I had intended to blog somewhat in real time, but the Wi-fi was not accessible to us in the conference rooms, and in fact, the reception was so poor in the rooms that I could see the battery percentage on my phone tick down before my eyes as my poor phone tried to lock into a signal. In fact, my blog post yesterday cost about 30% oft battery (I posted it using the hotspot on my phone).
Anyhow, it means that I have to post after the fact...maybe not as fun as posting in real time, but it will work. So, back to the workshops...
The first workshop I attended was a K'Nex workshop. Actually, to be correct, it was a workshop involving Energy, Motion, and Aeronautics, and we used a special set of K'Nex to try out some of the activities. The workshop was taught by a STEM teacher that wrote the lessons/experiments designed for classroom use.
We built some models and them tested them out, sometimes modifying them, one parameter at a time. We made a rocket launcher and then had fun seeing how far the soft darts would fly...
Some other groups built rubber band controlled cars. Then we made a mini figure (can I say that if it's not Lego?) with a parachute, and observed how well it flew. We climbed up an 8-foot ladder and dropped the parachute. We tested different ways to stabilize the supports, and the shape of the chute (round vs. rectangle) while other groups also experimented with different parachute materials.
Two of my most memorable things from this workshop--one of the other groups kept making modifications to the darts, adding nose cones using different materials, to try and make the darts fly farther. I loved watching them work together with such enthusiasm. I can totally see how they could also inspire similar enthusiasm in their students! The second thing that was memorable from this workshop is the drawing for the opened kits at the end of the session. I was one of the lucky winners so I got to take home one of the kits that I can now use in my classes! And, on top of that, my building partner's colleague also won a kit, but generously donated his kit to my classroom so that I would have enough sets for all the groups in one class! (They train teachers, so they said they wouldn't use the K'Nex very much if at all). So awesome! I can't wait to dig in and use these awesome materials in class...maybe as soon as next week!
The second workshop was about STEM Literacy. It was very affirming to me that what I kind of muddled through and figured out early in the year is, in fact, what we need to be teaching our students. One of the main points we discussed in this workshop was the engineering design process, and how it has parallels to the scientific method. When testing and redesigning a model, just like a science experiment, you should change only one parameter at a time.
We also had a fun hands-on activity, where we used a pizza box to make a solar powered cooker.
Definitely learned a lot, and had a great day of workshops! Off to Day 2 and the general session and my Enginering by Design workshop this afternoon!