A Gifting Idea: Using Engineering Skills With a DIY Dollhouse Kit

A new kind of toy

To give girls confidence in STEM, Brooks and Chen created an entirely different type of toy: Roominate. It includes building blocks, walls, and a circuit, which allows children to build furniture, houses, stairs, and moving fans.

Alice Brooks seeks to interest girls in engineering (Source: Clayman Institute)

By giving girls confidence in themselves and their know-how, Roominate encourages more women to pursue careers in STEM. “Part of that confidence comes from being exposed to building and circuits,” said Chen. “Boys feel like they’ve played with that and have confidence.”

Research supports the ideas behind Roominate. In an article analyzing inclusive STEM classroom practices, Helena Isabel Scutt, Shannon Katherine Gilmartin, and Sheri Sheppard argue that developing the spatial skills of women is crucial for their success in STEM fields. One study they reviewed found that, “female engineering students with poorly developed spatial skills who receive spatial visualization training are more likely to stay in engineering than are their peers who do not.”

But Roominate does more than improve spatial skills. “What is particularly powerful about the approach being taken with Roominate is that girls are working in 3D to realize their imagination,” Sheppard said. And as the creators of Roominate are seeing, this physical realization is sparking experimentation, imagination, creativity, and more building. “I think that they are onto something very important.”

Beyond the pink Lego

Of course, Roominate will achieve its goals only if kids actually play with it. Indeed, many others have failed in their attempts to make ‘boys’ toys’ accessible to girls, which usually focus on taking the boys’ toy and painting it pink. So Brooks and Chen took a different approach: They watched girls play with their toys. They quickly noticed a key trend. “A lot of them had cool dollhouses in their houses ... they were quite elaborate, but they were very static,” said Brooks.

Roominate gives girls confidence in themselves and their know-how (Source: Clayman Institute)

So Brooks and Chen took the idea of the dollhouse and made it customizable, so that little girls (and boys) would develop building, spatial, and problem-solving skills, all while being exposed to circuits. The results? Spectacular.

Watching children play with Roominate confirms this observation: Kids have fun playing with Roominate and they learn valuable engineering skills too. At the annual Maker’s Faire in San Mateo, CA, the Roominate tent was continually overflowing with both girls and boys. Many parents were forced to drag their children away from the toy. A similar scene occurred at a Roominate play date held at the Clayman Institute.

“I like designing the stuff,” said nine-year old Gracie. Kylie, who is ten, pointed out how, “usually you just have the furniture, you don’t build it.” All of the children echoed the idea that it was more fun to engineer their own model houses and furniture. Nine-year old Camila went even further: “If I could find a store that sells this, I’d buy one for my cousin because they’re really cool.”

Fear not Camila! Roominate can be purchased at bay area toy stores. It is also available from roominatetoy.com, Amazon, and Brookstone.

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