We introduced the next step in the activity: take some of the techniques learned with paper, and try to create a construction with cardboard that had some elements of pop-up. The kids were divided in groups of three or four for this part, and each group was working closely with a collaborator. I think this was of great help in making this section successful, especially for the younger kids. Finally, we presented each group with a very simple cardboard “stage” for them to fill however they liked.

First, we showed them some examples of the same mechanisms, and how they could translate and scale up with cardboard. This simple double triangle becomes a scary mouth, for example.

We also showed them Ryoko’s pop-up tree. They were duly impressed and inspired!

Of course, cardboard is more difficult to cut through with scissors. But where there’s a will, there’s a way.

Even when the elements were mostly flat decorated pieces of cardboard, they contained a dynamic element, the embryo of a pop-up, if you will.

The next step, of course, is trying to figure out how to affix the sheet to the stage…

Even the younger kids had no trouble finding a level of complexity of construction that worked for them.

All kids at Brightworks go through a five step knife safety training. One of the steps is: “Always cut away from yourself.” They take it seriously!

Zada carefully checks the hand she cut out from a tracing of her own hand.

Thinking inside the box…

After everybody had a chance to work for a little over an hour, we stopped at whatever level of completeness we were, and shared our work with each other. This group was inspired by the whiteness of their stage to create a winter wonderland / snowball fight scene. There’s also a polar bear in there.

This group, composed of three girls, made a store, a tree, and a bench, each of them working on separate aspects but collaborating to create a cohesive piece.

A piece with an environmental message: Don’t pollute, or the animals will turn into zombies. A very nice touch in this tableaux is the Coke bottle that swings into the fish’s mouth as you open the pop-up!

Isaiah and Zada used cutouts of their own hands to create a hybrid creature, half man and half tree. This is what happens, apparently, if you inadvertently swallow a seed…

The kids were very thoughtful throughout the sharing portion of the activity, and had good questions for each other, about both the construction challenges specific to each build, and the inspiration and narrative elements behind each idea.

It was certainly a treat to work with such a passionate and fun group. As we think about how to bring an activity like this to the museum floor, rather than in the controlled context of a workshop, we’ve learned invaluable lessons on how we might be able to quickly seed ideas and competencies so that a visitor might be able to pick up in a short amount of time the knowledge he or she needs to get started and have an early success. Hopefully, we’ll get to revisit this activity soon, perhaps during January’s After Dark event.

For me, one of the most interesting aspects of the day was shifting my thinking from the usual situation we are in — that is, having to provide a “finished” experience to our visitors, that ends when they leave the Tinkering Studio — to realizing that here we have the opportunity to offer a provocation to a group of tinkerers who then have the chance to keep working on whatever they started with us, and take it in whatever direction they want.

We started by introducing a few simple techniques to cut, fold, and pop out shapes with stiff bristol paper, briefly demonstrating a couple of tips that might make the process easier.

We also had examples of scenes that could be constructed using those techniques hanging in the space, which we had created in the previous weeks, while experimenting ourselves with the process.

We wanted to keep the focus on construction rather than decoration, so we opted to not put out colored pencils, crayons, or markers, and just use pencils and a few black sharpies.

Construction started in earnest right away, with lots of facilitators at hand: six from the Tinkering Studio, and six Collaborators from Brightworks, for a total of 13 kids!

A lot of the kids were in the 6-8 age range, and we were a little worried that the activity required too much fine hand manipulation, but they did not seem fazed or slowed by that at all.

Pop-up shapes start appearing everywhere.

The collaborators also got into it, and started exploring geometry, as well as shadow-play.

Beakface rules, and the font is really nice too! The kid who made this said he had played with pop-ups before, but never this specific triangular mechanism.

Some kids got really interested in the iterative nature of the process, and created many versions of the same mechanism.

Quinn made a very unique three-dimensional shape, and then realized that it worked well as a marble chute!

And finally, our friend, Tinkerer in Residence, and Brightworks director Gever Tulley created his own pop-up as well!

Stay tuned for the second part tomorrow, because after a short break we moved on to large scale cardboard construction!

Gever showed up with 400 linear feet of 1/2″ diameter, 10-foot long PVC pipes, and as a further contraint, decided to not cut down any of the pipe to a length smaller than 5 feet. We quickly realized that the only way to join pieces together was to drill holes in them, and lash them together with bailing wire. Zipties proved to be too flimsy, and would break under tension. We ended up making two main structures: one used the tension of the pipes agains each other to hold itself up, and the other used tension from a rope to keep from springing apart. And, of course, we had to try and suspend a kid (again) from one of our contraptions.

The initial idea takes shape: joining pipes together with bailing wire.

We made a quick jig to hold the pipes in place while we drilled holes into them.

Bailing wire and lots of twisting holds everything together.

The first structure starts taking shape: a pentagon base connected by 5 longer bent pipes becomes very sturdy.

We added more pipes radially without really knowing where we were going with it…

But eventually it became a structure solid enough to hand a swing from it!

Annie decided to have a go, and amazingly, the structure held! This created a line of kids all wanting to have their turn next.

Two more girls have a go.

Emboldened, we tried to see if we could life the whole structure up without it crumbling, with a kid inside. The answer (luckily) was yes!

The second structure we built, while not as exciting, was interesting because it used a completely different principle to hold itself together.

Cool knot.

For the rest of the photos, check out the slideshow on flickr.

Well, how about 2,000? Gever Tulley, our beloved Tinkerer in Residence, worked all day in the Tinkering Studio to see what he could come up with with lots of one thing and one thing only. We happened to have around a little over 2,000 strawberry baskets (long story, maybe one day they will be used for what they were originally meant…), and so we piled them all on a table, and started futzing and playing. Using only binder clips to join them, and later on nothing but gravity and stacking, here are some of the things we came up with.

Binder clips are a good way to hold baskets together non-destructively, but they limit which sides can be joined. Interesting constraint to work with!

About half-way into the first wave of construction. Notice the big dome on the left above the table, and the beginnings of what we christened Strawberryopolis.

The easy way to make an arch.

A giant tower with no binder clips whatsoever. Just gravity and stacking.

Ryan, Annie, and Kate pose with their masterpiece.

This happened spontaneously while we were having lunch!

Art Deco arches by Kai.

A giant pyramid using almost all of the baskets! It was so strong that it supported a small child (scroll down for the movie.)

The piggy sphinx.

And finally my favorite bit: testing the strength of the pyramid (again made with no binder clips) with our wonderful human test subject: Rowan! Thank you for being awesome.

More photos in the slideshow.