Initial Testing

For this week we started to test print models of the United States to begin configuring the finer details of our ultimate goal.  We also begin doing research with teachers by asking them the methods in which they are teaching their students about the electoral college.  We have also been asking students that have been in classes where the electoral college is taught what ways they were taught and if they fully grasped the concept of what the electoral college is and how it works.

We are using the Ultimaker 2+ and the Ultimaker 3 to do the preliminary printing. Our test models are based on the amount of votes that each state receives in the electoral college.  Depending on how these test prints turn out and after modifying them, we plan to print the models so that each state corresponds to which way the state voted in the election.  We used the Community Shape Generators to find the the states that were created by David Reeves in TinkerCAD.

In the state of Virginia students are taught according to the Standards of Learning (SOLs) that the state saysevery student should know by the time they leave the class they are in, whether it be in 7th Grade Civics, 11th Grade Virginia and U.S. History or 12th Grade Virginia and U.S. Government.  The state provides teachers with activities to help their students learn and understand the method behind the electoral college.  Theses activities do not involve hands-on models that a student can see just how much influence the electoral college has in deciding who will becoming the next President of the United States.  We hope that by producing and providing these hands-on models to middle school civics and high school history and government teachers that they can help their students better understand the Electoral College.

***Feature Image provided by Everything Board Games***