Fab Labs and Education
Pedagogy, Research and Evaluation
The MIT Fab labs are special prototyping workshops that employ digital design and fabrication
tools and processes. They are applied STEM learning environments being used around the world
in community centers, colleges, universities, and more recently in K-12 formal education settings.
Fab Labs include computer-controlled subtractive and additive tools to make structures with
features from microns to meters along with development tools for embedded computing, sensing,
actuation, and communications. They also include tools to design integrated functional systems,
and video and online tools for collaborative development.
A Fab Lab is an environment that employs a constructionist approach to teaching and learning.
Constructionism uses Piaget’s theories of constructivist learning as a foundation-- learners
actively construct knowledge from their experiences in the world-- but builds on that foundation
by recognizing that new knowledge is constructed more effectively when the learner is engaged
in making things that are personally meaningful (Resnick, 1994, pp. 23-24). Although
implemented primarily in community development and informal education contexts, recent Fab
Lab installations in community colleges and a handful of public schools have extended the
constructionist approach into formal education institutions, thereby enabling a pioneering
community of children and young adults to build new literacies that help them shape their digital
and physical worlds. The effective integration of a Fab Lab learning environment in schools has
so far allowed students to follow their natural curiosity about how things work and their natural
interest for making things they want or need, scaffolding them on a journey through science,
technology, engineering, and math during which knowledge is acquired “just in time” instead of
“just in case.” In Fab Labs a number of critical skills necessary to succeed in the 21st century are
acquired including: systems thinking, critical thinking, problem solving, analysis skills that
inform an evidence-based iterative design process, communication and collaboration skills,
integration of social and ethical considerations into design thinking (Janisse, 2011, pp. 1-2).
Creativity, one of the most valued 21st Century skills, is greatly about the ability to make things,
whether physical or virtual, and is one of the targets of the Fab Lab program. Engendering
creativity will require blurring the boundaries between disciplines and between formal and
informal learning environments. The goal is to bring educators closer to Papert’s Samba School
effect, a community in which learning, playing and work are all closely woven into a richer
cultural-social experience and where learning is continuous, coherent and has a common purpose
(Papert, 1975, pp. 6).
In a Fab Lab learners are tasked with designing and creating, asked to produce content and
objects and to model systems. As Papert observed in his work with children in LOGO
environments, having children create their own systems and programs makes them passionately
involved in every aspect of learning (Papert, 1970, pp. 4-1). The things they design should be, to
a great extent, self-curated. As noted by E. Yi-Luen Do, and M. Gross in their Creativity and
Cognition paper describing environments for creativity, when students define their own problem
statement, figuring out what they want or need, they are greatly motivated to engage in just-intime learning to achieve their project goals (Do & Gross, 2007, pp. 29). Students draw on their
personal experience and needs as a primary source for creative exploration in the design
environment.
Our constructionist approach embraces cross-disciplinary learning. Again Do and Gross note that
designing and making happen in the same space, and a cross-disciplinary approach in that process
is essential (Do & Gross, 2007, pp.28). As a student generates ideas and builds prototypes
through incremental refinement—they learn to function in whatever fields necessary to
accomplish their goal, again, supporting a just-in-time learning approach rather than just-in-case
learning, where students pull for knowledge when they need it and apply it immediately. The
creative design process increasingly requires multi-disciplinary knowledge, knowledge that
includes STEM disciplinary skills and understanding.
The Fab Lab environment encourages an iterative approach to learning, an approach that MIT’s
Mitchel Resnick describes as typical for kindergarten-aged learners, but not for older learners.
Kindergarteners use a spiraling process in which they imagine, create, play, share, and reflect,
coming full circle to start the cycle again with imagining. He believes that technologies can play
a transformative role in learning if used to extend this spiraling cycle (Resnick, 2007, pp.2).
Figure 2: The kindergarten approach to learning (Resnick, 2007, p.2)
While evidence of the success of Fab Lab as an effective tool for STEM learning is still largely
anecdotal, there are a few projects in the US Fab Lab network that have performed evaluation on
their programs: the MC2STEM High School in Cleveland, OH, the South End Technology
Center (SETC) Learn 2 Teach, Teach 2 Learn project, and the Midwest Digital Fabrication
Partnership (MDFP) project.
MC2STEM High School was designed and built as a special STEM school in 2007, funded by the
State of Ohio through a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and by substantial
support from local foundations and sponsors. MC2 STEM High School is a project-based STEM
school intent on preparing students for college and successful careers in STEM fields. It is a
distributed campus, with 9th grade classes held at the GE Nela Park corporate campus, 10th grade
classes held at the Great Lake Science Center, and 11th and 12th grade classes and internships
held at one of the greater Cleveland healthcare institutions. MC2STEM has built fab labs at the
9th and 10th grade sites to serve as core platform for their interdisciplinary, applied STEM
learning approach. The school is using the Harvard based Understanding by Design framework
and a capstone curricular approach to create units that are engaging and that effectively use
technology.
Supporting curriculum has been developed by MC2STEM teachers that fully utilizes the fab lab
while integrating state standards. Participating high school students have shown great gains in
21st century skills. In addition, the students’ performances on the Ohio Standardized Tests have
shown enormous improvement after only a few years in this learning environment (see Table 1).
Although there are many factors contributing to these results, anecdotal evidence indicates that
fab lab was a strong contributor to the overall effect.
The table below reflects cohorts 1,2,3 performance on Ohio’s 8th grade test (OAA) and Ohio’s
10th Grade test (OGT) in the same subject area. MC2STEM High School has a waiver that allows
its students to test prior to the typical start date of the state’s testing cycle. The class of 2014
scores indicate how MC2STEM students have performed on the OGTs that they have taken prior
to the typical testing time for 10th graders statewide. The class of 2013 and 2012 scores reflect
that cohorts’ scores on the tests in March of their respective 10th grades. Please note that all 8th
grade scores reflect matriculation in other schools pre-MC2STEM, and all 10th grade scores
reflect the same cohort after MC2STEM intervention.
Table 1: Average percentage achieved on State Standardized Tests given in 8th and 10th grade for the MC2STEM Classes of 2012,
2013, 2014.
OAA vs. OGT Performance by
Class
OGT
READ
OAA
READ
OGT
MATH
OAA
MATH
OGT
SCIENCE
OAA
SCIENCE
Class of 2014*
90.00%
47.50%
80.00%
39.00%
67.60%
35.60%
Class of 2013#
95.00%
42.62%
85.00%
39.34%
81.70%
27.87%
Class of 2012#
90.60%
78.30%
87.70%
66.67%
69.20%
48.33%
OGT = Ohio Graduation Test (10th grade level)
OAA = Ohio Achievement Test (8th grade level)
* Data for OGT reflects scores for students prior to typical test date of March of 10th grade.
# Data for OGT reflects scores for students on typical test date.
MC2STEM has just graduated their first class of seniors. While the data is not yet compiled and
published, more than 90% of the students who started in 9th grade graduated, and more than 75%
of the students decided to continue study in higher education institutions or specialized training.
Two students were accepted to Ivy League schools, one with a full scholarship. The MC2STEM
students all come from economically challenged neighborhoods, and these results far exceed the
local public school outcomes.
SETC’s Learn 2 Teach, Teach 2 Learn (L2T, T2L) project is in its ninth year of operation. It is an
informal educational program, a youth mentoring program for learning and teaching emerging
technologies and sciences. The program hires approximately 50 youth teachers (ages 14-18) each
spring and summer to learn new software and technologies, to create a relevant community
project integrating those technologies, and finally to teach those technologies to about 500
younger people over a 4-6 week period. The Fab Lab is one of the core technology platforms used
in the program. In 2009 the program engaged elementary, middle and high school youth,
collaborating with 17 community organizations from Boston neighborhoods. The group was
diverse, self-described as 24% multicultural or multiracial, 18 % African American, 5% Chinese
American, 5% Dominican, 8% Haitian, 5% Puerto Rican, 8% did not want to declare themselves,
and 8 participants didn’t identify with any of the categories provided. Evaluation forms were
completed by all participants covering a number of topics, but the data was not published using
standard evaluation methods, rather it focused on trends in student responses. Below is a list of
some of the topics evaluated along with one or two select student responses indicative of the
category (King, 2010, pp. 9-10).
Table 2: Select Evaluation Responses from the 2009 Learn 2 Teach, Teach to Learn Report
Topic Evaluated
Select Responses
The general learning
environment
It was a much better environment and it helped you learn
different things quicker than in a class –Stefen (p. 30)
The program is set in an environment full of technology
while at school it’s just a board and desks with maybe one
old computer lying around somewhere. –Tien (p. 30)
Hands-on projectbased activities
The difference of how I learned here and from school is the
fact that you learn things hands-on. I believe that learning
hands-on helps you learn better. —Shaquille (p. 30)
Being able to change
how to learn and how
to be in school
differently
Now I know that for me to get things, I can’t just write them
down. I have to use them in life and at home, that way I
won’t forget them. – Xia (p. 31)
Contribution toward
learning in specific
classes
…I know for a fact that when I start my new science
classes, SOMETHING from the L2TT2L material will
popup and I’ll be ahead of the game.—Ariana (p.32)
Definitely taught me new things that will help me in my
future robotics and engineering class.—Nebia (p. 32)
Pure anecdotal evidence over the last five years of the program support the comments above, that
the environment is engaging, that hands-on project-based activities are generally helpful for many
types of learners, that youth learn about learning and that reflection on their own learning helps
them grow, and that this experience contributes toward learning in STEM disciplines. Also
evident in the 2009 report is that there is a strong social connection in the learning environment,
that peer-to-peer teaching and learning are positive and exciting experiences, that almost half of
the teachers return to the program for another year, and that this experience inspires many of the
youth teachers to seek higher education (pp. 3, 4, 6, 31).
Figure 3: Solar cell phone charger made by Learn 2 Teach, Teach 2 Learn students, 2009 (King, 2010, p.1)
The MDFP (NSF Grant #0802388) is a partnership between four higher education institutions:
Fox Valley Technical College, University of Wisconsin-Stout, Century College, and Lorain
County Community College. The three year project goals were to integrate digital fabrication
laboratories into selected courses to provide hands-on STEM learning experiences, assess the
ability of digital fabrication learning experiences to enhance STEM competencies and attitudes
and evaluate Fab Labs as a STEM recruitment vehicle.
The MDFP project data indicated three relevant outcomes of their research. First, the search for a
valid list of STEM competencies was complex due to a lack of clear consensus on the definition
of STEM competency—national and state organizations had different meanings and operational
standards for learning outcomes and how they integrate with the fields of engineering and
manufacturing. Instead this work pointed to the importance of skills such as entrepreneurship,
creativity and self-directed learning. Second, educator exposure to Fab Lab has generated higher
levels of interest in using digital fabrication project-based learning experiences in courses,
seminars, workshops, etc. Third, educators indicate a significant improvement in competencies
such as visualization, creativity, and critical thinking in their student populations as a result of the
work in Fab Labs (Janisse, 2011, pp. 1-2).
There is additional research being conducted on constructivist learning, new learning
technologies and the fab lab environment at Stanford University’s Transformative Learning
Technologies Lab. The research is in process and results are not yet published. Preliminary data
does indicate that student perceptions of science and technology and their sense of self-efficacy
regarding science and technology improve after interaction with a fab lab, with the most
significant impact occurring in lower income and female student populations. (P. Blikstein,
personal communication, August 24, 2012)
References
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T. MacArthur Foundation.
Janisse, J. et al. (2011). [Midwest Digital Fabrication Partnership, NSF Grant #0802388]
Unpublished raw data.
Jenkins, H. et al. (2006). Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: Media education
for the 21st century. (MacArthur Foundation Report). Chicago, IL: The John D. and
Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
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