Inspiretownsville@ MAKING IDEAS COME TO LIFE
STUDENTS, EMAIL YOUR LETTERS TO In Design and Technologies at St Margaret Mary’s College, we study both Design and Engineering units.
As Year 9 students in 2018, we made paddle-pop stick bridges that could hold up to 50kg and functional chairs out of recycled cardboard.
We have also had the chance to use professional software such as Autodesk Inventor to create 3D digital models of our mobile phone audio resonator designs.
Our resonators amplify sound without the use of electronics, which we achieve by applying knowledge of sound science.
In order to produce these products, we have had to learn different design and engineering principles, construction techniques and human-centred design processes.
We learn very quickly how to manage our time wisely!
In 2018, we were lucky to incorporate the use of 3D printing into our learning.
Year 8 students are 3D printing models of sustainable water bottle designs, Year 10 and 12 students are printing components of their jewellery designs and Year 11 students have printed scaled models of furniture.
As Year 9 students, we had to the opportunity to 3D print our mobile phone resonators.
3D printing is the creation of a physical 3D model which is produced from a digital model.
It gives us the chance to make a physical prototype of our design that we can test to see if the model works as intended.
I even had the opportunity to learn how to independently operate the 3D printer, which involves scaling my model and calibrating the machine.
Overall, Design and Technologies has been a beneficial subject that has been very enjoyable.
This unit has left both of us with an interest in a future career in engineering.