The Superpets program was previously run at Monash Tech School by program facilitators. This year, MTS shifted the delivery of this program to ‘offsite’ and ran the program on partner school premises. South Oakleigh Secondary College and Wellington Secondary College were the first to pioneer this mode of delivery.
This involved an MTS staff member assisting the schools with translating the program into a framework that suited the classroom timetable and structure. The MTS staff member also ran professional learning for teachers who would be involved in running the program. This invol
ved familiarising the staff with the Design Thinking process, the content of the program and training around the technologies used in prototyping. The technologies were Tinkercad for modelling of objects to be 3D printed and laser cut, and LittleBits for designing modular electrical systems.
Students worked in teams and were guided through the Design Thinking process to develop a device that would act as a solution to a medical condition for an assigned pet. They were introduced to a variety of wearables, implants and bionics that are currently being developed to help save the lives of injured animals. From this, students undertook activities to empathise with some of the medical conditions, then iterated to problem solve and develop a prototype using the technologies above. They then pitched their prototype to their classmates and actively reflected on how to improve their design.
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