SketchUp for Education

Paper House Project: Part 1 - DIY Color

I LOVE this four-part series on SketchUp paper houses. And so did my kids, and so will yours. Teachers, take note – these projects are fabulous for spatial thinking (geometry) as well as artistic creativity. Part 1 shows the easiest method – printing a blank house and coloring yourself. Part 2 shows how to edit texture graphics from within […]

3d printing boat maid mist

Here’s what I’ve written about so far in this series: In Part 1 – a 3D printed bear, and in Part 2, a few 3D printed cactus trees. This post will detail the most complicated of the objects I printed for this project: a customized boat. Maid of the Mist My son, whose state you’ll […]

3D Printing Cactus

In Part 1 of this series, I showed how I modified a Thingiverse model of a bear, to print out for my son’s diorama state project for school. Now it’s my daughter’s turn. Her state was Arizona, and she wanted to include some sort of Arizona tree or plant. And what says “Arizona” more than a saguaro cactus? […]

3D Printing Benji Bear 09

In the school where my twins go, each third grader is assigned a US state. After spending a few months learning about their state, the students write a report, give a little speech, and present a diorama. If you don’t know what a diorama is, picture a shoebox filled with cute, stand-up, informative things: If you’re a […]

ModelMetricks Books for SketchUp 2017!

Perhaps you’ve already heard – SketchUp 2017 was released last week! Lots of improvements have been added – inferencing, extension management, much better graphic display, and more. The first of the 3DVinci materials to be updated is the popular ModelMetricks Series.   (Updates for our other books are coming soon!) Who Are These Books For? ModelMetricks books are designed for kids […]

Happy SketchUp Halloween!

How about a Halloween SketchUp project? Grab your kids – they can do this one as well. Download a Pumpkin There are many pumpkin models in the 3D Warehouse. The one I used for my jack-o-lantern is this one:   Click the “3D Warehouse” logo at the lower right corner to find this model’s download […]

SketchUp Seashell: Geometry or 3D Printing Project

I have a colleague named David Thornburg, who is the Director of Education for Polar3D. (If you’re into 3D printing, check out Polar 3D – their printer works by spinning the circular build plate, rather than with lateral movements.) Recently I ran across a 3D printed seashell project that David posted on the Polar3D blog. He wrote […]

MS Physics - I'm Already Hooked

Some of you may remember an awesome SketchUp plugin called Sketchy Physics. You could use it to assign physical properties to SketchUp objects and let those objects interact with one another. And you could add hinges, pistons, sliders – it was incredibly fun and somewhat addictive. Teachers loved it. But Sketchy Physics wasn’t compatible with SketchUp […]

SketchUp Mosaics 3

I don’t know about you, but I have kids home this week of summer break. And the two most annoying words I keep hearing: “I’m bored.”  If you also find yourself fighting on the front lines of the War Against Child Boredom, maybe this activity will help. And for any teachers reading, you might appreciate this […]