engineering in primary school

bungaro79

hi,
i'm a teacher in a boys primary school and i'm looking to set up an after school club where our students can get exposure to STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) projects. a lot of our lads are big into programming and computers but i want to give them the chance to build stuff and experiment with as many different types of resources as i can. i'm hoping to have a budget of a few hundred euro so i'm looking out for ideas of possible things to buy. so can anyone here give me any recommendations of different stuff out there which they think may be suitable for up to 13 year olds?? i know lego has some cool stuff but it's very expensive.

here are a few things i've seen on amazon on the past hour but if there's anything people would recommend then i'd love to hear it!
thanks

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B000YX7OXO/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=5KO0IQ6IIUIB&coliid=I1IM5P54U8NU1

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0000683A4/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=5KO0IQ6IIUIB&coliid=IKL4YIM5WCVZ9&psc=1

Johnnyhpipe

Great to see Engineering being promoted, so fair play to you!

Why not contact Engineers Ireland and see if they can be of any assistance.

From a building point of view, lego & mechano are great. But the spaghetti/glue bridge building can be a great way to learn some fundamentals of structural principles.

Decoda

Hi Bung,

Why not try and see if it's possible to introduce Junior Achievement Ireland programmes into your school? Some of their courses are science / technology based and may suit some of your requirements. I volunteer with JAI and present some of their science based programmes in my local national school. They consist of 5 modules, each module taking approx 45 minutes and are presented once a week. A lot of the JAI programmes can be business related but some of those aimed at older primary based children contain a large amount of science / technology based material and do include some practical lessons etc.

http://www.jai.ie


Good luck with your idea regardless

D

bungaro79

thanks for the replies so far!

i'm planning to get on to engineering ireland and steps.ie johnny. we have some geo mags already which are great for building, some of the lego stuff is amazing but its just so expensive and i don't want it to eat all of my budget. the spaghetti bridge is a great idea and i'm looking for those kinda things too as i hope to structure a proper programme too, not just have them there to play (although that is a big factor too, that they will get experience using concrete resources).

we get junior achievers in decoda and you're right, they are brilliant and my class love it whenever we do get the chance to have them in. i'm planning to contact them too and see if they can offer any advice.

i hope to have about €1000 to spend (might be more or less, have been sending letters to local businesses) and i really want to make sure the stuff i buy will last and will encourage any lads with an interest to really consider it as an option for their future.

if anyone has any ideas where i could get donations or equipment too then please let me know! i'm in the cork area btw!

Decoda

Fair dues to you bung and good luck with the proposal.

Another idea might be to see if you can source any professionals in the field to come in? I'm from a Civil Engineering background myself and have also visited my local school and brought along a dumpy level, electronic theodolite, a laptop with 3d software loaded and let them play around with them (under careful supervision lol)....the kids seemed to get a kick out of it....

Maybe a local architecture practice might help you out with a model making class......maybe if the school is recently built you could access the plans from the planning office and construct a scale model of the school? Any local bridge that the lads could make a scale model of? All you'd need would be general model making materials readily available from local sources...balsa wood etc.

Good luck and let is know how you get on

DC

miss no stars

These are pretty cool:

http://www.lego.com/en-us/mindstorms/?domainredir=mindstorms.lego.com

Got to do these as a lab in first year, was cool

Also, anything build and break is really cool and really cheap. Spaghetti bridges are popular even among qualified engineers

Rules are simple: no lasagna sheets, no selotape, total weight must be under 1kg and must span a clear distance of 1m. The winner is the bridge that carries the most relative to its weight. If you wanted to do this there's plenty of people here could help direct you to simple explanations of how different bridges work, plus the kids can look up plenty on youtube about it. It's not exactly high-tech but it is a bit of fun.

Turbulent Bill

If the kids are into programming, and you want them to build things, Arduino might be just the ticket. Cheap hardware, lots of freely - available projects etc. to use. I'd be amazed if there wasn't a primary school project kit on the market.

To echo everyone else, fair play, it's great to see someone encouraging this kind of learning.

aidanki

a lot more appropriate than learning off stupid poems I have to say, fair play to you

Poly

Great project OP.

You might like these, model aircraft built from drainpipe and corriboard (the stuff election posters are made from)

I've built a few of these and they fly great.

http://www.spadtothebone.net/

I'd also suggest the Arduino, another brilliant piece of kit for teaching kids about electronics and micro controllers


http://www.arduino.cc/

miss-p

I think these look pretty cool, little bits, but they may not be feasible.

There are a few groups that look at introducing kids to this stuff already, Coderdojo and CTYI. They might be willing to share some resources or give some tips.

I know DCU do demos and classes for kids during engineers week, one of the classes involves kids building hydrogen cars and racing them. They also play with solar bugs. So maybe one of the colleges down in Cork might do something similar and be willing to loan resources.

There's also simple experiments that you could carry out that need limited resources, for example building a battery from a potato/lemon or make a simple motor.

bungaro79

thanks for the replies, keep 'em coming!!

miss no stars, those kinda ideas are what i'm looking for! we did something like that in CIT but it was more building a spaghetti structure and putting a marshmallow on top and the tallest wins. any other things like that i'd love to hear and i could put together lessons for them.

poly i've only recently learned about ardunio and i still am not 100% on what it is but it does look like a possibility. the kits look affordable too but i just hope that there wouldn't be too much learning on my end for lessons which would last only a few weeks.

again i'm in the planning process of this and its a case of exposing them to a lot of different types of STEM projects and seeing what they think. i know that i said they are expensive (and they flipping are!!) but the lego education i used before is great and has pre made lessons and i know they love it. but over €500 for kit is a lot!! http://shop.learnit.ie/products/p1111/

a few ideas/projects so that i'm thinking so far are:

spaghetti bridges & towers

mechano toys (just to get them comfortable using screwdrivers, wrenches, etc)

scratch computer programming

vex robotics (we got into a pilot programme, woo hoo!!!)

lego?!?

bungaro79

the club kicked off today and we had spaghetti & marshmallow challenge as our first activity! the lads absolutely loved it and are excited about next weeks class already! thanks to everyone here for the great info and advice! we are still in the process of trying to get local funding and people in to help but we are sorted for the next few months with lessons and activities!

the website is currently being designed so i'll throw up the link once its done and ye can follow the progress of the club!

bungaro79

hi all,
just said i'd come back with an update! the club is going fantastically well and we've had approaches from other schools looking to start up. our website has just been launched so you can check out what we've been up to so far!!

www.stemacademy.ie

thanks for all the help and info i received on here too!

mawk

That.. Is my primary school..

I didn't expect that. Keep up the good work.