3D Design Contest with Apps for Kids in Japan
Sakura (or Cherry blossom) season, the icon of Japan, is around the corner. Therefore, we would like to share some stories from Japan this time.
For this article, our colleague, Junko Arai from SOLIDWORKS Education & Early Engagement in Japan, was the liaison with Keita Ushizaka, Industrial Human Resource Development Division, Fukushima Prefecture. Keita talked about how SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids inspires elementary students in their daily lives and how they used it for their presentation in the annual 3D Design Contest organized by Fukushima Prefecture.
FUN EXPERIENCES WITH APPS FOR KIDS
SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids gives kids some new experiences. “It’s different from drawing something on paper.” Kaita quoted a student’s comment about his using experience, and she said Kids can use Shape It to create all kinds of shapes easily. They are also excited to work on the SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids projects because it is easy to use on tablets and other devices. It is also remarkable that they can print anything they designed as 2D pictures or 3D models with the Print It app.
Educators and mentors can focus on teaching and managing student accounts with Classroom with an easy-to-use environment. Students not only use it at school but also at home. It is very secure for file management, and data is stored on the cloud.
3D DESIGN CONTEST WITH APPS FOR KIDS
Every year, Fukushima Prefecture organizes an aerospace-related 3D Design Contest that targets K12 and university students. It aims to provide opportunities for the young generations interested in aerospace industries to improve their skills and expand their personnel diversity. They use SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids in the elementary school group and SOLIDWORKS in middle school, high school, and university groups for 3D design content.
The Contest was part of an “after-school care program” in the Elementary group to learn 3D Design with SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids. It is sometimes a challenge for students to learn new tools, but they quickly found out how easy SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids is to use. Once kids knew how to create basic models, the desire of creating complex designs sprung up. Moreover, they wanted to learn more. Later they started to share their designs with each other in the classes.
The students practiced a lot their presentation for the final performance. Some kids cracked under pressure, but they did not give up and continued practising their speeches, polishing their designs and PowerPoint presentations. At the finals of the 3D Design Contest, on stage, students showed images of their 3D models and gave publicly spoke about the concepts and functions of their designs.
By participating in this 3D Design Contest, they learned how to deliver ideas, transform them into 3D models with SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids, and provide clear explanations. It’s enjoyable to see those kids develop from zero presentation or 3D design experiences to win the competition and achieve their goals.
“I believe SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids can be used as an educational tool for learning how to model in 3D version and for various educational effects,” Keita said.
STEM LEARNING WORKSHOPS IN JAPAN
SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids also focus on STEM learning workshops.
Our SOLIDWORKS Japan team and our customer YAMATO LOGISTICS CO., LTD. hosted during last summer “Friday’s Kids Workshop”:
Koshiro, age six, became one of our youngest Dassault Systemes customers during the workshop!
With the “cube print” option in the Print It app, the children created flattened cubes on paper and cut, folded, and taped them into a cube.
SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids was also introduced into an online summer event for kids, “Kids Engineer” organized by the Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan.
Thank you, Keita Ushizaka from Fukushima Prefecture, and Junko Arai from SOLIDWORKS Japan, for these inspiring stories. We are glad to hear that SOLIDWORKS Apps for Kids helps the students in Japan have fun, learn and get inspired by design, engineering, crafting and making things.
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