STEAM Centers in 5th Grade

Fifth graders engaged in playful exploration today in their math & science rotations, using STEAM tools (Science Technology Engineering, Arts, Math) to explore scientific concepts.  Ms. Douglas, Ms. Woods, and Ms. Moore created 5 centers with instruction cards for each center explaining the key goals to accomplish with a given set of materials, and what needed to be stacked together during clean up time before the next rotation.  After initial rule explanations, the students moved to their groups and remained in each center for 20 minutes before having a couple minutes to clean up and move to the next area.  Students explored the following stations:

• Index Card Challenge: Using index cards and tape, create the tallest, free-standing structure that will hold a book.  Materials included cards, tape, scissors, ruler.
• Straws & Connectors: Using the specific material called "Straws and Connectors," build a base that has a perimeter of at least 16 or 32 feet (use ruler or yardstick to measure and calculate).  Build as free-standing structure of your own design on top of the existing base.  Materials included straws & connectors, yardstick
• Magnatiles & Keva Planks: Create a 3-D town using Magnatiles and Keva planks.  You can use graph paper to map out your design.  Materials included: Keva Planks, magnatiles, graph paper. The town must include the following: 
  • 6 streets -- 2 parallel, 2 perpendicular, 2 of your choice
  • Store with a base of equilateral or isosceles triangle
  • 2-story library with a base of a quadrilateral of your choosing
  • Post office with a pentagon base
  • Library with a hexagon base
• Code a Robot: Choose one of the included challenges (instructions included on the center sheet) to program a robot to follow commands.  Materials included Dash robots, Sprk+ robots, Xylophone attachment, Accessories pack; bag of Keva planks:
  • Program Dash to play a song on the xylophone attachment and move as s/he plays
  • Create a maze with Keva planks and then program Dash to pull or push (using the appropriate attachment) an object through the maze.
  • Program SPRK+ to move through a Keva-plank maze (this coding is a little more challenging than Dash coding as there are more options)
• Create a catapult:  Use craft sticks and rubber bands, build a catapult you can use for two challenges.  Materials included: cups, rubberbands, pom poms, craft sticks, yardstick, iPad (for timer), challenge documentation sheet
  • Using a timer, see how many pom-poms you can catapult into the cups in one minute
  • Using a yardstick, measure the highest level to which you can catapult a pom-pom
  • Mark your findings on the chart included 

5th_catapult_record_sheet.pdf
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