Case Study: Bespoke Gravity Sketch training for Year 12 Design and Technology students

We are proud to share that we have recently completed a three session long bespoke training session for Leicester Grammar School’s Year 12 Design and Technology students and their teachers. Students are currently in the midst of their Architectural drawing project , requiring them to ‘design a 2-bed detached bungalow and surrounding garden overlooking a picturesque valley.’. With the brief in mind, we developed a bespoke training programme, tailored to the brief, filled with easy to follow and engaging activities to build the attendees’ skill sets. As the school does not currently own any VR headsets, we provided all students with access to a headset for all three sessions. All students and staff who brought their own headset were provided with access to the Gravity Sketch software at no additional cost.

This case study report provides a brief overview of the sessions including our objectives, and some of the feedback we received from both students and teachers. If you’re interested in levelling up your student’s skill set or you’d like to find out more about our training sessions, please do not hesitate to get in touch with the team at info@meshtraining.co.uk or contact us on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/mesh-training.

Session Objectives

Above all else, the primary objective of this training session was to provide a fun and unique learning opportunity for students and provide a new way to approach a design challenge. Our training objective was to provide all attendees with a strong foundation of Gravity Sketch skills, ensuring they developed a form of autonomy by session three to independently develop their models. 

Our training was intertwined with the school's timetable resulting in three 1 hour 30 sessions over the course of three weeks. With all attendees having never used Gravity Sketch before, and some having never used VR before, we started session one with a basic overview of how to safely use a VR headset and set it up. Once all attendees were inducted and comfortable with their headsets on, we jumped straight into using the stroke tool in Gravity Sketch, drawing lines and abstract shapes in 3D. The class quickly grasped how to do this, so we swiftly moved on to scaling objects, moving around in VR and adding colour to an object. Although most wanted to carry on in VR, we encouraged regular breaks to allow their eyes to adjust and follow the next live demonstration on the classroom projector. 

During all 3 sessions we utilised our ‘follow me’ demonstration technique where attendees firstly watch our trainers demonstrate a specific tool in a steady, step by step process. Then attendees go on to conduct the same process in their VR headset whilst both trainers are walking around the room, on hand to provide support or advice both in and out of VR. 

Design is all about collaboration, whether that’s discussing new ideas or developing a concept with your team, throughout our training we continue to encourage this by utilising Gravity Sketch’s Collab Room feature. In groups of 3-4, students and staff were placed into a room so they could collaboratively develop their ideas and help one another out. Additionally, this also allowed for trainers to provide mini-demonstrations in VR or cast to the projector. 

By the end of session 1, attendees had developed the skill set to build a variation of the Anglepoise 12-27 lamp, often known as the ‘Pixar lamp’.

The beauty of our bespoke, in-person training sessions, is that we can dynamically adjust the rate at which our content is taught based on a class’ progress. For instance, after an intensive, yet productive session one, we slowed things down in session two with more complex modelling and demonstrated the early stages of advanced tools. The class began to develop the exterior of their bungalows using primitive objects and the precision move tool with reference images they had imported  into Gravity Sketch via the LandingPad online portal. By the end of the session, attendees had developed a low poly layout model of their bungalow and had mapped out where their windows, doors and footpaths should be.

Moving into session three, the class had come prepared with their 3D pencil sketches of their bungalow concept preloaded into LandingPad from session two’s tutorial. With this being the final session, we moved straight into the live demonstrations, showing the class how to use the smart move gesture and import mannequins to manipulate them for user journey within their bungalow. Once demonstrations were complete, the class had an hour to refine their bungalow, add exterior features and colours. To tie off the training, we ended with a demonstration of the screenshot tool so they could import images of their model into their project submission and portfolios. 

Results: The fact and figures

• 84% of participants rated our training good or very good

• 100% of participants who had never used VR before or had occasionally used it in the last 12 months, felt comfortable with VR after our training sessions.

• 92% of participants found our training sessions easy to follow

One students' favourite aspect of the software included ‘being able to put your designs in space, annotate them and make them really big’.

Another student highlighted ‘I really liked the fact that I could use my hands to move and make my design instead of using a computer’

Priten and Rob are very welcoming in their approach to training. They were very good at helping our pupils to relax into using the headsets - this is especially important for those who have no prior experience of VR. They made the sessions fun, engaging and interesting without getting frustrated when people were struggling. - Member of Leicester Grammar School Staff

We’re incredibly impressed with some of the work that was made in such a short time frame and we would like to thank the class for their engagement and willingness to learn. We would also like to thank Leicester Grammar School and their staff for this opportunity and their very welcoming hospitality. We look forward to returning to Leicester Grammar School on 15th June 2024 for the Bright Sparks STEM Fair.

If you’re interested in bringing this experience to your Design and technology classroom, feel free to contact our team via info@meshtraining.co.uk or visit our website for further information about our courses.

We’re exhibiting!

Bright Sparks STEM Fair

15th June 2024