Magnetic wallpaper, heated child booster seat, bike tire that melts ice, and a bracelet that shows your class schedule so you always know what class you have next. These are just a few of the amazing designs on display at this year’s Westchester Day School Invention Convention!

Since January, WDS middle schoolers have been putting their creativity to the test by coming up with new and improved products for the Invention Convention. Students were tasked with identifying a problem to solve by conducting a series of interviews with people in their communities. Once the students identified a problem, they had to design a prototype of a product that could solve the problem. In the age of the Internet and Amazon, it’s possible to find just about anything on the web. Students whose “inventions” had already been produced had to demonstrate their use of the design process to come up with the idea prior to finding out that a similar product already existed. They then had to create a prototype that was different from what they found online in at least one significant way. The students presented their inventions to the school community on Tuesday and visiting elementary students got to think about which inventions they might want to use in their own lives.