Garden Design Project: an Introductory Engineering Design Project Using Tinkercad

As I sat in my kitchen watching the deer in my backyard polish off the last growth from our summer garden, I decided I needed to build a fenced-in garden this fall before planting a new garden next spring. While I researched proper plant spacing and started brainstorming different layouts for my fenced garden that I might want to move forward with, I realized that I should have the students in my high school engineering design courses attempt this design project to start their school year so they could see how applicable the engineering design tools we will learn throughout the year can be for their "real" lives.

The following Instructable explains this garden design project, which I use to teach my beginner-level high school engineering students how to use the engineering design process and the value of 3D modeling.

Additionally, it highlights two of my favorite things about Tinkercad.

1. The program is incredibly user-friendly. In my experience, high school students do not need almost any instruction to be able to start designing effectively with this program.
2. Using a 3D modeling program like Tinkercad allows students to visualize and share their design ideas effectively and professionally.

This project requires very few supplies. Some paper (for sketching) and an internet-connected computer are the only physical materials you will need.

If you can find a "client" (or a person who would like a garden designed for them) that will help assess the proposals students prepare, however, that adds a fun, competitive element to the project.

To begin, you need to give the students enough information to understand what the constraints and requirements for the garden design will be. If you have a "client" of your own you can use that is best, but if not you can use the information for the "client" we used in our project that can be found HERE.

I recommend having students generate a list of requirements (such as the specific plants that the client has asked to have planted in the garden), the constraints (like property/size information), and wants to help them fully understand and define the problem.

Before developing designs of their own, students should spend time researching items related to the garden. For instance, how far apart should different plants be placed and how will that impact the overall dimensions of the garden? Or, where will the sun hit the home during the day? Where is water available on the outside of the home? Have students record their questions and the research they do to help answer each question in the template HERE.

Once students have learned enough background knowledge to start developing their ideas, they (alone or in groups) can begin to formulate their own design concepts. They should generate several ideas so that they can then use a DECISION MATRIX to determine which is the best solution. To use a decision matrix, students should generate a list of categories that may be an important element of the design proposals. Then, they should weigh each of these categories on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most important. Next, have students list each design idea they have and rate the idea on a scale of 1-10 for each of the categories, again with 10 being the best performance. Finally, students will multiply the rating by the weight for each category and add up the total score for each proposal. The proposal with the best score is the one students should move forward with.

An electronic template (including directions for how to complete a decision matrix) that can be used with this project can be found HERE.

Students should now make a model to explain their design proposal. Many students - even those in high school - have limited exposure to trying to make 3D sketches by hand that will successfully help them explain their design proposals, and even fewer have 3D modeling experience. Tinkercad, however, is incredibly user-friendly and in my experience, students can be given a link to the program (Tinkercad) and after familiarizing themselves for only a few minutes, begin to construct models that help them explain their 3D ideas in a professional and easy to understand way.

This is not only a great way for students to clearly and cleanly explain their design proposals, but it is also a great introduction to 3D modeling that will help them begin to understand the tools and strategies needed for other programs like Fusion 360.

As a final step, students should create a proposal "pitch" to share with the client that explains their design proposal. This should be a simple overview of their project. In our class, students prepared slides and added a voiceover (using Screencastify) to present a 1-minute final pitch that included 3D models of their designs, information about the engineering logic behind how they made their design decisions, etc. A template for the slides portion of this presentation that can be utilized for this project can be found HERE.

This project was highly reviewed by the students in the class, who - on average - seemed to find it to be a gentle, real-world introduction to the elements of engineering design that will be explored in more detail throughout the rest of the year.

The following comments are reflective writings from students upon the completion of the project (which I recommend having students after submitting their final pitches).

In this project I learned how important research is and without it, things can be messier and a lot less organized. If you take the time to research and know what you’re doing before you do something then you’re prepared and you know what to do next. I honestly loved this project because it was fun designing something with a 3D modeling program that can be used in someones everyday life. This project was helpful because I know how to stay better organized and I know now that if I take the time to go through the process then I can come out with a much better result for my final project.

Through this project, I was able to learn that in order to have the results you want to achieve, it takes careful planning and consideration of many aspects. If we would have just looked at one part of the garden, the other parts would not have performed as well. I was also able to take away some important gardening knowledge. Before this project I did not realize that it mattered how much space was in between rows in a garden. I will also be able to share some of the knowledge about how to keep deer away from plants/gardens with my family, because we have an issue with deer eating and knocking over our apple trees. I enjoyed this project because I was able to learn about aspects of real life that I did not already know about, and will be able to use for a long time. I enjoyed the creative aspect of this project, and found it interesting to use Tinkercad for the first time.

I hope you will have as much success with this project as I have. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions or recommendations!