A Maker's Life

We talk with authors of this new book, which full of insights for educators and families about why to make and how to engage the young and old as makers

I had a delightful conversation with Marilyn Nash and Amber Hudson, authors of A Maker’s Life. Marilyn and Amber are educators in Indiana who met through 1st Makerspace. We talked about their new book, the personal practice of making and how to write your own maker story. While we talked about making in school, I especially liked what Marilyn is doing talking to people of different ages to help them see themselves as maker and part of a larger maker community.

Excerpt from interview

Marilyn: I just retired from 48 years in education and youth work. And during those decades of working with students, I always made sure we had an art center because I found that as I was speaking, they may start individually working on something, but then as they see themselves coming to life in an art piece, then it becomes part of a community of makers. And I think that connective piece with makers around you is also key. But students need that place to be safe, to be able to share and express themselves.

Dale: Exactly.

Marilyn: And it's just very important.

Dale: Yeah. No, it really is. And, but sometimes even kids themselves misunderstand art. I'm not gonna be an artist. You want me to be an artist, that's why you asked me to do this. Now we want you to —

Amber: Yes, be creative.

Dale: in some way, right? Find something in you that means something to you.

Amber: I can speak to that too. I think that I found in my own classroom as well. I also was a classroom teacher for over 20 years and students are so scripted to do exactly what they're supposed to do in school every single day. That, that there's very little time for them to have freedom to sit and think about what they might want to create or what they might wanna do.

And in my classroom, we're gonna have this hour on Friday that's gonna be our makerspace time. It was the short amount of time that I could squeeze into my education schedule, which we all wish was much different. But what I found great joy in was allowing them to have some freedom to choose. Here's this wall of materials and you can go pick what you want and do what you want.

And I actually sat down right next to them and made my own projects, which again was something that was very rare that happened in the classroom, but I so enjoyed it as the educator. It just was a time for us to sit and the conversations were [00:11:00] fun and it, they, it truly was the same collaborative effort.

This idea of sitting next to somebody who was making with me, and it didn't matter that they might be 10, but we were having these great conversations surrounded by the idea of just a freedom to create.

Dale: Yeah. And Marilyn, you're such a great example. This is something that, that you could do your whole life and it is your life.