STEM

Welcome to STEM

Welcome back to Term 3 and a new focus in the STEM room as we move on to Design and Technology. Think technology, engineering, mathematics, problem solving, persistence and weekly challenges.

📚 Thank you!

Thanks to all the families for donating so many recyclable materials for our Term 2 and Term 3 STEM program.  

We are currently on the look out for:

PREP

We have been using fairy tales as a springboard to create structures and explore materials. Rapunzel and The Three Billy Goats Gruff had us building high towers and long bridges. Students learnt about The Learning Pit as a tool to begin a task independently and feel safe in not knowing how to begin, or how to complete the structure. We worked on watching each other to gain strategies before asking for help. In the coming weeks we will be using a range of recycled and repurposed materials to build houses. Straw houses, stick houses and brick houses, can you guess the next fairy tale?

Year 1/2

We have been busy exploring Moriac Primary School, using our 5 senses to observe closely. Students have spent each session outside, exploring new locations around the school with increasing difficulty each time. In our last session, Jenny Possinger from the Geelong Field Naturalist Club joined us to teach us about using magnifying glasses correctly, insects life at Moriac and showed us the Seek iNaturalist App to identify species as we discovered them. Students will continue to expand these skills and in the coming weeks take a trip to Newling Reserve to broaden our discovery zone.

Year 3/4

We have hit the ground running this term. Planning, designing and creating parts of our term long project-Mini Golf. Students have formed groups, designed and created putters, created a structurally sound frame as well as laid down the thematic base to the courses. It's been a busy three weeks, with students meeting challenges along the way. Each challenge has been discussed each week with students reflecting on what went well for the session and an even better if for the next.

Year 5/6

Students have spent the last three weeks exploring elements to include in their term project-Carnival Games. Students have created catapults and a hand pulled fan. Some successfully and some unsuccessful. But with each element, reflecting on the design, the materials and how we can improve it or create a game out of it has been insightful to watch the budding engineers, architects, design technologists and future inventors emerge from our sessions.

In the coming weeks, students will continue to create new possible elements to include in their Carnival Games.