Activity Title: V Environmental STEAM Maker Week
Date: From April 25 to 29, 2022
Author: Jose Maria Beltran Gomez
During the last week of April we celebrate a thematic week related to STEAM disciplines to awaken the scientific and technological vocations of our students and ignite the flame of curiosity and learning.
We believe that science and technology are nowadays indispensable tools for economic and cultural development in any society. To be able to access what we call the “knowledge society”, it will be necessary to develop and increase the number of subjects.
Although we work daily from all disciplines in a transversal way on everything related to STEAM, it is considered essential to create a few days where everything that is done in the centre is focused on science, technology, engineering, mathematics, art, the environment…
On this occasion, the following activities were planned:
– Conference on the Protected Spaces of the Province of Jaén. Knowing what is close to us will make us love and respect it even more. The saying “think globally but act locally” is kept in mind. On this occasion we had the presence of a biologist, director of the Despeñaperros Natural Park.
– A theatrical performance titled “Alunizante”. A play which, through a dialogue and a presentation, shows the history of man’s journeys into space, as well as the future projects that are to be undertaken to visit the moon and even Mars. In a pleasant, approachable way and with touches of humour, the students are infected with the desire to learn a little more and to acquire knowledge of everything related to aerospace disciplines. We have the presence of a theatre group called Teatro La Paca, who thanks to their experience and dedication to the school environment are able to capture the students’ attention and involve them in the story.
– Maker Workshop. During the school year, the pupils have been developing a series of workshops in the classroom related to energy, electricity, mechanisms, programming, 3D printing, etc. Subsequently, the students have developed a script for their presentation to other students about what they have been studying during the previous months. To do this, students from 6th grade Primary School were invited to visit the centre and receive various workshops given by students from our school. The maker workshop consisted of ten corners where work was carried out:
o Construction of a magic can.
o Construction of an electric sweeper.
o Construction of a doodling robot.
o Making greeting cards using electrical circuits made of paper.
o Makey Makey. Fruit piano, interactive book, musical collage…
o Microbit. Programming the board and setting up the maqueen robot.
o Scratch. Programming workshop.
o Stop Motion. Making a short film using the stopmotion technique.
o Scornabot workshop. Programming for a robot to move around a gridded board following a series of routes and encouraging computational thinking.
o 3D printing workshop. Use of TinkerCad and Thingiverse. Downloading of parts in stl format, preparation of the part and printing.
The students have been involved in a very important way, tasting the benefits of teaching and the importance of science and technology for their future.
– Lecture given by professors from the Polytechnic School of the University of Jaén to explain why to study engineering and the projection it offers for the future that is on the horizon.
– Toys with science workshop, where through a series of experiences, practices and the use of various toys they were able to see the involvement of science in their functioning and the importance of this in our environment.
– Waves, sound and music workshop. Each of these aspects has been worked on, discovering through simple practices and experiments how waves, sound and therefore the generation of music are produced. The students were very involved.
– Recycled paper workshop. A session was held in which the pupils, following an established procedure, made paper from used paper. It has been a real discovery for them and they have learnt the importance of taking care of our resources, using them sparingly and putting them into circulation for later use.
– Homemade soap workshop. Soap was made from used oil, which will later be used for washing clothes. The pupils, guided by the science teachers, followed a series of steps to obtain this resource.
– Other workshops: Game on Climate Change, aloe vera, geometric hilarograms, creation of comics of scientists…
– Hiking. Outings to existing environments around the town to get to know the flora and fauna and to promote the enjoyment and care of our immediate environment based on respect, knowledge and fun.
– Poster exhibitions with information related to the environment, climate change and energy, where pupils, with a series of educational guides, have learnt about various aspects related to science, technology and the environment.
All this is necessary to surprise, excite and encourage curiosity in our students, which are the fundamental pillars, according to neuroscience and neuroeducation studies, to awaken the desire to learn in our students. In addition, it is of great importance to create monothematic sessions related to STEAM disciplines in order to bring scientific and technological knowledge closer in a different way.
