Cardboard Creators is a project-based design and construction lab focused on building, testing, and refining three-dimensional creations using cardboard and simple fasteners. Each class begins with a short demonstration of a specific building technique—such as folding, slot-and-tab connections, hinges, layering, or structural reinforcement—so students gain practical construction skills they can immediately apply.
Students are then given a design challenge that introduces a building goal or functional requirement. After completing the challenge, students continue working on long-term free-build projects that develop over multiple classes, allowing time for experimentation, redesign, and increasingly complex structures.
At the end of each build cycle, students present their finished creations to their classmates, practicing communication, design explanation, and reflection on their building choices. The lab emphasizes creativity, spatial reasoning, problem-solving, and confidence with real-world materials while encouraging independent thinking and collaboration.
While we do provide basic supplies, we encourage students to bring their own tools if they’d like to. If you are with a charter and need documentation to justify cardboard tool purchases (or just want to learn more about the class), you can download this Program Description to give to your teacher. Hope this helps!
