How to create a robotic arm with your students

What are STL files?

Lesson objective:
Know what are STL files and create a simple 3D design.

It is important that your students know what an STL file is since they are the files that are used to create a 3D object.

As advice, you should create a lesson to explain what is an STL file that is neither more nor less than a CAD file which only contains the geometry of a 3D object. It is a very simple file which does not contain information about the texture, color or other types of properties that other CAD files do have.

In order for the student to experiment with 3D design in a simple way, a practical exercise can be proposed. In our case it consisted of reproducing a 3D design in the tinkercad.com program and generating an STL file of a well-known place in our town such as the temple of the “Playa del Angel”.

 

Photo collected from Diariosur.es

 

The objective was for the student, using the tinkercad 3D design tools, to generate a replica of the template with the Tinkercad tools (tinkercad.com). This online program is very easy to use and very intuitive, which allows the teacher that with a minimum of explanation the students work on a simple design.

The result of one of our students is the following one:

 

design of one of our students
Design of one of our students (Jaime Alamillo)

The student is not asked to make a perfect replica, but his design is required to keep the proportions and shapes of the original design.

How can the student’s work be evaluated?
By taking a test or orally through questions and by evaluating the work done
The Demeter Project