Welcome to the Innovation Room with Mrs Parker!
Students in Stage 3 have been participating in exciting STEM lessons during Term 2 in the Innovation Room. While in the Innovation Room all students have agreed to be CHAMPS and helped me form our room agreement together which is all about being active learners, showing respect and being safe.
Students have also learnt about the STEM process which includes Ask, Imagine, Plan, Create, Test, Improve and Reflect. We follow this process each time we have a new STEM challenge. Have a look at some of the exciting challenges we have completed so far this term!
Paper Chain Challenge
Students were tasked with the challenge of creating the longest paper chain ONLY using 1 piece of A4 paper, scissors and glue! They had to determine whether to cut the paper into thin or thick strips and long ways or short ways. Students had a lot of fun with this first team building STEM challenge.
Cup Stacking Challenge
Students had to work in groups to plan how they would stack 10 plastic cups into a pyramid using ONLY 1 rubber band and 4 pieces of string without touching the cups! They figured out the configuration of the cups pretty quickly, however, the rest took a while. This was actually great as students had to use the improve and reflect parts of the STEM process. It was another great team building challenge that allowed students to build their communication skills and also their critical thinking skills.
Earthquake Challenge
After students completed a couple of team building STEM challenges, it was time to incorporate their Science unit of extreme weather into STEM. We completed this challenge over 2 weeks. The first lesson we looked at the question of – How can we build a 3-storey structure that will withstand an earthquake simulation? Before students went off and completed the challenge it was important to build our background knowledge of earthquakes to understand how they work and figure out how best to create our structure. Students then worked in groups to plan their structures using only the materials provided. Then it was time to build and oh did time fly. Students soon realised that the planning stage of STEM is actually very important as without a plan, the building cannot happen! Some groups structures held up very well and others not so much, however, students later reflected on what they could do differently next time to improve.
