Ways to use a paperclip

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How many ways can you think of to use a paperclip?




This question is often used for an enrichment activity with gifted students, or for a person to demonstrate their divergent / out-of-the-box problem-solving ability.

Children normally score better than adults, showing that young minds are very creative.

When I used to teach I sometimes gave students one- or five- minute timed "tests" to see how many ideas they could generate on their own.

It's a good way to wake up your brain.


Here's an article about it:


https://www.inc.com/john-brandon/are-yo ... d-out.html



List as many ideas as you can!

Well...
you could clip hundreds of them together to make a shirt that looks like it's made of chain mail armor.

And then get a bunch of your friends to make the same...so you all can reenact the Battle of Hastings.

My daughter and I made a wedding dress entirely out of toilet paper for art school.



It was gorgeous!

Earring?

how long did that take?...and you can make a paperclip teach people how to use certain software on their computer

Most of a semester, on a dress form (mannequin).

The only prompt for the project was the word "Attach" as a theme.
We went from there and developed the pattern for a dress.

I use a paperclip as a replacement for one of those pointy key things, the tip of which can be pushed into a tiny hole on the tray that holds a sim card/memory card on the side of a typical smartphone.

I usually lose the pointy key thing and end up using an unfurled paperclip.

I came up with the idea myself - I didn't need to look that little shortcut up on the internet.

Usually I prefer to just bend them into weird shapes until I accidentally stab myself.
But I have used them to replace broken zippers.
Also when I build things out of paper, they're good for sticking inside and fixing things too small and delicate to use my fingers for.

Lock pick
Hair clip
Stitch marker for crochet or maybe knitting
Bend it into a really crappy ring
Could probably weave them into jewelry
Stop motion

When I was in high-school I sometimes bent them in the shapes of various guns It was one way for me to stim & deal with boredom. It's very surprising I could do that so well since I generally have bad fine motor-skills & I could barely read my own handwritting.

Bookmark
Leave it somewhere as a reminder to do something.
Trade it for a different object
Use it to measure or weigh things due to it having a standard length & weight.