Welcome to PLIX Paper Circuits! Learn the basics of circuits while creating beautiful, interactive works of art!
🥰 Ages 8+ 🕐 1–1.5 Hours 👩👧👦 up to 10 Participants 🍎 1–2 Facilitators ⚡️ Low-tech Electronic
A friendly introduction to electronics, this activity is a PLIX team favorite. It's our recommended starting point for new facilitators who want to begin offering creative STEAM programming in their libraries.
Workshop Prompts & Gallery
Prompts from PLIX
Lit Wearables Enhance your clothes, jewelry, or other wearables with LEDs and copper tape. Examples: Decorate your shoes with LEDs; make a light-up bracelet
PLIX Community Remixes
by Doria Ramos (Santa Ana Public Library)
remix by Angelica (Johnson County Black & Veatch Makerspace)
by Dave Fink (Michigan City Public Library)
by Tracy (Hennepin County Public Library)
Check out more examples and experiences from other librarians on the PLIX Forum Paper Circuits space
Paper Circuits Book Connections
Materials
Supply Kit
For purchasing electronic parts, we use online shops like SparkFun or Adafruit, but there are many other options as well (e.g. local hardware stores).
Supplementary Resources
PLIX Zine
PLIX zines are a supplementary resource for patrons and librarians to refer to. Use our guide to cut and assemble them.
Love our zine, but it doesn’t fit your adaptation of the activity? Remix our zine with this Google Slides template!
Print and use this simple example to practice making paper circuits
Stuck? Refer to these troubleshooting tips to get unstuck.
Facilitation
Playtest and Plan
Remember: There’s no one right way to prepare for a workshop. Use these steps as a loose guideline for planning to run this activity.
- Choose one of our prompts, or come up with a prompt that suits your library community. Our activity guides are for getting you started—feel free to change or create new design elements to suit your local community! All PLIX activity guides are designed for a minimum of 1–2 facilitators
- Gather materials and print out the zine.
- Make an example project. Try it out with friends and colleagues. Thoughtfully incomplete, good examples feature a variety of approaches and starting points. Use them to inspire learners to make something uniquely their own. Check out this guide for step-by-step instructions for making examples for your Paper Circuits workshop ‣→
- Try the activity with your patrons. Set a date and time. Easily promote your workshop with our editable Paper Circuits flyer template →
- Populate your workshop space with diverse example projects. Create and play together!
- Reflect on what you’ve done and consider doing a remix!
Learn more about the art of the example in our Guide to Making Activity Examples
Facilitation Tips
This activity is designed to invite learners of all backgrounds into tinkering with circuits and electronics. The materials used in this activity are intentionally low-cost and friendly to encourage participants to try new things, mess around, make mistakes, and experiment. When facilitating this activity, we encourage you to support this tinkering mindset!
into creative learning facilitation with our Self-Guided Mini Course. It’ll also help you get started running your first PLIX workshop.
What We ❤️ About This Activity
🏠 Low floor, high ceiling, wide walls Making a basic paper circuit is very simple (low floor), yet the materials support increased complexity (high ceiling) and allow for a broad range of creative and aesthetic expression (wide walls).
🧩 Offers a playful approach to learning about circuits This activity is designed to invite learners of all backgrounds into tinkering with circuits and electronics.
💡 Inexpensive, familiar materials support tinkering The materials used in this activity are intentionally low-cost and friendly to encourage participants to try new things, mess around, make mistakes, and experiment.
👨👨👧👧 Encourages collaborative troubleshooting Common issues are easily investigated and resolved by a group of participants making paper circuits along-side one another—a great way to learn!
Did you come up with new prompts? Share your ideas with your peers on the PLIX Forum. Try our Remix Share-Out template if you’d like us to feature your remix!
About PLIX Paper Circuits
The PLIX Paper Circuits kit was inspired by Jie Qi’s work from the High-Low Tech group at the MIT Media Lab. You can check out additional paper circuits components and tools designed by Jie on the Chibitronics website!
Other ways to engage with PLIX Paper Circuits
- Looking for some background music? Check out our PLIX Paper Circuits Playlist 🎶
- Read more about how the PLIX team thinks about designing creative learning activities ✨
- Share your experience running this activity on Twitter or Instagram and tag us @heyplix