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Join the Parent Board & enjoy exciting benefits. Details here
21st century parent parent of 8 to 16 years old kids parents of stem learners
Welcome to Makershala!
What do you need help with?
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Frequently Asked Questions
Learning by Making A.K.A. Project Based Learning approach in which learners are given a context or a problem to solve or a scenario for which they have identified what they should know or learn in order to complete the goal or solve the problem. This really drives a learner to take ownership of their learning as opposed to the approach of traditional learning, where learners are told, what they have to learn, with an end goal to clear a test.
Many world renowned organizations have identified skills like collaboration, self-awareness, creative thinking as must have skills for the human workforce. The World-Economic Forum describes Creativity as the most needed skill in their 2020 report. Makershala is focussed to keep these skills at the core of its objectives and build learning experiences that engage learners to develop knowledge and find their interest.
Makershala offers learning experiences in the form of projects which gives each learner an opportunity to develop and demonstrate these skills. Learners are assessed, graded and rewarded based on their performance in these projects.
Makershala projects are set around different themes and technology platforms. These themes are basically real-life scenarios related to various communities and industrial domains. Learners can try doing projects of different domains and explore their interests. Once they have identified a few areas, they can further pursue it by doing more projects.
Makershala projects are mapped with different text book topics. Learners develop better understanding of these topics and concepts by applying them in their projects. Learners are also assessed and graded on their conceptual understanding.
Kids from age 8-15 can set up an account and enroll in different courses and projects.
Admission means creating a learner account on Makershala. And there is no admission fee till any further notice.
Parents or kids themselves can set up their learner account on Makershala by signing up and can start enrolling in projects and courses of their choice or interest.
Each learner account has a vault, like a wallet, which holds coins. A learner can use these coins to enroll in a course or a project. Parents have to refill coins in the Learners vault when the learner requests a refill from the learner dashboard.
Learners can generate a refill request from the dashboard and mention the number of coins required. The parent will receive the payment link through which coins are refiled in the learner vault.
Tools and materials are listed in the project page and based on required items can be added to cart. A learner can procure these items as a kit with the “Purchase Kit” option.
It generally takes 2-4 working days to deliver the items.
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About Makershala

Makershala is a Learning by Making ecosystem for kids from age 8-16 to help them discover their interests, develop future skills and deepen conceptual understanding. Makershala follows the Project Based Learning approach as its way of teaching in which kids work on authentic, real life & personally meaningful projects.

Kids work on these projects in different educational settings, namely; self-learning; online 1:4 Peer to Peer with a mentor; or in a school. Projects are categorized in different interest segments like Robotics, Coding, Electronics, 3D Printing, Animations, Photography, Machine Learning, Astronomy and many more.

Each project is mapped with classroom concepts, 21st century skills, UN sustainable development goals and interests/careers to not only focus on holistic development of a child but help them identify their calling by giving them exposure to problems that exist in the real world.

Why Project-Based Learning

Project-Based Learning has the potential to solve many of the learning problems we see today beyond foundational literacy.

  • Ownership: Learners have complete ownership on what they need to know to solve a problem and come up with the best solution in the best way. It can be a concept or a software tool or a skill. Kids involved in projects are never required to be told to study.

  • Interdisciplinary: Unlike traditional learning where subjects are taught in silos and learners develop a perception of liking or disliking a subject. In project based learning, the given problem is supreme and it may require to know something from maths, science and history together.

  • Experiential learning: We generally retain 75% of what we do as opposed to only 5% of what we hear and 10% of what we read, hence PBL helps kids retain what they learn.

  • Lifelong learning: The most important gift that PBL gives to its learners is to make them lifelong learners as this is the most required skill to lead a good life, personally & professionally.

  • Skills & Knowledge balance: Project-based learning doesn’t focus too much on memorizing information, rather it equally demands practising life skills to be able to do better in projects.

How Makershala Works

  • Parents and Kids who wish to start their journey with Makershala, are suggested to pick one interest area of the child and then choose a plan.

  • Parents and Kids after enrolling in a course based on their interest are assigned a batch. Each batch has 3-4 learners and 1 mentor.

  • Each course has 6 guided projects and 1 challenge project.

  • During the project, formative assessments are conducted to evaluate learner’s knowledge & skills.

  • On completion of a project parents and kids get a learning report which indicates the skills and knowledge developed/displayed by them.

  • Kids also build their portfolio which showcases problems solved, solutions created, skills developed, knowledge acquired and technologies learnt.

  • Kids earn rewards in the form of badges, points and coins for their performance in a project, course and overall.

  • Kids are maneuvered to take up courses and projects from different learning segments to gain more clarity on their interests. This eventually helps them in picking up a career.