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New Hope students gear up for school science night
Instead of just participating in a STEM challenge before spring break, Ms. Shivak’s fifth graders at New Hope Elementary School spent time in Ms. Barringer’s STEM lab, actually designing challenges for other students. Fellow classmates will have an opportunity to participate in these challenges and more at the school’s annual Science Extravaganza. Before spring break, Ms. Shivak's class engaged in various phases of the “STEM Challenge Design.”
The first step was to plan. In the design phase on Day 1, student teams named their challenges; described and explained how they would work; listed all materials needed to build their models; considered how to make the challenges easier or harder for different kids; and then they illustrated a “picture” of a successful solution to their challenge.
All throughout the rest of the week, students worked through the development process. They had to troubleshoot and continuously improve upon their models. They worked through scaffolding to make challenges accessible and to adjust the degree of difficulty for students of varying abilities.
Testing phase: On the Friday before spring break, two first grade students, Evan and Tenneh, visited Ms. Barringer’s STEM lab and tested out each STEM station.
And Tuesday evening, April 5, the entire New Hope Elementary School will host its Science Extravaganza, where New Hope families can see these final projects, and participate in a wide variety of other stimulating STEM activities.