Paper Dreams

Submitted by: Vince Heyser

It is easy to laugh at a simple concept that gets you and your kids fired up about learning. I would like to enlighten you on an example that has helped my CAD kids through some “January blues.” We have been printing full-scale drawings on CAD and then adhering those drawings onto one-inch foam board and making full-size models of a product. The result is an excited CAD student who can’t wait to carry their model to the next step in their other industrial art classes and a teacher who likes to see that spark of energy. This concept isn’t new and works really well with first year CAD students. The drawings don’t need to be elaborate 3-D renders, but instead can be multi-view drawings that can be assembled to show a small product. Some ideas are paper hope chests, jewelry boxes, coffee tables, computer terminals, snowboards, and the endless list goes on. I encourage my students to be very original on their designs and to add artistic elements as well. Lessons can be developed to explain the need for prototype and to aid in solving design issues before the product is put into production. So build a little example model to get yourself and your students fired up about industrial arts. Below is a picture of a paper hope chest built in actual size.