Club STREAM

Our Resource team is trying something new this year.  Since we have 4 resources (Art, Music, Library, P.E.), in the past our Fridays have been a class we saw earlier in the week, and trying to come up with a different activity for students to do.  This year, we are trying "Club Fridays."  Each nine weeks, students get to choose what club they'd like to join.  We gave a little presentation back on August 19 and had students choose:  Art/Gardening, Music & Movement, 100 Mile Club, or my club.  Unfortunately, my club has been called Makerspace, STEM, building club, and I had to stop the Art teacher from calling it Lego club at one point!  This past Friday was our first club day!

We have our small but growing Makerspace in our library, which the kids love, so it made since for my club to have something to do with it!  I thought about it this summer and finally came up with some cute ideas, thanks to Pinterest inspiration (pinspiration?).  I also decided to make it easy on myself:  group lessons by K/1, 2/3, and 4/5.  Well, for K/1 and 2/3, I'm focusing on stories and projects.  This past Friday, we read Mark Teague's version of the 3 Little Pigs, and students got to become pigs and build houses from each of the materials, then become the wolf and try to blow them down!  I differentiated between the two levels.  K/1 got all 3 materials and built in groups:  "sticks" (unsharpened pencils), "straw" (drinking straws), and "bricks" (connecting cubes).

2/3 had the same story, but different approach.  They had to choose a card from a bag to determine what type of house they would build - sticks (popsicle sticks), straw (drinking straws), or bricks (Legos).  I laid the materials out for students, as well as tape and string, and they had a certain amount of time to build.  Then, they too became wolves and got to blow their creations down!

I was a little nervous, thinking students might not want to hear a story and then do the activity, but they loved it!  Next Friday, we're doing Jack and the Beanstalk.  On a side note, when I asked students who had heard the story of the 3 little pigs, not everyone raised their hand!  Interesting.

For my 4/5 group, I was so excited to finally be using our Makedo tools we earned from Donors Choose last school year!  We are working together as a group to build a giant windball, so we can become familiar with the tools and working together.  This will last several Fridays.  In fact, we are still working on cutting out the cardboard squares!  Then, after that project is finished and we've played with it, we'll take it apart, and I'll show students the story of Cain's Arcade.  We'll then build our own arcade machines from recycled cardboard and other materials.

I'm really excited on how our clubs turned out this past week.  Each nine weeks, I plan on offering something a little different.  I just hope it's not one of those things that we do for one year, and it gets dropped!  The kids have really enjoyed having a choice and being able to mingle with other kids in their grade not in their class this year!  I've included some pics below on what we're doing, as well as a video of my 4th graders hard at work (and a preview of what our ball will hopefully look like!).  I can't seem to get the video to orient, so hopefully your neck doesn't get too stiff!

Summer in the Library: STEAM Day

For our 2nd Wednesday in the Library, we focused on the STEAM concept.  What that meant for my students was that Mrs. Youel was opening up the Makerspace!  However, since these days are open up to anyone and everyone, it was a bit different, as some of the students told me ("Wow, I didn't know you had this many things!").   It was nice to show the parents, though, what the Makerspace actually is and that their donations go to good use!

I decided we would do structured stations with free play, if that makes ANY sense.

Building Station:  Students could use Legos (always a hit), Tinker Toys, Marble Runs, and PlayDoh to make things.

Art Station:  I brought out my binder of activities we've done this past year that I've kept the directions, opened up the "Fletcher's Creation Station" wiki page on a couple iPads, and set out different materials for those projects, as well as a few extra (like painting) so students could get their create on!







Take Apart Station:  ALWAYS a hit!  If you have a Makerspace, or are thinking of starting one, THIS is the big hit - almost bigger than Legos!  Students have a BLAST taking apart things to see how they work.  Since it's summer, I had a tape player and a CD/tape player that didn't work, and let me tell you - they took them down to bare bones!  However, the conversation that ensued about how they discovered a magnet in the speakers....and the fact the screwdriver they were using was magnetized after awhile....would've made any Science teacher happy!





Circuits/Coding:  On my iPads, I have a folder for "Hour of Code" apps, so I locked in a couple for play:  Lightbot, Scratch Jr, and Foos.  I also set out my Little Bits with some suggestion cards that I got on TPT as a freebie.  One set shows what to build, the other makes a suggestion.  I can't wait to use these next year with my kids - maybe they won't be as obsessed with the buzzers!  I was surprised this station didn't get more activity (I had about 1-2 kids check it out briefly, then moved on), but I'm finding that although the kids love to use tech in the library, hands-on wins hands down! (pun intended).



So, 4 simple stations, but the participants (including some parents) were engaged for the 2 hours and some were even reluctant to go (always a sign of a hit!), but of course, it was lunch time so they were also hungry!

It was a lot to set up, but it was a very hands-off activity, unlike the Amazing Race, where I was bouncing from here to there, helping out at stations (someone's got to ref the Kangaroo race!).  I hope you're able to use some of this in your library or classroom!  I ended up conversing with some of the parents who came, and totally forgot to get action pics! :(  Good thing I remembered my set up ones!