Maker's Red Box tackles this challenge by developing course materials that help educators engage children with STEAM-focused making activities. The materials use the power of storytelling and role play to motivate kids to explore, design and create using new technology. The students learn key maker skills like 3D design and 3D printing, laser cutting, soldering, electronics and robotics, and soft skills such as teamwork, emotional intelligence and critical thinking.

Maker activities take place in makerspaces equipped with prototyping technology, including 3D printers, microcontrollers, soldering stations and laser cutters. Propelling a shared vision of bringing maker education to as many kids as possible, Craftbot has provided Maker's Red Box with 12 Craftbot Plus Pro 3D printers.

"Our goal is to make kids fall in love with 3D printing," says Peter Fuchs, lead developer at Maker's Red Box. "As soon as they get their bearings, they can't wait to discover what they can accomplish with the technology. Instead of some fancy lab equipment, Craftbot becomes a means of unleashing children's creativity and bringing their ideas to life, whether they're printing a building for the city of the future or a water tank to save a Mars mission."

Maker's Red Box is the brainchild of a team of seasoned education professionals with a passion for helping schools and students explore and benefit from the power of making. Over the past six years, they've run hundreds of maker courses with over 10,000 participants. These have provided them with deep insight and ample opportunity to discover how to use STEAM education resources in teaching children 21st-century soft and hard skills.

Maker's Red Box brings a crucial part into the equation. It provides stories that teach, entertain and inspire students. And most importantly, keep them engaged in 3D printing, from modelling through slicing to post-processing.

In the City of the Future course, for example, kids use their imaginations to design where they would like to live 80-100 years from now. After a brainstorming session on the most pressing issues cities face today, they build prototypes of possible solutions. They first get exposed to 3D printing with a Cratfbot when creating lamps for the city's micro:bit controlled streetlamps. The templates are pre-designed, and the tiny objects take only 15 minutes to print. The makers can use them right away and get rewarded for their efforts: the lamps automatically turn on when the light in the room goes off.

But they don’t stop there. "Building their own designs using a Craftbot 3D printer first makes children feel like they've done something cool for themselves. But they soon realize they can also do cool things for others, like designing and creating things that solve real problems real people have," explains Peter Fuchs. “The possibilities are endless: they can see themselves as the engineers of the electric cars of the future, doctors printing human organs or designers who create custom footwear."

In fact, it’s often the kids themselves who ask for more complex challenges during the course. Drawing a simple circle might become their stepping stone towards designing a wheel, then a machine’s running gear and one day a car – that is, the car of the future. Each course follows a different storyline to cater to all interests and skill levels, strengths and weaknesses. The frame stories both define the creative process and help makers gain transferable knowledge through hidden learning.

Maker's Red Box selected FDM 3D printing as the most sustainable and cost-effective 3D printing technology for educational environments. As most course participants have no prior experience with or in-depth knowledge of 3D printing, Maker's Red Box experts needed a 3D printer that is safe, reliable, easy to use and hard to break and consistently produces the same results. That’s why they chose to work with Craftbots.

"One of Craftbot's biggest advantages is its steel frame. There are tons of cheap 3D printers out there that you can assemble yourself. But they all come with a weaker structure, which makes printing less accurate. Craftbot is both robust and affordable," explains Fuchs. His team prints some 10,000 objects per year, including samples and pre-made elements for kids to use.

Maker's Red Box course materials have been tested with more than 300 teachers in various environments, from extracurricular workshops to summer camps. They are currently being used in private and public schools in Hungary, Finland, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. "In Hungary alone, we've helped over 70 schools to set up makerspaces and taught hundreds of teachers how to turn them into a place of inspiration and growth."