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Best intro project for a 5th grader?

Hi - my 5th grader son has a class at school called "Tinkering" where they have been asked to bring in a broken electronic device -- whether to repair or build into something else. What devices come to mind as 1) most accessible/plentiful and 2) have a higher chance of success with kids doing the work? ... so as to inspire them to keep going down this path?

I have access to a wide network of neighbors and friends. I’d like to send out a short list asking if anybody has these easier devices to donate, and to drive more awareness of IFixIt’s mission.

Thanks in advance!

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Hi there Christine,

Thanks for posting on this forum. We’re excited that your son and his classmates are enrolled in a “Tinkering” class and are looking to learn how to repair electronic devices! Here are some of our thoughts for electronic devices that we think would work best for this class:

1) The devices that are most accessible/plentiful would be older cellphones and laptops. Compared to the newer cellphones and laptops, older devices don’t use as much glue and are much more modular.

2) With that in mind, older devices tend to use more screws instead of glue. You’ll definitely want to focus on modular devices where the components and pieces are easy to remove so the students can break down the entire device themselves. Cellphones made in the late 1990s to early 2000s would certainly be a great starting point. If you’re looking for modular laptops, the HP EliteBook series from the mid to late 2000s would also work well. If you’re looking for more interesting devices, older R/C cars and electronic toys may be abundant in your local neighborhood and will certainly inspire future mechanics and engineers in the class.

If you’re looking for more helpful resources for the class, the Smithsonian website has great resources for educators, parents, and students looking to learn more about the history of cellphones.

We wish you and your son’s class the best and we hope parents and people like you inspire more people to repair their devices. Please feel free to continue posting on this forum with your questions and comments and we’d be more than happy to help.

Happy fixing!

Justin Ogihara

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Oh this is fantastic information! Thank you so much for the quick response I really appreciate it! We are so grateful for your organization and will continue promoting the cause.

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@jogihara I would also add the "undesirables" from the Latitude series to this list like the D Series and early E Series (6X00/6X10 and most E5 Series machines) - basically anything from the Vista era. The E5 Series typically needs to be gutted for anything beyond the WLAN/WWAN/RAM/HD but things like the keyboard tend to be tolerable, so that hurts the resale years down the line since they're harder to repaste the CPU on since the motherboard needs to come out. Unless I NEED an XP/Vista machine that's licensed, I'm not interested in early ones unless it's cheap or free. Some of them even use uSATA, which is a deterrent on top of the age of the system since you need to adapt it to use a modern drive or be stuck with a 64GB uSATA SSD if it wasn't removed.

I consider those "undesirables" because of the lack of SATA III support since most of the currently available SSDs no longer support legacy modes OR have limited II/III compatibility. They can be had cheap because people like me don't want them when you can do way better for similar money if you forego the hard drive. I don't want to deal with that mess and having to find one with SATA I compatibility as insurance against the questionable speed support with them and needing it as a backup - when I don't need to care on a Sandy Bridge+ era system

I would rather have a E6220/30 (and the 14/15" equivalent) or something like that without the hard drive (I'll install a cheap SSD like the PNY CS900) for similar money with a lot of them. You practically NEED to give those early ones away. It stinks to lose a chance at a cheap one on eBay, but when my choice is pay more then I should for old stuff or get a E6220/30 I'm more interested in the E6220/30.

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@Christine Grafer No worries! We may be the ones pushing for more repair, but we can't do that without the efforts of everyone in the community. If you wanted more information about repair and what you and other community members can do to help promote it, you should definitely check out the Right to Repair. Thanks again for believing in and promoting our mission!

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@nick Yes most definitely! I couldn't remember the other laptop series that are easy to open, but the older Dell Latitude models would certainly be a great starting point. As always, thanks for your suggestions!

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Christine Grafer will be eternally grateful.