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Professionals use SketchUp, Google’s 3D software, to design all sorts of creations.
We’d like to share with you stories of four kids with autism
who have used SketchUp to design their own creations.
The house that you’re looking at was created NOT by a professional architect
but by Rachel, a teenager who is on the autism spectrum.
We met Rachel and kids like her a couple of years ago
when members of the SketchUp team at Google began
hearing from customers whose kids are on the autism spectrum
and absolutely love SketchUp.
We soon learned that people with autism tend to
be visually and spatially gifted.
In fact, they literally think in pictures and when they
get their hands on 3D design software like SketchUp sparks fly.
We wanted to keep those sparks flying so we’ve
partnered with experts, including the Autism Society of America
and the Life Long Learning Lab at The University of Colorado,
to launch Project Spectrum, which works to provide autistic children
with software and guidance that can help them to express
their ideas and creativity, and even develop a life skill.
One of the things we’ve learned in the past year
is that tasks that seem straightforward can be incredibly
challenging to an individual on the Autism Spectrum.
Meg, for example, was given a school assignment
to sketch the floor-plan of her room.
Meg worked two hard hours on this hand drawn plan.
Now, take a look at Meg’s first attempt at using SketchUp.
Meg created her dream house – one made completely of water
with the walls held together by force fields – in about
half the time it took her to sketch her room.
Meg’s aquarium dream house is a great example of
enabling someone to express the pictures in their head.
Meg’s brother, Casey, also drew a floor plan of his room.
Not one to mince words, Casey refers to the experience as painful
and adds, It would have been so cool if we had known about SketchUp.
And here’s Casey’s dream house.
Casey really covers a lot of ground in this model. Let’s take a closer look. 0:02:03.050,0:02.06.000 Casey combines his own models with pre-drawn components 0:02:06.050,0:02.10.000 like this playground equipment from SketchUp’s component library. 0:02:10.050,0:02.13.000 In some cases he improves upon SketchUp’s components, 0:02:13.050,0:02.15.000 like by drawing teeth on this semi. 0:02:17.000,0:02.21.000 And check out this model within model he has created.
As we zoom down you can see that he has made a model
of what looks like a factory that sits on a table in Casey’s dream house.
Dream houses seem to be a common theme.
In Rachel’s Maximum Rock n’ Roll room she can star in her own music videos.
We recently spoke with Rachel’s mom who shared what SketchUp has meant to their family.
SketchUp has allowed our family to journey with Rachel in her
unique world in ways that we couldn’t before – we are not gifted with
the visual and spatial abilities that our ASD kids have.
This gift is a core strength and feature of autism
and tools like SketchUp not only allow us to journey with them,
but offer life skills and potential career tracks to our children.
We are so excited about Rachel’s new found desire,
direction, and where it will take her.
Another teenager, JP, used SketchUp to express his desire to become
a film maker. As you can see, JP’s models are pretty amazing.
He has used SketchUp as a stepping stone to other sophisticated 3D
modeling and animation packages as well. As JP experiments with
animation and short films, it’s clear that SketchUp has opened the door
to what could very well be a life skill and his career.
SketchUp won’t be appropriate for everyone on the Autism Spectrum
but our experience tells us that it really clicks with a lot of folks.
We want everyone to have a chance to experience SketchUp and perhaps discover a life skill.
Visit www.google.com/educators to read more about Google’s Project Spectrum,
download a free copy of SketchUp and learning materials designed specifically for the ASD community.