So On and So 4th

Thanks for joining me on my first ever Makers Space Monday! Today I will be talking about how you can create paper circuits in your own classroom!

At the beginning of the summer I attended a STEM Convention that Utah hosts every summer. One of the best things about the conference is that it is FREE. You gain so much knowledge, ideas to implement in your classroom and I even won something from ETA Hand to Mind, so cool! One of my favorite things that I did at the Convention was learn how to create paper circuits.

Paper Circuits can be found here at Makerspace.com . There you can go to the top of the site and go to free, where you can grab the free pages that I used. It does require you to enter your e-mail in order to get to the free pages. I printed the pages on cardstock so that they were more durable in holding the lights, paperclips and brass brads.

I ordered the following supplies from Amazon, as that was the cheapest way to do it, however I am not affiliated in any way with Amazon. 

1. Copper Tape

2. LED Lights 

3. CR-2032 Batteries 

For both projects you will need basic scotch tape. For the Traffic Light Project, you will need a brass brad and a jumbo paper clip. 

With the LED Lights, there is a great lesson to talk to the students about while also teaching them how to spot the negative and positive side of the light. 

As you can see the "legs" of the lights are different sizes. While discussing the different sizes, you can tell students that there has been scientific evidence that people who are POSITIVE have a longer life span than those who are negative. Therefore, when we look at the LED lights, the longer leg shows the positive side, while the shorter is the negative. 

Once you get your supplies together, you can either head to my Instagram for the video reel under my highlight that says Makers Space! Otherwise, I will give you the rundown here! 

Step 1: Students need to take the copper tape and carefully little by little place it over the lines provided on the paper. If it at all rips, students just need to make sure that they reapply the tape where it ripped, so that it stays connected. It is a great conversation to have about what happens if it doesn't connect. 

Step 2: After students finish with the copper tape, they will need to take the lights and carefully split the legs so that they lay on the copper tape. Make sure students are paying attention to the positive and negative sides on the paper and on the lights. They will then need to tape the legs of the LED Light onto the copper legs, making sure that the metal legs are directly onto the copper table. 

Step 3: Now students will take the battery, paying attention to the + and - sides of the battery. They will place the battery on the page (it's the gray/blue circle on the paper) 

Step 4: Fold the paper on the fold line, so that you can activate the lights. 

Here is what it looks like when the the circuit is connected! It is pretty cool! 

This is such an inexpensive project to have in your Makers Space or as an Early Finisher Activity. I wholeheartedly think that students could also great a game with this. Join me next week for another Makers Space Monday! I will be back tomorrow for Tech Tuesday!