The three stages

• Build it. Learners construct the instrument or sensor themselves, from low-cost or everyday materials. Building it is how they come to understand what it measures and how.
• Test it. Learners test and calibrate the instrument against known references, usually through a teacher-prepared activity that is guaranteed to work. This is where they meet data quality, calibration, and the limits of measurement.
• Use it. Learners use their instrument for authentic, self-directed investigations. Once confident, they modify the design, build new sensors, and pursue questions that matter to them.

The teacher-practitioner form: two cycles

In practice the pedagogy runs in two cycles, and this is what gives it its insight and makes it teachable by non-specialist teachers. Without the preparation cycle, the three stages are just a recipe to follow.

• Cycle 1, the teacher's own preparation. The teacher first works through Build it and Test it alone, on their own time, becoming the learner: building the apparatus, calibrating it, and gaining confidence that the equipment works and the activity is teachable. This is also where the teacher identifies and removes hazards before any learner sees the equipment, for example enclosing multimeter probe tips in a screw terminal to avoid sharps and burns, or checking that interfaced devices have compatible voltage levels so nothing is damaged in front of the class. Doing this first is a matter of professional duty of care, not convenience.
• Cycle 2, the work with learners. The teacher leads the class through Build it and Test it together, now as an experienced guide rather than a co-novice. Because Cycle 1 is done, equipment-failure frustration is largely eliminated and the expert and novice gap that intimidates untrained teachers is removed. Both then move into Use it as genuine co-investigators, exploring the learners' own "I wonder" questions, with neither knowing in advance what the working equipment will reveal.

This two-cycle structure is the constant across every platform the pedagogy has been applied to, from multimeter sensors to RIGEL and the B9 robot: the technology changes, the method does not.

Rooted in the nature of science

This is not a new idea; it is how science has always worked. Before commercial laboratory equipment existed, the first scientists built their own instruments to obtain objective data. Galileo built his telescope, and the earliest microscopists ground their own lenses. Building, testing, and using one's own instruments is intrinsic to the practice of science, and it remains the most direct way for a learner to experience how scientific knowledge is actually made.

A modern classroom equivalent

The modern, classroom form of this approach grew out of the impossible task that founded the Nexus Research Group in 1997: teaching practical science with no laboratory, no equipment, and no budget. The earliest application was an ordinary webcam repurposed as a low-cost photomicroscopy tool, so that students could capture and share real microscope images.

The approach was extended through the 2008 Ministry of Education E-Learning Fellowship research into mobile sensor technology (Zenodo), and was then set out explicitly, and named Build it, Test it, Use it, with worked teaching resources in the 2011 SCIOS journal article on using a digital multimeter as an inexpensive data logger (Zenodo). It was presented publicly in the SciCon keynote From Galileo to LIGO: Reclaiming the Maker Space for Science (slides).

Where it is used

Build it, Test it, Use it runs through the hands-on work across this site, and the teaching resources remain in use nationally across New Zealand. Worked examples include:

• Digital multimeters as low-cost data loggers, including home-made UV and other sensors.
• The Casio calculator data logger.
• Maker science, robotics and electronics.
• RIGEL, and the browser instruments RIGEL-WEB and SMART.
• The B9 robot mobile laboratory.

Classroom-ready resources

Two worked exemplars model the pedagogy in practice:

• Angle sensor investigation, an A4 learner Build it and Test it teacher-led instruction sheet.
• Digital multimeter mini manual, a set of learner-centred Use it activities.

These include an activity testing sunglasses for UV protection, which has been adopted by the Tait Foundation's SAT-STEP programme (Sir Angus Tait Science Teaching Enrichment Programme) in New Zealand.

Origin and attribution

Build it, Test it, Use it sits within the long tradition of the nature of science, the same necessity that led the first scientists to build their own instruments. Its modern classroom articulation, the explicit naming of the three stages, and the worked teaching resources that put it into practice are the work of Michael Fenton, first applied in the Nexus Research Group and documented in the published record from 2008 onward.

The pedagogy is archived as a dedicated record with a permanent DOI: Fenton, M. (2026). Build it, Test it, Use it: A Hands-On STEM Pedagogy. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20580175

It was first documented in the 2011 SCIOS article: Fenton, M. (2011). Using a Digital Multi-meter as an Inexpensive Data Logger Substitute. SCIOS, Science Teachers Association of Western Australia. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19325413