According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, STEM careers will grow by 10.8% over the next seven years. Compare that to other industries and career fields — which will expand by just 5% collectively — and the need for more STEAM in the classroom is glaringly clear. Those students who don’t bring future-ready skills to college and the workforce will be at a disadvantage.
There’s a lot of evidence and research around the growth that students gain when you give them hands-on experiences that include content-based skills, soft skills, collaboration and cooperation. These experiences and real-world connections translate into exponential growth in student retention across all STEAM subjects and careers.
5 steps to success
After meeting the TinkRWorks team at a conference in Texas, we quickly realized the synergies between the company and our passion for bringing STEAM into the classroom.
We agreed that it shouldn’t just be certain classifications or subsets of people who get these great, immersive STEAM experiences, which are completely applicable and engaging for all students.
When we got back to Houston the following week, we launched “STEAMotion” with the goal of introducing young students to STEAM. Here are five steps that we took to make our program a success:
- Hatch the idea and then put it into action. We knew we wanted to provide STEAM experiences to students who wouldn’t necessarily always have access to these opportunities. The goal was to provide as many hands-on STEAM experiences as possible to students by utilizing the innovative STEAM education platform, which helps educators deliver engaging, hands-on learning experiences to students. We also integrated some low-cost, low-fidelity, hands-on STEM experiences for kids and created our program based on those foundational elements. We basically hatched the idea and then rolled forward with it.
- Choose age-appropriate projects. We identified our target audience and decided we wanted to focus on the K-8 space. At the Rice Office of STEM Engagement (R-STEM), all of our programming up to last summer had been with students in third grade through community college. STEAMotion provided us with the opportunity to reach students in grades K-2, which is critical for laying the foundation for STEAM education. For them, we created experiences that increase engagement and effectiveness and are developmentally appropriate based on their age and grade. It could be something as simple as engineering a product (for younger students) or doing some type of tactile coding experience that includes sewing circuits into clothing (for older students).
- Let students take the reins. The STEAM platform includes a strong curriculum, but we approached it from the standpoint of inquiry. Most programs that we run out of R-STEM are inquiry-based. When I talk to teachers about inquiry-based instruction, the focus is in the context of being the “guide on the side” and not the “sage on the stage.” This gives students the freedom to create, explore and experience the learning before the teacher dives in and helps answer questions and shores up misconceptions. The goal is to make everything student-centered and let them be the ones who are doing the actual exploration and creation. This helps build both critical thinking and problem-solving skills.
- Incorporate hands-on learning. We also wanted to make sure we were incorporating hands-on learning with potential real-world connections. Anytime you can infuse real-world phenomena for kids, it creates a more meaningful experience for them. A great way to do this is to bring in collaborations and connections. If you can do field trips or bring experts into your program, for example, it creates a great opportunity for real-world phenomena. We run a summer program that focuses on engineering design for middle-school students, and we look at real-world issues in the community and the students work on projects to solve those problems. Afterwards, students can actually see the impact of their efforts and that’s very meaningful for them. You can also reach out to local businesses or individuals who can help bring that real-life STEAM-based experience right into your classroom or program.
- Get everyone excited about STEAM. We all know that technical subjects are viewed as “difficult” or even something to avoid, but you can shift that narrative and get students excited about STEAM. The post-COVID world has made it so much simpler because you can hop onto a Zoom call or Google Meet with a local expert or businessperson to talk about what STEAM looks and feels like in the real world. Before the presentation, talk to the guest about your students and their interests. This is a great way to introduce students to potential careers while also planting seeds in their heads of “Oh, this is what I’ll have to think about if I’m interested in aerospace engineering and the types of courses and programs that I need to explore.”
Stoking STEAM success
The time when STEAM subject mastery was limited to a small handful of “brainy” students is long gone. As we’ve proven with our own program — which has no prerequisites — even kids with zero coding experience are completely successful in our program. Students of all abilities and capabilities are succeeding.
Our teachers are equipped with all of the resources and support they need to implement a STEAM program in their classrooms, afterschool programs, summer enrichment camps or other efforts. We develop a plan and then implement STEAM programs across all different situations and timeframes. Our programs are well-suited for all students, teachers and facilitators to thrive.
With the team from our STEAM provider handling much of the planning, we can focus on engaging with students in the classroom and developing strong relationships with them. This also supports a truly student-led classroom, which is exactly what you want with a STEAM program.
Opinions expressed by SmartBrief contributors are their own.
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