Laser Cut Projects 2024: Back to School Bulletin Board Ideas
This article is your laser cutter and engraver DIY guide and source of five back to school bulletin board ideas that will make everyone’s new term a joy to start. Click here to find out more.
Introduction
All around the world, both teachers and students look forward to new academic sessions in their educational institutions, and for this, preparations are made in different ways. A big part of such preparations is the school bulletin board, which is a perfect way of setting the right tone and ambiance in a classroom for the new term. This article focuses on back to school bulletin board ideas and new ways to make them using a laser cutter and engraver.
The application of laser-cut projects is perhaps one of the most innovative ways that can be employed to improve school bulletin boards. Laser cutting lets the teacher incorporate sophisticated designs to change simple bulletin boards into unique and eye-catching ones.
To get started with laser cutters when making such bulletin boards, you need the following things:
1. A laser cutter
The obvious one is a laser cutter and engraver, which should be capable. It is also important to confirm the type of materials you wish to use in your laser cutting project and see whether your laser cutter can support your material type. We recommend using the Ortur LM3 laser cutter and engraver which is optimized for such projects, has plenty of safety features, and offers a wide range of accessories for the best results when making bulletin boards.
2. Design software
You can use Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW, or Inkscape to draw or rasterize designs that may be used for laser cutting your board. Ortur’s LM3 comes with its own Inspiraesth software designed to be user-friendly for both novices and pros.
3. Materials
Most DIY enthusiasts and professional carpenters prefer using plywood or MDF because of the natural grain on the surface, which allows it to be painted or stained. You can also go with acrylic, but it demands more care and skill. But it does give a more modern look and offers more appealing designs (browse Pinterest to find design files). Some people also use thick cardstock paper for a lightweight solution, but it is quite fragile in a classroom setting.
4. Adhesives
For this project, it depends on the type of materials you use to attach laser-cut parts to the bulletin board, and it is recommended to use wood glue, spray adhesive, and double-sided tape. For MDF, you can go with polyvinyl acetate adhesives to get the best results.
If you are using acrylic as a raw material for your boards, you can go with cyanoacrylate (super glue) or epoxy resins, which are best for bonding acrylic to metal, wood, or other non-plastic surfaces. Once you are all set up, we recommend the following five back to school bulletin board ideas that are worth making with your laser hardware:
Goal-Tracking Bulletin Boards
Goal-tracking boards can be used to help students understand their progress during the entire year. Use the laser cutter to cut objects representing milestones in different shapes, like trophies, stars, or badges. Such boards can be a timeline of progress as the students achieve their targets and can also attract their attention all year long.
Attendance Boards
Laser-cut a bulletin board for attendance, through which students can enlist their attendance on a particular day. For such boards, you can make reusable name tags that students should put on a ‘’present’’ or ‘’absent’’ tray. One can also use magnetic strips or Velcro for easier fixing of the frames. Also, you can give the board a class theme like a garden; the students will move their name to a spaceship or a flower, where one has to put the name in a space orbit or a garden.
Student Work Displays
Students need a boost from their teachers when they show progress in their academics. For this, you can make laser-cut decorative frames to showcase students’ work on bulletin boards during the academic year. These may be rectangular only with plain lines or other designs, such as borders or shapes associated with something. You can also follow the laser-cut motifs, stars, or ribbons to create a second layer around the student’s work.
Puzzle Piece Bulletin Board
Such laser-cut boards can have the theme ‘We all fit here’ or ‘Becoming a classroom family’. Laser-cut elements in such boards can be pieces of a puzzle made of wood, plastic, acrylic, or MDF. To do this, make a big figure that shows a puzzle, and each segment of the puzzle should represent a student in the class.
They can include their name and photos and design their items to be more special and closer to their personalities. Individual elements can be given different colors to symbolize diversity while at the same time forming complete unity.
Seasonal and Holiday-Themed Boards
Probably one of our favorite ideas in all the above-mentioned back to school bulletin board ideas this article has covered. For such boards, you can go with “Winter Wonderland,” “Autumn Leaves,” or “Spring into Learning” themes and can have laser-cut elements of seasonal decorations such as snowflakes, leaves, flowers, or holiday symbols done with felt, foam, or wood. Such boards can be designed for all different seasons. For winter, you can place laser-cut designs of snowflakes and icicles on the board.
For autumn, it is fitting to make laser-cut leaves and pumpkins in varying colors in the creation of the vignette. For spring, the accents can be made in the form of laser-cut stencils in the form of flowers and butterflies. Replace the decorations from one season to the next to avoid repetition of the same items on the bulletin board.
Conclusion
The idea of the school bulletin board is diverse, and it brings different surprises and feelings to students in the new semester. Use your imagination with a high quality laser cutting machine!
