for so many unique projects so being patient for a certain tool was a challenge in itself. In making our project we took the risk that we would not be successful, that maybe the gears wouldn't spin or the glue wouldn't hold, these things did happen but we still were able to remake some of the gears to mesh, and duck-tape what glue could not hold. Yes, there were many challenges but there were also many solutions.

When doing this project again I would rethink just how long it would take, given that I had to work on this reflection part over the weekend. I would also reconsider the way that we make the gears, because that alone took most of our project and they weren't even the correct size. If given the chance to redo I would also change the look of my project to make it more professional looking. Although there were many things that could have gone better I had a lot of fun making a Cardboard Garage Door Opener for the first time.

The Hastings High School Career and Technical Education Program offers Agriculture, Business Management, Computer Programming, Construction Trades, Culinary Arts, Digital Multimedia, Engineering Design, Finance, Insurance, and Marketing. My project best fits with the careers in Engineering Design. In making this project I was most related to the jobs of carpentry, construction, mechanics, and clock making.