Summer Maker Days: Motors in Motion

11:00 AM -12:30 PM: Drop-in Maker Workshop: Motorized Mini Amusement Park Ride Construction

Calling all youth inventors, tinkerers, makers, and big thinkers! Join visiting maker and STEM educator Rachel Doneganas in an exploration of battery-powered motors and rotary motion as you invent your very own miniature amusement park ride to take home! This activity is designed for families with children ages 9+ and curious adults.

12:45 PM -1:15 PM: Special Exhibit Spotlight 

The American Precision Museum is filled with amazing machines of all types with gears, shafts, cams and other mechanisms designed to convert simple rotational motion into other motions.  During this short exhibit spotlight tour, APM museum experts will explore a few of the museum’s complex and unique machines that function using some of the very same mechanisms highlighted in the maker workshop. 

1:30 PM -2:30 PM:  Visiting Maker Demonstration

Join APM’s Visiting Maker Rachel Donegan as she shares examples of her work and  demonstrates her own unique maker approach including tips, techniques, and favorite tools for turning everyday cardboard into a variety of magical mechanisms – from Automata to containers to creative costumes, and more! 

ADMISSION: FREE for youth inventors 18 and under. $10.00 for adults.

Visiting Maker Bio: Rachel Donegan, Maker & STEM Educator

Rachel has been creating STEM educational experiences for middle and high school students that span traditional and new technologies for over 20 years. Recently, Rachel’s work has focused on working with digital tech and software and exploring the ways tools like laser cutters and 3D printers can change the way we learn and identify as makers.