Affordances of 3D printing


In one of my earliest blog I expressed an interest in 3D printers as an education tool, but hadn't thought too deeply about the scope of its affordances. The 3D printer can print out three-dimensional objects by depositing fused materials, commonly polylactic acid (PLA), under the control of a computer. The object created can be of almost any configuration or geometry and its design is based on digital model data or some other electronic data source. 

The affordances of 3D printing rely on the three components that make up the technology; (i) the computer aided design (CAD) software which allow for the specification of the design and then communication of this to the second component, (ii) the 3D printer which layers material according to the design to create the third component (iii) the physical product that results. The affordances discussed below are a result of the first two components acting together to create the third component. 

The most obvious affordance of the 3D printer is that it is able creates 3D structures or models of any kind. These products of 3D printing then have an entire set of affordances of their own. They are able to provide real-life physical models that students are able to examine in 3D dimensions and hold in their hands in order to more deeply understand and engage with certain complex and previously abstract concepts. Vaccarezza & Papa (2015) discuss 3D printing as a resource in teaching anatomy, where models of an organ can be produced at a level of detail that is nearly identical to the physical organ. This can reduce costs, ethical concerns and access limitations of dissecting actual specimens. 3D printing can provide a number of models that is only limited by cost of materials, and the models created can be tailored to highlight different aspects of interest i.e. nerves, vascular networks or muscles. 

3D printing also has the affordance of demonstrating principles by representing physical phenomena. An example is the tippe top (Ciocci et al. 2012), where the tippe top is a kind of top that when spun, will spontaneously invert itself to spin on its narrow stem. This top can be created using a 3D printer, and in doing so students are able to gain a greater understanding of the physics behind the structure. In a similar vein, Makino et al. (2017) showed how 3D printers can be used to demonstrate aspects of design as well as concepts in physics. They designed a police whistle using CAD and printed it using a 3D printer. They were able to rescale the length of its mouthpiece and the width of its body to demonstrate how frequency is proportional to the radius of the whistle. Another example is Blauch and Carroll (2014), who used 3D models to teach structure-energy relationships. Further Dean, Ewan and McIndoe (2016) had students using hand-held 3D printing pens to draw their own representations of molecular geometry.

Therefore the affordances of 3D printing I have encountered during my research can be though of in two categories:
(i)              The ability to demonstrate the process of design and as well as providing a depth in understanding of the elements of some physical processes. This first category relies on the CAD software as well as the 3D printer.
(ii)            The ability to increase understanding of complex processes and abstract concepts by producing graspable 3D models. 



References 

Blauch, D. N., & Carroll, F. A. (2014). 3D printers can provide an added dimension for teaching structure–energy relationships. Journal of Chemical Education, 91(8), doi: 1254-1256. doi: 10.1021/ed4007259

Ciocci, M.C. Malengier, B. Langerock, B. Grimonprez, B. (2012). Towards a prototype of a spherical tippe top. Journal of Applied Mathematics. dio: 2012:268537 

Dean, N. L., Ewan, C., & McIndoe, J. S. (2016). Applying hand-held 3D printing technology to the teaching of VSEPR theory. Journal of Chemical Education, 93(9), pp. 1660-1662. doi: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00186

Making, M. Suzuki, K. Takamatsu, K. Shiratori, A. Saito, A. Sakai, K. Furukawa, H. (2017).  3D printing of police whistles for STEM education. Microsystem technologies. pp. 1-4. 


Vaccarezza, M. Papa, V. (2015). 3D printing: a valuable resource in human anatomy education. Journal of Anatomical Science of India, 90, pp. 64-65. doi: 10.1007/s12565-014-0257-7

Comments

  1. Michelle M1 August 2017 at 18:22

    Interesting. I hadn't really thought about the educational possibilities of 3D printers in being able to create differing models for investigation, such as the police whistle example you talked about. Is the time and cost of printing coming down? e.g. would it be practical to print 10 or more objects? I've never actually used one.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Unknown2 August 2017 at 00:33

      Well, I don't know if you saw but they were selling 3D printers at ALDI not long ago so they're certainly becoming more accessible and I imagine the price of materials will continue to go down as they become more popular in use, so we'll see!

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