STEM Expo

The Smart City Expo Day was held on Wednesday 18th October - a big day for the Year 3/4 students! They have been working towards this day for the past six months. 

During Term 2, they worked hard learning the basics of block coding and JavaScript through Sammat Education. 

In Term 3, they began their group project, using the Engineering Design Cycle - ask, imagine, plan, create, improve - to create a farm, home or city building that they would automate using micro:bits. The past two weeks they have been busy finalising their projects and now, finally, it was time for the expo!

The Athol Road students welcomed Matt from Sammat Education along with students and teachers from Mount Waverley Heights Primary School and Mt Hira College to our school. They spent the morning setting up their projects, making the most of the opportunity to talk to Matt about how to improve their codes. During the expo, students presented their projects to each other. The Athol Road students did a fantastic job explaining what they had created to the visiting students. Everyone was eager to discuss and compare notes about construction techniques and coding challenges as they explored each other’s builds.

After the expo, Matt held a STEM challenge using spheros. Students formed mixed groups with the visiting schools to plan and build battlebots! The objective was to create a battlebot that could pop a balloon on an opposing bot. The creativity and teamwork students displayed during the challenge was amazing! There were some very interesting battlebots that entered the arena. After a few practice rounds, students reassessed their designs and made some improvement before competing in an “all in” battle! From all reports, the battle was EPIC!!

Thank you to all the ARPS staff, especially the Year 3/4 team for their assistance throughout the year; the students greatly appreciated the resources and extra help you provided them. And an extra thank you to the Year 3/4 and Specialists teams for their help on the day to make it as fun as possible for the students. It will be a day they will remember!

Bec Meade

STEM Teacher