Units in Foundations of Fabrication

Course Structure

The Foundations of Fabrication course is based on 20 units, over 40 weeks. The goal of the course is to support anyone who is interested in the interwoven set of skills used in a Fab Lab or Makerspace. Learning these skills at MakeHaven will empower each students to put ideas into action faster, with the support of a local instructors, facilitators and a community of makers.

Unit Structure

Each Unit will be comprised of lessons, individual or small group check-ins, and assignments - all designed to build experience and confidence in each of the areas of investigation. Many of the units will extend over two weeks, often with each week having a slightly different focus. No matter how many weeks a unit may take, the students' time is always valued. Larger projects and units are given extra weeks to make sure they can fit within students' busy schedules. Shorter units cover topics that are smaller in scope.

Typical Unit Layout

  • Monday: Lesson recorded live from MakeHaven with Show & Tell to follow

  • Thursday & Sunday: Office hours to work on projects with instructor & others

  • Tue, Wed, Fri, Sat: work on assignments

  • Following Monday: Student work is 'due' so it can be discussed at Show & Tell

Unit Documentation

Students will keep a running portfolio of their work. This should document what they have made each week for the assignments, as well as any notes on their process that could be helpful to others or their future self. The aggregate of this documentation will serve as one of the major benefits of this course: a portfolio of experience to communicate competency and resources to reference.

2021-2022 Tentative Schedule

There can be many reasons that a large course schedule can change, but we have made a tentative schedule for the course, available at this page. We will always want to work with students to make sure that their engagement with Foundations of Fabrication is balanced with their broader life goals.

Unit Planning

As of right now, the units are still being finalized. The core Ideas are worked out, but the details and specifics of each lesson and assignment are still in development. Check out this working document to see the notes we started with - but know the website is more up-to-date at this point. There are still lots of items to work out as we progress (not to mention COVID-19), but that "build the plane as you fly it" spirit is wholly part of the Fab Lab mindset.

As we run this class in future years, there will be more formality to these plans. Hopefully in the future we will also be able to build a custom Learning Management System (LMS) that is user-friendly and as adaptable as as the Fab Labs that use it. We want this content to be accessible to all people; and have that accessibility and validity be a quintessential element of the most-evolved form of these unit plans.