T-R PHOTO BY LANA BRADSTREAM — Marshall County Extension Summer Youth Assistant Hannah Hibbs dumps some Legos onto a table at the Marshalltown Public Library. She was hosting the Inventor’s Hat STEM workshop, which helped children discover the inventive process and visualize their inventions.

Ten children learned about the inventive process during yesterday’s Inventor’s Hat STEM workshop at the Marshalltown Public Library.

Hosted by Marshall County Extension Summer Youth Assistant Hannah Hibbs, the children were given a brief overview of the inventive process as they sat at three separate tables.

“This is to get them to learn how to think in new ways about inventions or ways to make things better,” she said. “This is a way to get them thinking in the engineering process of trying something, seeing if it works. If it doesn’t, try again and figure out why.”

The children were given simple toys to play with, and instructions to think of ways to improve those toys.

“I want you guys to think about what you could change to make it better,” Hibbs told them.

Two tables were given plastic jumping frogs and the last table was given handheld pinball toys. The ideas for the frogs included flicking the toy, using a different material to try to create a longer or higher jump and combining the frogs for a different jump. The children with the pinballs figured out how to make the play more enjoyable by combining the levers with movement.

“I’m loving these ideas,” Hibbs told them after the exercise was over.

Then Hibbs placed piles of Legos on the tables to allow the participants to “build” their own unique inventions.

“As a table, I want you to think of something you want to invent, that’s brand new,” she said. “The things you have to think about — is it going to fill a need? Is it going to make things safer or is it going to make things more fun?”

One table came up with the idea of a water slide as high as the clouds. The inventors were thoughtful in saying it would need an elevator, as people would be way too tired climbing that many stairs. They also wanted to put glass walls around it to keep people from falling off.

Another table created a theme park, complete with robots and a horse feeding machine. The final table wanted to create a Tron-inspired bike with possible projection lights.

“They’re trying to figure out how to make that in real life,” Hibbs said.

This was not Hibbs’ first time hosting the Inventor’s Hat. She also held workshops in Melbourne on June 26 and LeGrand on June 17. Out of the three Marshall County workshops, Hibbs said the invention which stood out to her the most was a propeller plane built by a kid in Melbourne.

“It was really cool,” she said.

Hibbs recalled when the series was being created, the original tool of invention was Playdo, but she said they did not want to make a mess for the libraries. So, they switched to Legos.

“Kids love Legos,” Hibbs said. “It’s a fun way for them to create and invent. They have pieces they use to make it.”

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Contact Lana Bradstream

at 641-753-6611 ext. 210 or

lbradstream@timesrepublican.com.