When we think of toys, we imagine a finished product, a remote-controlled car, a mini piano, or a glitter-filled beach ball. The internal pieces that make up the toy are only seen if the toy breaks. However, for some children with disabilities, the feel, sound, and shape of a toy’s exterior can be as important as the internal components. Features such as a multi-button remote, pressing piano keys, or grasping a ball can reduce accessibility to developmentally essential play.

Molly Y. Mollica, assistant professor of mechanical engineering (ENME), challenges sophomores in her ENME 204 class, Engineering Design with Computer Aided Design (CAD), to create an accessible toy for an individual with a specific disability or a toy for collaborative play between children with and without disabilities. CAD helps students create, modify, and analyze technical drawings and 2D or 3D models.

Team Goat Cheese, a five-student collaboration that included Adam Harper, a mechanical engineering and theatre design sophomore, was voted the ENME 204’s Most Creative Design and the Most Viable Product by UMBC faculty, ENME 204 teaching staff, and needs experts. Their competitors also voted them the Most Creative Design for designing two accessible toys for children on the autism spectrum: a soft, stuffed sea turtle and a bald eagle with weighted body parts, textured fabrics, and interchangeable parts. 

Integral to their success was the involvement of community members on the autism spectrum. “Many of us have someone close to us on the autism spectrum,” said Harper. “We asked them what kind of toy they would have wanted when they were seven or eight.” Harper’s close friend shared that they never had a stuffed animal because the stuffed animals on the market never met their sensory needs. 

“Students have the opportunity to design in collaboration with needs experts—including physical therapists, special education teachers, and potential product users,” said Mollica. “In some cases, the resulting designs are developed enough to be shared with these experts to help address real challenges in accessible play.” 

Designing with needs experts

The team’s online market research found that stuffed animals with sensory designs, such as weighted bodies, textured fabric, and scents, can help reduce anxiety, increase focus, and ease transitions for children on the autism spectrum, fostering greater engagement with peers and family. Another key takeaway of their research was that many sensory toys included only one sensory feature, limiting their effectiveness for children who benefit from multiple tactile inputs. 

Team Goat Cheese used this as their inspiration. “We felt we could do better,” said Harper. “We decided to create two cartoon-like stuffed animals with multiple sensory inputs.” First, they used CAD to design interchangeable body parts. After several trial-and-error sessions, they created a lock-and-release mechanism for interchangeable parts. The eagle’s head, wings, and legs all come off the body. The sea turtle’s front and back flippers and head are also interchangeable. If a child doesn’t like the texture of the bald eagle’s head, they can swap it for the turtle’s head, creating a completely different sensory experience.

Sewing tactile play 

Choosing the materials was also a process. The team chose soft brown corduroy for the eagle’s wings due to its unique texture and geometry, and extra soft sweatshirt fleece for the eagle’s head and tail feathers. The beak and talons are a yellow iridescent mesh fabric with metallic gold squares fused onto it, noted Harper.

(l-r): The eagle’s right wing insert, stuffed eagle without weighted wing pockets, and the fabric for the beak and talons. (Images courtesy of Harper)

The turtle’s body was made of minky fabric—a soft, velvety green plush, polyester fabric—with raised almond-shaped dots that felt like soft scales. The shell was made from a soft brown fleece. 

Harper—the team’s secret weapon as the only member who knew how to sew—owned a sewing machine and had years of experience sewing, welding, sawing, and constructing theatre sets, so he was in charge of sewing the final product.

“For the weighted components, I double-stitched corduroy pockets and filled them with glass microbeads, then placed them inside the wings, head, and body. I filled the rest of the body with polyester fiberfill—a synthetic fiber used for stuffed animals,” said Harper. “It was many hours and days of sewing and making pouches and remaking pouches and seam ripping and fixing.” 

“Our goal is to prepare the next generation of engineers who understand the engineering design process,” said Mollica, “are proficient in engineering design tools, value input from needs experts, and are equipped to create high-quality products that are accessible to as many people as possible.” 

While photos of the eagle and turtle stuffed animals still exist, the physical toy is no longer in the team’s possession—it has been passed on, and they hope it’s now in the hands of a child who is happily creating turtle-eagles with their friends. 

Learn more about UMBC’s Department of Mechanical Engineering.