The Problem
We want to expose more youth to STEM and give them the tools that they need to have the skillset and confidence to continue down the engineering path.
Our Plan
In Conjunction with Professor Patrick McCarthy at the Museum of Science and Industry, I am working on a project to bring STEM to underserved populations around Chicago with a lasting affect. Before, when Patrick did workshops and presentations surrounding STEM everything was amazing during the duration of the lessons. However, when the last day comes around kids are wanting to take the materials or the projects they have been working on home. The problem with this was that the museum could not fund all of the materials needed for every kid to take them home. Our goal, is to find cheaper environmentally friendly alternatives such as cardboard, copper tape, and simple electronics to put together inexpensive robots that kids can take home to further learn about coding and robotics. If we can reach more kids at a lower cost, the outcome would be that kids will be excited about STEM and can gain confidence through their newfound capabilities and the program would still to have enough money to run.
Themes Addressed
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Community Enhancement
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Education
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The Benefit
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People
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Here is how the project went:
This project went extremely well. Our first workshop included 30 participants and they all successfully assembled a project. We learned about all the materials and how they would contribute to this project. On top of that, the kids had the freedom to decorate however they wanted to. By the end of it, everyone was extremely proud and excited of what they made.
Through this project I/we learned:
Throughout this project I learned that kids need to feel comfortable making mistakes. Nobody is perfect so during the workshop if a kid made a mistake it was perfectly ok and we worked backwards with them until THEY figured it out. Another part of this is how you can't just give them the solution, they have to use critical thinking to solve whatever problem they are facing. In the end, this makes them so much prouder of themselves when they have a working project.
What I/we might change:
When I do this project again, I will probably wait to distribute the supplies right before we start building the project. This is because as soon as kids saw a bin full of supplies they immediately started taking things out. While the curiosity was encouraged, we did lose a few materials as a result.
My/our favorite part of this project was:
My favorite part of this project was seeing the smiles on the kids faces as they were showing their parents and friends what they had made today.
Some tips, tricks or fun facts about the project:
Over the course of this project, we learned that the LED or anything lights up is a huge hit with the kids. It is also cool because they can see the direct result of what the circuit did.