Focusing on STEM K-5th – Engineering

As many of you know, if you follow my Facebook page or see my posts as the admin of the MFW Fan Page on FB, my kids are very much STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) oriented kids.  What many of you don’t know, is that I am not.  I am a liberal arts, love to read, had 8 years of Voice Lessons, love to be on stage kinda girl. I also loved sports, particularly swimming and soccer.  I do love science, math is not my favorite and I like that a computer works but don’t feel the need to understand why.  How did I manage to raise all three who love Engineering?  No idea.

What I did do is follow their passions.  If they showed an interest in a topic, we got books, found small projects or enrolled them in a class.  We tried baseball, basketball, karate, and soccer along with drama, piano, dance and sewing, but it was the STEM activities that really peaked their interest.  So, this liberal arts girl learned how to love and teach STEM.  As a matter of fact, now I teach camps to Elementary students about STEM topics and coach 5 First Lego League Teams and am starting a Jr. First Lego League Team.  God moves in mysterious ways.

Actually, I used to pray every day that God would make me the Mom my kids needed me to be.  I didn’t want it to be about me, but about the plans that He had for my kids and along the way, He changed me.

So, to help those of you who are just starting to teach your kids ( and I think all kids need an introduction to STEM), here’s some ways that I have found to be really effective and fun to teach STEM.

The Engineering Process –

The Engineering Process is really great to teach all kids because it allows and encourages kids to try and fail.  Engineers prototype everything to try and figure out the failure points which means that they purposely try to get things to fail.  If it fails spectacularly all the better!  Then they know what to fix.  The point is not to stay in the failure, just try again.  Aren’t we glad Thomas  Edison kept trying to find the right filament for the light bulb?  He tried over a 100 times, which means he failed 100 times before he had success.

Curriculum –

Crash Course Kids – What is Engineering

Crash Course Kids – Engineering Process

Crash Course Kids has an entire line of Engineering Videos that describe the Engineering Process and define what several different types of Engineers do.  I think they are fantastic. Did I mention that they are free on You Tube?

Engineering Process 6 in 1 Poster – I like to post the Engineering Process when kids are working so that when kids get frustrated, and they will, I can point them to the poster and ask them where they are in that process.  One of my kids’ Robotics Mentors always ends a kid’s statement of “I can’t do this!” with, “I can’t do this, yet.”  In Engineering and life, that ‘yet’ is very important.  She also high fives kids when they, “epically fail’ because it means that they have a new data point for their prototype.  I love that.

100 Science Experiments – Seriously, one of my favorite Science books ever.  It was originally from MFW’s,  “1850 to Modern Times”, but I loved the book so much, I sold the package without this book.  It has a permanent place in my library.

Invention Journal   This journal helps kids to walk through the Engineering Process on any of their projects.

Activities –

I have done this with teams of kids as well as individually.  I like teams because it teaches kids to brainstorm, to listen to others and gives me opportunity to train those who struggle with working together with kindness and respect.  (For instance, the words, “that’s dumb, you’re stupid” or just yelling at each other will get kids a time out of the competition to have a discussion with me about respect and helpful words.)

Make a Bridge  – I like to do this activity several times.  First, I give them Craft Sticks and Wooden Clothes Pins with 3 mins and only the direction to build a bridge between two tables ( no more than 12 inches apart) to hold as many (thin, really light) books as possible.  After it fails, and it will, I talk them through the Engineering Process and watch the Engineering Process video.  Next, I give them a minute to make a sketch and plan and then 3 more minutes to build.  It should be a better bridge, but will probably fail after a book or two. Then read the except about “What’s going on?” at the top of page 33 of, “100 Science Experiments” and let them have another minute to plan and three more minutes to build.  Their bridge should be so much better and hold more. Good questions to ask are, “Are there better materials to use?”, my kids found binder clips to work better than clothes pins and bigger craft sticks are better than popsicle sticks, “Are there different shapes that hold more? How can you stabilize the structure?  What is the consistent failure point and how do we make it better?”

Build Stable Structures – This activity may take several times as well.  Following the above basic structure, I give them uncooked spaghetti and mini-marshmallows and 5 min to build the tallest, stable structure they can.  After the first try, I read page 32-33 of the, “100 Science Experiments”, give them a minute to sketch and plan and then 5 more minutes.  After that 5 minutes, I stop them to go through a “failure point” discussion.  “Where is their structure the weakest?  What’s going to fail first? How can they make it better?”  Give them another minute to plan and then they can fix their previous structure.

The point of these activities is to teach the Engineering Process and the thought that things aren’t going to work perfectly the first, third or even 10th time you build them.  The point is to keep, researching, keep prototyping, keep trying to make it better.

I also love the Mini Weapons of Mass Destruction, series of books to allow kids to practice their hands-on Engineering skills and to challenge them to make a working project even better.