The Maker Mindset

创客思维模式

Dale Dougherty

戴尔·多尔蒂

The Maker Movement continues to gain momentum. We can see the Growth of maker communities online as well as the development of physical community workspaces, called makerspaces, and the spread of Maker Faire around the world. The Maker Movement is spurred by the introduction of new technologies such as 3D printing and the Arduino microcontroller; new opportunities created by faster prototyping and fabrication tools as well as easier sourcing of parts and direct distribution of physical products online; and the increasing participation of all kinds of people in interconnected communities, defined by interests and skills online as well as hyper-local efforts to convene those who share common goals.

创客运动进展如火如荼。我们可以看到在线的创客社区与现实中被称为创客空间的社区工作空间同步增长，创客嘉年华在全球广泛开展。诸如3D打印技术、arduino微控制器等新科技的引入，激励着创客运动的发展。零件和实物产品的网络直接配送、更快的原型开发和制造工具，这一切都创造着新的机遇。同时，有各种兴趣和技能的人们不断参与到互相连接的在线社区，起到凝聚跨区域的、具有共同目标的人们作用。

Yet the origin of the Maker Movement is found in something quite personal: what I might call “experimental play”. When I started Make magazine, I recognized that makers were enthusiasts who played with technology to learn about it. A new technology presented an invitation to play, and makers regard this kind of play as highly satisfying. Makers give it a try; they take things apart; and they try to do things that even the manufacturer did not thing of doing. Whether it is figuring out what you can do with a 3D printer or an autonomous drone aircraft, makers are exploring what these things can do and they are learning as well. Out of that process emerge new ideas, which may lead to real-world applications or new business ventures. Making is a source of innovation.

然而，创客运动的初衷可能被认为带有相当的个人色彩，我称之为“玩实验（experimental play）”。当我创立《Make》杂志时，我意识到，创客是那些通过玩技术而学技术的狂热爱好者。一项新技术就如同一个玩耍的邀约，而且创客把这样的玩耍视为高级享受。创客勇于尝试，喜欢拆卸东西，甚至他们尝试做一些生产厂家还没有想去做的一些新玩意儿。无论你是否想到3D打印机和自主无人机能干些什么，创客们已经开始探索这些东西的用途，并同时学习。在此过程中迸发出的新想法，或许能引向真实世界中的应用，和新的商业风险投资。可以说，动手造是创新（innovation,革新）之源

While technology has been the spark of Maker Movement, it has also become a social movement that includes all kinds of making and all kinds of makers, connecting to the past as well as changing how we look at the future. Indeed, the Maker Movement seems to be a renewal of some deeply held culture values, a recognition rooted in our history and culture that making comes to define us. As Frank Bidart has written in his poem “Advice to the Players”: “We are creatures who need to make”.

在技术已然成为创客运动的亮点的同时，创客运动已然成为一个社会运动，其中包含了各种类型的制作和形形色色的创客，也连接着过去和改变着我们对未来看法。实际上，创客运动可以被看作是对植根于我们历史和文化中的，注重动手创造的深层文化价值观的重新诠释。正如Frank Bidart在诗中写道，“我们是一种需要创造的生物”。

All together, makers are seeking an alternative to being regarded as consumers, rejecting the idea that you are defined by what you buy. Instead, makers have a sense of what they can do and what they can learn to do. Like artists, they are motivated by internal goals, not extrinsic rewards. They are inspired by the work of others. Most importantly, they do not wait until the future to create and make. They feel an urgency to do something now—or lose the opportunity to do it at all.

总的来说，创客们总在找机会从消费者角色中转变过来，拒绝被自己所购买的东西所局限。取而代之，他们有一种能干点什么或者能学着干点什么的意识。像艺术家一样，他们由内在目标的驱动而非外部回报。他们被他人的作品所激励。最重要的是，他们迫不及待地要去创造。他们觉得如果现在不做点什么，那么就永远失去做这件事情的机会了。

Making is no longer, however, a mainstream activity or aspiration, although it once was a core attribute of the American middle class. Today, making lives on the margins of society, but it is thriving nonetheless. Makers are likely to see themselves as outsiders, like some artists and writers, who do not follow the traditional paths. They create their own paths, which is what innovative and creative people do. Quite simply, we need to encourage more young people to explore, create, discover, and make their own way.

在美国的中学课堂上，动手造曾经是一个核心的技能，然而今日已非主流的活动了。在今天，动手造生存在社会的边缘，但它依旧蓬勃发展。创客们似乎把自己看作局外人，就像某些不走寻常路的艺术家和作家一样。他们独辟蹊径，如同那些发明家和创新者。同样，我们需要鼓励更多的年轻人取探索、创新、发现，去开辟属于自己的道路。

The biggest challenge and the biggest opportunity for the Maker Movement is to transform education. My hope is that the agents of change will be the students themselves. Increasingly, technology has given students more control over their lives, and even simplest cell-phone can change a person’s sense of agency. Students are seeking to direct their own education lives, looking to engage in creative and stimulating experiences. Many understand the difference between the pain of education and the pleasure of real learning. Unfortunately, they are forced to seek opportunities outside of school to express themselves and to demonstrate what they can do.

对于创客运动来说，最大的挑战和机遇就是令教育转型。我的愿望是，学生本身就成为这种转变中的代言人。越来越先进的技术手段让学生更能掌控他们自己的生活，即使是最简单的手机也能改变对于个人的意义。学生不断寻求主导自己的学习生活，希望拥有创新与刺激的体验。很多人都能理解“教育之苦”与“真正学习之乐”的区别。但很不幸的是，他们仍被迫在学校之外寻求自我表达的机会，去展现他们的才能。

Formal education has become such a serious business, defined as success at abstract thinking and high-stacks testing, that there is no time and no context for play. If play is what students do outside school, then that is where the real learning will take place and that is where innovation and creativity will be found.

正规教育已经成为一项被认为在抽象思维和海量测验中获得成功的严肃事业，在这里面没有空余的时间和环境留给玩耍。如果学生在学校之外的行为是玩耍的话，那么真正的学习就会在那里发生，在那里也能找回创新与创造力。

The rigid academic system is short-changing all students, even though an elite few seem to do well by academic standards. However, there is increasing skepticism that even those who succeed academically are not the kind of creative, innovative thinkers and doers that we need.

这个僵化的学术系统束缚了全部的学生，即使是精英，在这种学术标准下似乎也很少能做好。然而，有越来越多怀疑认为，即便那些学术成功的人，也未必是那些我们需要的具有创造力的，创新型思考者。

Dr. Stuart Brown’s book, Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the imagination, and Invigorates the Soul, tells the story of how the Jet Propulsion Laboratory realized that although they were hiring the best and brightest college graduates, they were hiring the wrong kind of people. Something had changed in the kind of people that came to work at JPL:

在Stuart Brown博士《游戏：如何塑造大脑、打开想象、鼓舞灵魂》的书中，提及一个喷气推动实验室的故事，这个故事是关于JPL是如何意识到他们虽然招聘了最优秀、最聪明的大学毕业生，但其实是聘任了些不合适的人。来JPL工作的人在某方面发生了转变。

The JPL managers went back to look at their own retiring engineers and … found that in their youth, their older, problem-solving employees had taken apart clocks to see how they worked, or made soapbox derby racers, or built hi-fi stereos, or fixed appliances. The young engineering school graduates who had also done these things, who had played with their hands, were adept at the kinds of problem solving that management sought.

JPL经理在回顾那些已经退休的工程师的时候发现，那些能真正解决问题的雇员在他们青少年的时候，要么已经拆开钟表看看内部是如何运作的，要么用肥皂盒造德比赛车，要么搭建立体声HI-F收音机，要么去修理电器。那些做过这些事情的，动手实践过的青年技工学校的毕业生更能符合管理中需要问题解决能力的要求。

We must try to bring this kind of magic into schools, hard as it may be. I have been focusing on the importance of creating a space where kids have the opportunity to make—a place where some tools, materials, and enough expertise can get them started. These places called makerspaces, share some aspects of the shop class, home economics class, the art studio, and science labs. In effect, a makerspaces is physical mash-up of different places that allows makers and projects to integrate these different kind of skill.

我们需要尝试把这样的魔法带进学校，虽然这可能很难。一直以来，我的聚焦在建立一种能给孩子提供动手造的机会的地方，这个地方有一些工具、材料，能有足够的专家能把孩子领进门。这些地方被称为创客空间，某些方面类似商店、家政中心，又仿佛一个艺术工作室和科学实验室。事实上，创客空间是一个混合了多种不同场所类型的地方，这让创客和他们的项目能整合这里面不同的技术。

We can create a workshop or makerspace, and we can acquire tools and materials, but we will not have succeeded at creating innovative thinkers and doers unless we are able to foster a mindset.

我们可以创立一个工作坊或者创客空间，可以从中获取工具和材料，但是如果我们不能培养一种创客思维模式，我们已然不能成功地称为一个具有创造力的，创新型思考者。

Carol Dweck, a Stanford psychology professor, has written a book called Mindset that distinguishes between fixed and growth mindsets. People with a fixed mindset tend to believe that their capabilities are set, as though these abilities were out of their control. People with a growth mindset tend to believe that capabilities can be developed, improved, and expanded. A growth mindset tolerates risk and failure, while a fixed mindset avoids risk and its accompanying frustration. It is obvious which mindset helps someone adapt to and contribute to a world that is constantly changing. Dweck points out that many who excel academically have a fixed mindset, which limits them to exploring only the areas they were told they were good at. Conversely, many who do poorly in schools have taken too seriously the judgment of others about their ability in subjects such as math or science. In both cases, such limiting views of oneself are self-defeating and hold people back from exploring new areas and developing unknown capabilities. Making is about developing one’s full potential.

斯坦福大学心理学教授卡罗·德维克在著作《思维模式》中描述了固化的与成长的思维模式之间的差异之处。有着固化思维模式的人倾向于认为他们所拥有能力是固定的，并且是他们所不能改变的。而一个有着发展思维模式的人则倾向于认为，他所拥有的能力是可以发展、改进和延伸的。一个发展的思维模式可以容忍冒险和失败，而固化的思维模式则千方百计避免冒险以及随之而来的挫败。显而易见，思维模式能帮助一个人适应不断变化的世界，并有所贡献。德维克指出，那些持有固化思维模式的学术成绩优秀者，他们在思维模式的局限之下，只在他们被认为优秀的领域中探索。相反，许多在学校里表现不怎么好的学生，在某些科目如数学、科学的能力上，却得到别人高度的肯定。在两种情况中，一个人的视野的狭窄其实是一种自我否定的表现，这会使人不敢去探索新的领域，发展新的、未知的技能。动手造意味着人的潜能的全方位发展。

Dweck’s growth mindset maps very well to maker mindset, which is a can-do attitude that can be summarized as “what can you do with what you know?” It is an invitation to take ideas and turn them into various kinds of reality. It is the process of treating over a project to improve it. It is a chance to participate in communities of makers of all ages by sharing your work and expertise. Making can be a compelling social experience, built around relationships.

德维克的发展思维模式与创客思维模式相当吻合，而创客思维是一种“能做什么”的心态，通常被总结为“你能用你所知道的做些什么？”。这是一个鼓励人们想出些点子，并把它们变成现实中各种各样的东西的邀请。这是一个找出项目毛病并不断改进的过程。这是一个通过分享你的作品和专业技能，从而参与到不分年龄大小的创客社区的绝好机会。动手造可以与周围的建立联系的，相当引人注目的社会经验，。

Fostering the maker mindset through education is fundamentally human project—to support the growth and development of another person not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. Learning should focus on the whole person because any truly creative enterprise requires all of us, not just some part. It should also be rooted in the kind of sharing of knowledge and skill that humans do best face to face.

通过教育培养创客思维模式，从本质上是一个关于人的项目——不仅仅在身体上，还要心理上和情感上的促进个人的成长与发展。所以学习应该聚焦在一个完整的人上，这因为任何创新的商业活动都需要一个完整的自我，而不仅仅是某些方面。与此同时，学习也需要植根在人与人、面对面的经验和技能分享的方式之上。

One might reasonably fear that making will be reduced to another failed approach at education reform. Making can be described as “project-based learning” or “hands-on learning,” yet doing projects or working with hands is only what making looks like, not what it is. In his book on education, To Understand Is to Invent, Jean Piaget wrote that educators should “lead the child to construct for himself the tool that will transform him from the inside—that is, in a real sense, and not just on the surface.” It is the difference between a child who is directed to perform a task and one who is self-directed to figure out what to do. That kind of transformation, that kind of personal and social change, is what making is about.

在重塑教育过程中，令人忧虑的一点是，动手造可能会因为其他错误的目标而被削弱。动手造有时被描述为“基于项目的学习”或者“动手学习”，然而做项目或者手工制作，只是动手造看上去的形式，而非其本质。在让·皮亚杰关于教育的著作《创造即理解》中写道，教育者应该“引领孩子为自己建造那些能从内心转变他自己的工具——这种转变是真正意识上的，而不仅仅是表面上的。”

Here are some thoughts for bringing the Maker Movement to education:

下面是一些把创客运动引进教育中的一些想法：

To create a context that develops the maker mindset, a growth mindset, that encourages students to believe they can learn to do anything;

创造能发展创客思维模式的情景，发展的思维模式可以鼓励学生相信他们能学习任何东西；

To build a new body of practice in teaching making and develop a corps of practitioners;

建立一种新的讲授动手做的实践体系，同时建设体系的开发者队伍；

To identity, develop, and share a broad framework of projects and kits, based on a wide range of tools and materials, that connect to student interest in an out of schools

在大范围工具和材料的基础上，定义、发展、分享项目大框架和套件，让学生的兴趣在学校之外能得到延伸；

To design and host online social platform for collaboration among students, teachers, and the community;
设计和主持在线的社交平台，以聚集学生、教师和社区；

To develop programs especially for young people that allow them to take a learning role in creating more makers in schools, afterschool programs, summer camps, and other community settings;

发展课程项目，特别是那些针对青少年的，能让他们学习如何在学校、课后课程、夏令营和其他社区项目中发展更多创客的课程项目

To create a community context for the exhibition and curating of student work in relationship with all makers and making, such that new opportunities are created for more people to participate;

创造给学生展览以及联合其他创客一起动手策展的社区环境，这是吸引更多人参与其中的新机会；

To allow individuals and groups to build a record of participation in the maker community, which can be useful for academic and career advancement as well as support the student’s growing sense of personal development;

允许个人和群组在创客社区中建立参与记录，这对学业和生涯的进步相当有用，同时这也对建立学生个人成长意义有相当的支持作用

To develop educational contexts that links the practice of making to formal concepts and theory, to support discovery and exploration while introducing new tools for advanced design and new way of thinking about making (practically, this means developing guides for teachers, mentors, and other leaders);

创造能关联概念、理论与实践的教育环境，以便支持发现与探索。与此同时，为高级设计引入一些新工具，为动手造引入一些新思路。（在实践中，这意味着要为教师、导师和其他领导者开发指南。）

To develop in all students the fully capacity, creativity, and confidence to become agents of change in their personal lives and in their community.

在全体学生中发展全面能力，培养创造力和自信，以便在他们的个人生涯和他们所在的社区中成为变革的代言人。

In summary, we can think of organizing this work in terms of places, projects, and practices. The Maker Education Initiative (http://MakerEd.org), a nonprofit launched in spring 2012, was found to work on many of the above ideas. Its mission is to create more opportunity for young people to make, and, by making, build confidence, foster creativity, and spark interest in science, technology, engineering, math, the arts, and learning as a whole. One way that the Maker Education Initiative will approach this is by working to help existing organizations, such as libraries, to build the capacity to engage and develop young makers. Empowering makers of all ages to play an active role in introducing students, and educators, to making will be key component of these efforts.

总而言之，我们可以认为通过一系列场所、项目和实践，来组织这项工作。在MakerEd.org网站，以非营利为目标于2012年春提出的创客教育倡议中，上面很多的理念都得以体现。它的任务是给年轻人创造更多制作的机会，并且通过动手造，建立自信，培养创造力，点燃对科学、技术、工程数学、艺术以及综合学习的兴趣。在创客教育倡议中指明的一个方向是，帮助像图书馆之类的现有组织，增强它们鼓励和发展年轻创客的能力。在这些努力中，鼓动各个年龄段的创客积极参与到指导学生、教育者进行动手造活动，是非常关键的组成部分。

Finally, I would like to share a quote by John Boyd, which gets at why making is a gateway to understanding why science and technology matter. Boyd wrote that the goal of education is “to make evident how science, engineering, and technology influence our ability to interact and cope with an unfolding reality that we are part of, live in, and feed upon.”¹

The kind of change we seek in education is a part of the change that we are seeking all around us, the kind of change we seek in ourselves. If those interactions with the world we live in inform and inspire us to create, then we are makers.

最后，我想分享John Boyd引用的一段话，这段话很好地解释了动手造为什么是通往理解科学和技术重要性最好入口的原因。Boyd写道，教育的目标是“彰显科学、工程和技术是如何影响我们的能力，让我们能与赖以生存、生活的，身在其中的环境进行互动。”

我们在教育中寻找的变革是我们寻找周围的变革的一部分，是我们所寻找的自身的变革。如果与我们生活的世界的那些互动能鼓励告诉我们、激励我们去创新，那么我们就是创客了。

¹ Frans P. B. Osinga(2007). Science, strategy and war: The strategic theory of John Boyd. New York: Routledge, p.220

References

Brown, S. and Vaughan, C.(2009). Play: How it shapes the brain, opens the imagination, and invigorates the soul. New York: Penguin

Dweck, C.S.(2006) Mindset: The new psychology of success. New York: Random House.

Piaget, J.(1973). To understand is to invent: The future of education. New York: Grossman

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