The Art of Tinkering:

a three day workshop about tinkering, making, thinking & learning

September 15-17, 2015
The Tinkering Studio @ the Exploratorium
Pier 15, San Francisco CA 94111

Join us for a hands-on workshop about how tinkering and making experiences support fundamental STEM thinking and learning, designed for educators from all backgrounds, settings and experience levels. This three-day workshop will explore tinkering and making activities that have emerged as new standards for blending science and art explorations, exemplify best practices for critical thinking and incorporate creative ways of becoming active participants in the process of tinkering and making.

The workshop agenda includes: - participating as a learner in core tinkering and making activities
- debriefing / deconstructing each activity as an educator
- complete guides and material lists for each activity
- networking with other educators integrating tinkering into their practice
- a planning session about how to do this where you work

Application guidelines: - send a letter of interest to mpetrich@exploratorium.edu
- commitment of participation in the full three-day workshop
- participation with a partner or colleague is strongly encouraged
- there is a fee for this workshop, write to Mike Petrich at the email address above to find out more and reserve a spot

The workshop fee will cover: - all supplies, tools, and consumables materials used during the workshop
- electronic activity guides and copy of the Art of Tinkering
- continental breakfast, snacks, and full lunch each day of the workshop

The Art of Tinkering workshop will be led by Tinkering Studio educators who have worked with over 100,000 learners of all ages, in settings as diverse Kindergarten classrooms, graduate school courses, community centers, public schools, Tibetan monasteries, science museums, and cultural festivals around the world.
For more about the Tinkering Studio visit tinkering.exploratorium.edu

"Having an understanding and confidence to move back and forth between directing and allowing space is foundational to making tinkering really work for learning." -participant

The Fine Print: Workshop participation is limited, and applications will be processed on a first come, first serve basis. The workshop fee does not cover costs associated with travel, hotel, or meals and incidental personal expenses.

The Tinkering Studio recently hosted a series of Chain Reaction workshops for visitors attending the Festival Polytech, a public event hosted by the Polytechnic museum in Moscow.

The festival was the first collaborative project of the Polytechnic Museum (Moscow) and the World Science Festival (New York) and gathered scientists, artists and musicians from Russia, USA, Netherlands, Japan and Sweden.

Our part took place in the open air, at the All-Russian Exhibition Centre. Over 30,000 people attended the free event. The weather was unseasonably warm for Moscow, but we set up under a shade tent, sorting materials and tools for building (saws, drills, glue guns etc.). We created our usual S-shaped table configuration which divided the tent into two sections. All around our tent were reminders of the history and impact of the exhibition centre.

We also set up an example table with a preset section of chain reaction at the front of the tent, and a finale (which Nicole and Lianna had created at the Exploratorium) outside in a prominent location (more on both of these in subsequent posts).  We set everything up the day before the festival, and were assigned a guard to watch over the materials overnight since the festival grounds are open to the public 24 hrs.

The next day we found our materials just as we left them, and prepared to start the first public build. We were introduced to several museum volunteers (who also spoke English) and did a quick and dirty introduction to the activity, the materials, and the expectations for what visitors might build. Lianna is working on a post about the details of the activity during the festival.

... and then we found the Strandbeets!

We were delighted to find Theo Jansen as a featured part of the festival. He had just been to the Exploratorium as a guest of our annual Gala, but we hadn't spent much time together. We were inspired by his installation in the Space Pavilion as it covered almost all of the indoor space (this massive building used to be a festival hall highlighting the USSR space program). 10 or more of Theo's strand beasts were roaming both levels of the pavilion, and as an extra special surprise he set up a mini workshop showing off his experiments, tools, materials, and parts that were no longer working (he calls these fossils from the boneyard).

Theo stopped by our chain reaction area to see the construction for himself and Nicole asked him what he might build if he were to spend the day with us. He said "I would make what I always make, a Strandbeest, I don't make much else these days and I think I will continue with the Strandbeests until I stop building altogether".

We had a wonderful time at the festival, and send our thanks to Sasha, and the rest of the polytechnic staff for hosting us. We are especially grateful to the amazing volunteers who made us feel welcome, helped with translation, and became expert chain reaction facilitators over the two days.  Spasibo, Das Vadanya!

January 21-23, 2014
The Tinkering Studio @ the Exploratorium
Pier 15, San Francisco CA 94111

Join us for a hands-on workshop about how tinkering and making experiences support fundamental STEM thinking and learning, designed for educators from all backgrounds, settings and experience levels. This three-day workshop will explore tinkering and making activities that have emerged as new standards for blending science and art explorations, exemplify best practices for critical thinking and incorporate creative ways of becoming active participants in the process of tinkering and making.

The workshop agenda includes:
- participating as a learner in core tinkering and making activities
- debriefing / deconstructing each activity as an educator
- complete guides and material lists for each activity
- networking with other educators integrating tinkering into their practice
- a planning session about how to do this where you work

Application guidelines:
- send a letter of interest to mpetrich@exploratorium.edu
- commitment of participation in the full three-day workshop
- participation with a partner or colleague is strongly encouraged
- there is a fee for this workshop, write to Mike Petrich at the email address above to find out more and reserve a spot

The workshop fee will cover:
- all supplies, tools, and consumables materials used during the workshop
- electronic activity guides and copy of the Art of Tinkering
- continental breakfast, snacks, and full lunch each day of the workshop


The Art of Tinkering workshop will be led by Tinkering Studio educators who have worked with over 100,000 learners of all ages, in settings as diverse Kindergarten classrooms, graduate school courses, community centers, public schools, Tibetan monasteries, science museums, and cultural festivals around the world. For more about the Tinkering Studio visit tinkering.exploratorium.edu


The Fine Print: Workshop participation is limited, and applications will be processed on a first come, first served basis. The workshop fee does not cover costs associated with travel, hotel, or meals and incidental personal expenses.

The South Gallery includes a number of exhibits that Norman Tuck created. His newest piece is called "Your Turn Counts". It is a storage and display device that keeps a numerical record of each time a person turns a mechanical crank. Each digit in the display draws upon an earlier stage in the history of technology in order to advance the count.

Here is the initial sketch from 2011...

Here's a video of the exhibit in progress a few months before we moved into the piers...

and here's an image of it when we put it in the Tinkering Studio. Notice that at this point (April 9, 2013) there are ~19,000 turns on the exhibit. Today I noticed there are over 380,000 turns! What number will it be on when you visit the Tinkering Studio!?