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stem and literacy integration

STEM and Literacy Integration Ideas [ep.48]

STEM and Literacy Integration Ideas [ep.48]

stem and literacy integration

Check out the full episode on STEM and Literacy Integration Ideas:  

 

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Episode Summary

Even though it’s not in the name, literacy definitely has a place within STEM challenges. In fact, I would even say that STEM and literacy are a perfect match.

The audio from today’s episode is from an online summit I presented at in the past at one of the Wonder Workshop International STEAM Summits.

In this episode, I’ll be sharing five different ways that you can combine STEM and literacy together and make the perfect pairing in ways that you might not have thought of before.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • STEM story and retell lesson ideas
  • STEM and story lesson ideas
  • STEM and literacy lesson ideas using robots
  • Green screen STEM and literacy lesson ideas
  • Stop motion animation and literacy lesson ideas

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Even though it’s not in the name, literacy definitely has a place within STEM challenges. In fact, I would even say that STEM and literacy are a perfect match, just like avocado toast. Well, the audio from this episode has never been heard before on this podcast. This presentation is from an online summit I did in the past at one of the Wonder Workshop International STEAM Summits. I’ll be sharing five different ways that you can combine STEM and literacy together and make the perfect pairing in ways that you might not have thought of before. I’m more than just a STEM coach in this episode. Think of me more as your STEM chef. Chef’s kiss. Let’s get to it. 


Naomi Meredith  01:13

Hello, and welcome to this very fun session. I am so glad that you are here. Literacy and STEM integration are perfect like avocado toast. I am your presenter, Naomi Meredith. So why in the world would we even think about implementing STEM and literacy? They kind of seem like two separate worlds that don’t exactly go together. Well, I had this analogy with avocado toast. If you don’t like avocado toast, I’m so sorry. I love it. I know a lot of people do. So just bear with me. So of course, avocados are delish on their own. So is toast. But when you put the two together, it’s an amazing combination. So just like STEM and literacy, they are amazing on their own and you do wonderful things in your classroom. But they are even better together. Actually it does that make your planning so much easier. I think coming from the classroom and into a STEM role, I still have that classroom teacher mindset, where I really want to be thoughtful about my planning, having things cross curricular, having those experiences be meaningful and integrated rather than separate. So literacy pops up into my instruction all the time. I know that whether you are a STEM teacher or a classroom teacher, or even have a different specialized role that you could find meaning within this integration. So today, I’m going to be sharing with you five different ways that you can integrate STEM and literacy together. I’m going to also give you some student examples that you could think about for your own planning or even do the same lessons in your classroom. 


Naomi Meredith  02:51

So first, we have STEM and stories. This is the first way I love sharing with teachers to integrate STEM and literacy into their classrooms. I feel like that this is the easiest way and in some ways the most fun to plan. But as elementary teachers, we love reading stories, we love books, we have extensive classroom libraries. Well, that can definitely go into your STEM integration. Now thinking about STEM and stories, it could be picture books, which are a great example. You could even use chapters from a chapter book, even nonfiction articles can fit into this category, STEM and stories. So with that, thinking about different types of STEM lessons you can use, the best one to get started is to think of stories that have a clear problem and solution. Oftentimes with that problem and solution, how building can go into that story. So I’ll give you an example. If you’ve read this story, Iggy Peck Architect, they go on a field trip and the poor teacher heaven forbid, this would happen if I went on a field trip, but she passes out on the hill and the kids have to go save their teacher. You can pause reading the story and then have the kids build to solve the problem. Then you can read the rest of the story to see how their solutions compared to what is in the book. So a problem and solution story especially like I said building to solve a problem works really well with this integration. Also, alternate endings, stories that would change if the ending was changed, work well. So you’re really thinking about that story structure with both of these problem and solution and alternate endings, parts of a story beginning, middle and end. What if the ending did change? You could have students write the alternate ending and then build what that alternate ending could be. So that again, a very easy integration. I know you’re thinking of books in your head right now. Also, with STEM and stories, this is a great way to explore nonfiction topics. So some stories have specific science and nonfiction topics that it touches on or you can integrate other types of science within the story that would actually make sense. So you could go either way with that. What’s really great is if you’re using a fiction story, and then you’re exploring nonfiction topics, you’re really going into those standards when it talks about the paired selections, and comparing and contrasting, or you could do a nonfiction story and then a nonfiction exploration. So again, you’re connecting all of those things together. What’s really great about starting with the STEM and stories, and really, with all the other four examples is that you are maximizing your time. I know that teachers are pressed for time, you are really maximizing that time and connecting it all together and building up that scientific background for kids. 


Naomi Meredith  05:43

So more examples for you thinking about that problem and solution and if within this presentation when you have access to it, you can actually click on each of the pictures for more detailed lesson plans. The first one is showing After the Fall. So the book is really, really cute by Dan Santat I believe. After the Fall is after Humpty Dumpty fell and he’s so sad, and he just doesn’t believe in himself. He’s down on his luck. Well, students can build a solution to that problem, Humpty Dumpty falling off the wall. This is a great time, springtime, easter eggs are on sale. You may have a collection hiding in your class, but students can build a solution to keep Humpty Dumpty safe for an alternate ending. In the middle, we have the gingerbread man. As we know, in their original there are lots of different versions. But in the original poor gingerbread man gets eaten by the fox. So what if the gingerbread man got a little bit smarter? It got to the river and we found a way to float across the river.  So there’s an example kindergartener built, not me, I just held up the boat and took the picture. But students learned about sinking and floating and created a different ending for the gingerbread man to float across the river. Obviously, eventually, in that picture, the cardboard would disappear. Then we also have that scientific connection, where we read Beekle, The Unimaginary friend, and students create their own unimaginary friend, and they have to figure out a way to have them stay together with a magnetic force. So you’re talking about forces with magnetic energy. So there are some, there’s a little paperclip on her hand and a magnet on the back. But they could explore different things that are magnetic and not, and choose the one that works best to keep their friendship together. 


Naomi Meredith  07:26

Thing number two of how to integrate STEM And literacy is through robotics. The robotics in elementary isn’t as scary as you might think. Luckily, a lot of companies out there just like Wonder Workshop, love Dash, the robot, that is a amazing robot to get started with in your classroom. I’m not getting sponsored to say this. But Dash is a wonderful robot to have in any classroom, because there are lots of different avenues to code that robot, there are others as well. Companies are making it a lot easier for coding and robotics to be in the classroom to get students exposed to that type of learning. So don’t be scared of it. It is okay. What’s great is that you can share robotics and connected again to that literacy. So a lot of those same types of things. So story retail, can be used building your vocabulary, we are always are working on vocabulary development, whether it is content specific or scientific specific that can definitely be incorporated there. Also, it’s a cool way to bring the story to life, you’re bringing that movement into life. So you not only are students thinking about the story, but they’re thinking about the coding pattern as well. So that’s really integrating different types of thinking, and that students will really shine with this hands on way. So thinking about story retell, any type of robot, you could do this with. This is a little bee bot, and we put a little hungry caterpillar face on it. But students were coding the robot to different squares on the grid to retell the Hungry Caterpillar eating the food in order of when it happened in the story. So it’s really a great way. There’s a little side tip of robotics is if you have robots, measure the distance of one forward move. So on this grid, I made it with butcher paper, and then I pressed go on the little robot for one forward move. Then I measured the distance that it took. So that helped me know how big my squares needed to be. I printed the little foods on the side to put on this square. So you could do that with Dash, the Code-and-Go-Mouse, Sphero, whatever robot you use, but that’s how you can make a grid, very cheap. So code and retell this story. Also, building vocabulary having again, like talking about life cycles in your class, you could have students code the robot to show the lifecycle in order when it happens. So it could be on a grid, it could be in various places in the room for extra challenge that aren’t measured precisely. So then they’re building that vocabulary and going into your site. It’s unit building that background knowledge, also bringing this story to life. And that last picture, we have Sphero to pull us through the Ididarod race. And so we were reading some fiction stories kind of goes with that sentence stories as well. But it was bringing how what the I did route is and how that is an annual event in Alaska. If you’re from Alaska, I hope you’ve been I did write I want to talk to you sounds super cool to go to, I would never run the race, but I really want to go see it. But you can bring this story to life and make it more hands on and tangible for kids. So robotics is a great way. Don’t be scared, you can definitely do it. 


Naomi Meredith  10:40

Another way to integrate that literacy and STEM together is green screen. Now you don’t have to have an official screen, I have a blue screen behind me a blue painted wall. The one right next to me is green. But you can get creative with that green screen as well as go to Dollar Tree and get a green plastic tablecloth and it can be hung anywhere in your room, you definitely want to have great lighting. But also you think get even more creative. I could use this green stool behind me as a type of green screen, you can use green shirts, which you’ll see in some of these examples as a type of green screen. So think outside of the box when it comes to a green screen, because you could definitely do it on a smaller scale, which even might be more tangible in the classroom, when you’re thinking about the noise level and the space that you have. So green screen is really great. When you’re thinking about book reviews. I know a lot of units are talking about opinion writing where you’re trying to persuade someone to read the story. You can amp up your game with book reviews with green screen. Weather reports are a classic example. But it’s a great way for kids to work on writing a script practicing that oral reading, which is another standard that oral recall that oral retail write a script and they can tell the weather report of that day. Also, research projects doesn’t have to be super complicated can be enhanced with that green screen, a different way to publish. 


Naomi Meredith  13:41

So we have in the first one, you see the kids, we have an iPad stand and we can talk about other apps. Definitely message me we can talk about great apps to use for green screen, but green screen or blue screen can be used. Fun fact, blue or green is typically used because humans shouldn’t naturally be that color. So it really makes things pop with that background. So students in their writing class, wrote a book review and they publish their writing. They wrote it out nicely. They did all the editing. But then they had to share with our audience. We didn’t just type the story. We had kids verbally retell their stories. So you see that there’s a little script hanging on or their writing hanging on the tripod. The student was reading their published piece from there and I wish I had a picture of this from there and the green screen app. We put the book cover on the shirt. So it looked like the kid was wearing their shirt to promote it like a little bit of marketing about their story. And the middle of course we have a weather report that was the weather that day. So students quickly in the morning wrote their weather report, practiced their script, and then they read it out loud and pointed to what the weather was and then we uploaded that video on Seesaw. The last example is me for a research report. I was wearing a green shirt and I blended them into green background and researched about a famous person in STEM, this was Mae Jemisen, and it goes along with those, like those old school, I guess, old school. But when you have kids research about a person, they cut out the paper and put their head in it. It’s like that idea, but in a green screen more interactive way. And I’ll tell you, if you just show the kids this video, they will start laughing, it is a little bit creepy. If I didn’t stay still, my head was floating around. But it was just a fun way to prepare a research report. 


Naomi Meredith  15:26

Stop motion animation, one of the oldest animation techniques out there, it’s still used today. It’s used all the time. But it’s also a great way that you can integrate STEM and literacy. Again, this is like a low floor high ceiling type of activity I’ve learned so much about, um, students patience and creativity. So much happens with stop motion in front of the screen. It’s like, it doesn’t take a whole lot of hard technology. There are lots of free apps out there. But students really are focusing on paying attention to detail and how they’re going to manipulate the tools so that they can move smoothly. So this is really great for those problem solving skills. And if you can collaboration, so stop motion animation can be integrated with literacy, again, that story retell, that’s really a big thing with our comprehension. Again, building that vocabulary, and it’s a cool way to do creative writing. I love stop motion animation. And you’re gonna see in these examples, you actually don’t really need anything fancy. When I started this in my K through five STEM classes, I really didn’t have a huge budget. So I actually had the kids do all of their stop motion animation, like that middle picture with papers, so we drew the props, and then they move them. So you can just do paper. If you don’t have any budget, you can get started that like I said, the app is free. So if you have even your phone or one or two iPads, you could get started with stop motion animation. 


Naomi Meredith  16:55

So the first one with that story retell, this was a great starter activity. We combine Legos and modeling clay, but we talked about quickly, different, very few even doing a fairy tale unit, we talked about different fairy tales, and students had to retell the story through movement, and they weren’t allowed to add sound, or music. So they had to be very clear with their visualisation and the movements of their images to show accurately the story. So the first one, you probably can guess, is Little Red Riding Hood. And so this group did a really great job collaborating together, and restyling Little Red Riding Hood. And we would all guess what the fairy tale was. Another one that was really great. I don’t have a picture on here, but it was the tortoise and the hare and the kids had the little tortoise and the hair move inch by inch and had the whole story. It was amazing. And the tortoise was made out of clay. And then the hair was made out of Legos. So cute. When you’re thinking about that building vocabulary. Fifth grade was talking about the human body systems. So they researched about a different body system like very specific, more like a body part like eyes, your heart, ears, more specific things. And then they had a rubric to what they needed to include in their stop motion video. And all of that I’ll show you a couple examples are i’ll link these in here. That way you can watch them on their own, they don’t have sound. So if you go into the presenter notes are right there. Also with that creative writing, we really want to encourage that creativity in our classrooms. And having those narratives that are just have that creative piece and all those story elements, so students could complete their creative writing, and then create a stop motion animation to tell the story that they’re trying to convey. So they can narrate over their movements with their creative writing piece. So I definitely recommend stop motion animations, second grade and up, I think you can do it with K and one with some guidance. But second grade usually can be a little more independent and understand the picture taking process Makerspace. Of course, they’re all these big names, and they really aren’t scary, I think you can definitely do it. But Makerspace is my fifth way for integrating STEM and literacy together. And so you definitely again can integrate the two and make a meaningful experience. When you’re thinking about stocking up your Makerspace, having donations from home is a great place to start or even if you’re wanting to do it next school year. I have a little bin at my house where I start collecting things all summer long, and then I’ll bring it into school. So cardboard, for sure bottles, all those sorts of things. But writing game rules is a great way to integrate that Makerspace experience when you’re talking about a how to and how to be really clear with your writing and playing a game you have to be very, very specific. You might even be thinking about some games we like there are some games that have not very good rules. So those are some good non examples as well that you could share with students. You definitely can integrate that Engineering Design Process which a lot of states are adopting or already are using. 


Naomi Meredith  20:00

In the Next Generation Science Standards, which do have a portion that have the Engineering Design Process, so integrate that Makerspace, that science piece, all the literacy, those can all be connected together. And then of course, research projects are a great opportunity to use Makerspace. Because, really, you don’t need a whole lot of materials. So we used to have some cardboard and tape, you’re good to go. When you’re thinking about those game roles. Students can design a game using cardboard, tape, marbles, and then create those game roles. So how many players are needed? What do you do step by step, if I were to read your directions, what I know how to play, you could even have the editing phase where the game is created, students have to read the instructions, they can’t ask the author, and then figure out how to play and then they can get feedback on the game rules. That could be that editing that peer review, and see how they could change the rules. So it makes more sense, or even giving feedback like, hey, we found another way to play, maybe you want to change this piece up. So that’d be a great way to make that meaningful editing part. When you’re building that vocabulary, they Engineering Design Process, so you have the problem you’re trying to solve. And then that research piece and keeping track of information. This is just one way but building a cardboard airplane. And you’re talking even that math with the STEM, all the different measurements and the lines and angles of how you should set up different parts of the airplane, you could go through that whole engineering design where students are gathering data, and also writing the modifications that they made to their airplane and how it improved their design. So you can definitely go deeper into the responses for various phases. I think that modification piece and also explaining how the design worked or great opportunities to really integrate that writing. And that oral communication research projects. Like I said, low practice is a recycling plant. So we were researching about how recycling plants work, and what types of things can be recycled. So we did some research on that. And then we built up our recycling plants. And then students were able to present about how a recycling plant works. Again, that oral communication, you can go as deep as you want and reading. We also use books on Epic books, which is a free for teachers website, where there are lots of great examples of how to take care of the earth, how recycling works, how it compost works. So we’re working on that Earth piece together. So lots of ideas out there, you do have access to this presentation and click on those different pictures to go more in each of those lessons. But I know I’m that kind of person where I want to try all the things and maybe you’re like oh, so overwhelmed, you don’t know where to begin well next steps. Choose a lesson that you have in your unit upcoming that you think needs an upgrade. And springtime is a great time to dive in and try something new. And the kids have this energy but use that energy in a really hands on way and the kids will still be productive and engaged. So choose the lesson you think needs an upgrade. Try one of these ideas. It could be a lesson, or it could be a whole topic maybe the last month of school you want to do Makerspace so you’re talking about Earth Month, bringing your recyclables let’s find what we find outside we can build with it. So definitely use what you have. You don’t have to start off completely fresh, but use that little upgrade. So make it gourmet avocado toast get really good. Don’t feel like you got to make all the different avocado toast.


Naomi Meredith  23:34

Make one really good with the salmon in the egg and the capers like that picture. Oh my gosh, I’m getting hungry right now. But make that one lesson really, really good.


Naomi Meredith  23:50

Integrating STEM and literacy is so much fun. And I bet you’re dying to see all of the examples and handouts from this presentation. You can grab the video recording of this episode, the video slides I referenced throughout student examples, and bonuses for only $5. That’s cheaper than the dog treats that I like to buy for my little dog Frederick, way cheaper. The bonus includes a list of tools that you can use in STEM and literacy integration to different lesson planning templates and clickable links to lesson plan ideas you might want to try for various grade levels. This will be linked in the show notes, and you can check it all out here. Naomi meredith.com/stem literacy video where you play.

stem and literacy integration

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

stop-motion-used-in-the-classroom

How is Stop Motion Used in the Classroom? [ep.47]

How is Stop Motion Used in the Classroom? [ep.47]

stop-motion-used-in-the-classroom

Check out the full episode on How is Stop Motion Used in the Classroom:  

Embed YouTube video here

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Stop motion requires minimal materials for students to be successful but involves a high level of creativity and critical thinking.

This episode is a presentation from an online summit I spoke at in the past, the Teach with Tech Conference.

In this episode, I provide an intro to stop motion animation, a list of tools to get started, an explanation of student examples, and ways to extend this lesson even further with other resources.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • What stop motion animation is
  • Tools to get started with stop motion in the classroom
  • Ideas for how to use stop motion in the classroom

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Stop motion animation is one of my most favorite units to teach students. It requires minimal materials for students to be successful, but involves a high level of creativity and critical thinking. Well, the audio from this episode has never been heard before on this podcast. This presentation is from an online summit I did in the past the teach with tech conference, you’ll get an intro to stop motion animation, a list of tools to get started explanation of student examples and ways to extend this lesson even further with other resources. 


Naomi Meredith  00:32

And stop motion is one of those things that I feel like anybody can do. It’s not as hard as you think. So what in the world are we doing today? Well, I’m going to give you an introduction to stop motion, so you can be an expert on it. I’m also going to be showing you some tools to get started with stop motion in your classroom, which these are minimal tools. And so that’s great news. I also have some student examples to share with you and then some other extensions to take your stop motion to the next level when you’re ready. Or if you’re ready already, this is for you. 


Naomi Meredith  01:37

So in short, what in the world is stop motion animation? Well, stop motion is a lot of pictures played with tiny movements really, really fast to make things look like they are moving on their own. So you probably have seen examples of this, which we will show. But basically all those tiny pictures are doing all the animation for you. So animation experience is not needed. Anyone can make it look awesome. You’re probably more familiar with stop motion than you think. These are some examples of stop motion used in popular movies. Oftentimes I will show clips for my students because they are amazed how fluid the movements are, they can’t believe that a computer didn’t do all the work. Gumby is stop motion animation with all of its interesting characters. So that is probably one you’re familiar with. A year without a Santa Claus, they use a lot more puppets, and that also has stop motion animation. And then chicken run, and all those movies along those same lines are also made with stop motion animation. A big misnomer is that the LEGO Movie is not made with stop motion animation. It was actually made to look like it was created that way because LEGO is typically used in stop motion animation with kids, so they wanted to give that feel. But it actually wasn’t made that way. It was made with real animation. 


Naomi Meredith  03:10

So when you’re thinking about this technology tool, why in the world should you use it. It’s so old, who cares? Actually, there are some benefits to it. Stop Motion brings stationary objects and topics to life. It also doesn’t require a lot of tools. So that is great news, especially as teachers, we don’t always have access to unlimited resources. You can pretty much use anything when it comes to stop motion. The biggest thing that I love about this is that it teaches patience and problem solving. And I’ll show you some picture examples with this. But the critical thinking and problem solving happens in front of the camera. The kids aren’t spending a whole lot of time on their device until they start editing. But to make a really great video, it takes so much patience and problem solving for it to make sense. Those are things we want for our kids. Right? The technology piece. There’s lots of different options out there. What I’ve started with is this free app stop motion studio. This works amazing, and it’s a great place to start. Actually when I came into this STEM position in the first year, when I tried stop motion animation, I downloaded the free app on our iPads. Then the next year I was looking through my app management system and I actually had this one purchase from the previous teacher. I had no idea the kids had no idea and we were very successful with this free version. So totally go there. You don’t need to upgrade. As of right now, during this presentation, you can get it on iPads, Google Play, and Kindle Fire depending on your device compatibility, all for free. Start with the free. If you are able to let’s say you have one iPad or two iPads in your classroom and you don’t mind upgrading, you can buy the Stop Motion Studio Pro. It has additional editing options and LEGO faces that you can add on so has like more real animation to add in your stop motion. There’s also the options of green screen and you can do more editing within the app, I will show you some other apps at the end. So if you are just using the free version, I’m going to show you some other options if you don’t feel like upgrading. 


Naomi Meredith  05:42

Now with the Stop Motion Studio Pro again, it is compatible on these three types of devices. Then you can also purchase the software for computer programs. So this would be best with for Macs and Windows, if you are able to upgrade or if you write a donor’s choose or if you have a classroom budget, the HUE Document Camera, which I know has other benefits outside of stop motion animation. So it might be worth the investment. But the HUE Document Camera also has an option of stop motion animation software. And so each of those can be bought separately, or it can be bought together as a package. I’m not an affiliate, I’m just giving you free information. But this might be an option as well. So again, if you are a classroom teacher, or even a STEM teacher, if you bought one of these cameras and had a station in your classroom, that could be an option. So don’t feel like you have to have a device for every single student. In fact, stop motion works very well when it comes to collaborating and assigning roles. So that might be just something to keep in mind, depending on your situation. So lots of different options out there. If you even wanted to go super cheap, you could take a lot of pictures on a phone, like if you really trust your kids with a phone or if you have old little tablets that don’t connect to Wi Fi or don’t have cell service, you can take a lot of pictures that way, and then swipe through and it looks like it’s moving. So I’ve heard of kids actually doing that before they come to my class. And they’re so grateful to have the app, but you don’t even need to have a special app to do this. So when it comes to the materials you can use, these are just some options to get started. Honestly, you can just use paper as a prop. I will actually show you an example of how paper was used in stop motion. So these are things that kids could bring from home. Again, if you have donations, or you have a little budget, these are great places to get started. There’s actually a whole YouTube channel for stickbots. It’s a brand and there are some good clips on there kind of filter through and watch them first before you show the kids. But these have little string on them and it moves their joints so they move a little more human like so that can help when kids are trying to make a video of a person walking it moves a little bit better than a minifigure.


Naomi Meredith  08:09

Play-Doh is a great option as well because kids can mold and change their characters. I love Play-Doh and then I also discovered Crayola has a great modeling clay. What’s great about modeling clay is that it doesn’t dry out so they can leave their creations for a week. I had an after school club for stop motion animation, and kids would make things with modeling clay. We would leave it high up on the shelf and then they came back to their work and it was perfectly fine. It’s very inexpensive. It’s actually a little bit cheaper than play-doh. So keep an eye out for that Crayola modeling clay. LEGO, of course, amazing kids love it. Great option to build settings, characters, all sorts of things. Masking tape is great on hand if they’re trying to tape things to the background, construction paper, and of course many fakes. There’s lots of knockoffs of minifigs on Amazon so that you can look into that, depending on your class or school roles, even encourage kids to bring that from home and really encourage mixing these mediums. They can really bring their settings and their videos to life. So behind the scenes, here’s what it typically looks like in my classroom. The other thing I really love about using stop motion is that all the work is done in front of the camera. So you can see an example right here. I had iPad stands, which again, this isn’t something you have to have, but we had an iPad stand they zoomed in, they would move it like take make their little setting, move their character, take a picture, move their character take a picture. 


Naomi Meredith  14:53

They were back and forth the whole time, but it doesn’t have to be silent in my classroom. I know that can be hard when you’re filming and there’s 25 kids or they’re trying to make video goes stop motion is that recording the sound, you can make a stop motion video without sound. And it’s great. I have an example of that also to show you, and all that if they do want to add sound that can be done later. And usually, with timing wise, you have one group that finishes really fast, they might be out in the hall adding sound, the rest of the class is working away, and they can talk and collaborate that way. So that’s what I love, it doesn’t have to be completely silent to make this work. Here’s another example. This iPad, I believe, has a stand on the back. But I’ve seen kids actually make iPad stands with Legos to make their iPad stand up. So being inventive in a different way. But you can see that they’ve zoomed in on their screen on their setting. And you can’t even really see all this background actually wanted part of it in there. But there’s just a lot of little materials in their thing. If you kind of can see in this picture, there also is a LEGO base plate. And a little tip that I have seen kids use is each peg on the base plate, they move it one by one, to make their story look more fluid. So the tinier the movements, the better the video is going to be. Here’s some all other behind the scenes, this is from after school club that I hosted. This is actually that modeling clay that I was talking about. And since we had more time for this project, we actually filmed our videos using blue screen or green screen. So we still use that stop motion app. You can use the free one again. But we made sure that we filmed it in front of a background that we could change later. The reason why this is a blue screen is because if you can kind of see here, the stamps of these flowers are green. And we didn’t want them to disappear when we change the background. And this is actually a blue t shirt that we had. And so we’re going to change that later. And this image right here, I do have one of my walls painted green in my classroom. So we push the table up against the wall, we use the green face plate. And then she started filming her video here. And what was funny about this one, she actually decided she liked it without changing the background. So she actually left it like this and didn’t end up changing it. Here’s what a screenshot of a stop motion video would look like. This is actually the stop motion studio. This is from their website. And so this is what the app would look like. Very, very, very simple. So the kids would this one is already finished. But typically the image would be behind them. And there would be a red button for them to press once they have their object in the place that they like. So they move their character little take a picture, move a little ticker picture. This one has 101 frames, which we call them frames, that is great. You really want to encourage this, like I said before, the tinier the movements, the more pictures you take, the better your stop motion video is going to be. When kids are first getting started, they typically will take about 15 to 30 pictures. And at first glance, you’re like, Oh, that looks really awesome. But they’re usually really choppy. And they’re over in two seconds. So the better the more patient and the smaller the movements, the better their video is going to be. So these videos can take time, you can get it done probably in a couple of days. But if you really block out that time, if you can get them done and have them be really awesome. So you might be a classroom teacher, you don’t teach them. And you’re thinking, Well, why would I even use this? Like this is so cool, but how can I even use stop motion. If I were to go back to the regular classroom, as myself, I would use that motion. And here’s why. You can use this in so many ways. This is just to get your wheels turning, you can show the comprehension of the story by retelling it through stop motion, comprehension and main idea and summarizing are big standards for kids. Why not have them show it in a different way through stop motion, it can help kids of all different comprehension levels. And you can even pair those kids up in differentiated pairs. That would work so great. So try set motion for one of your units. Fairy tales worked very well for this. You can also have kids show vocabulary or vocabulary words from the text. And again, that is another way to bring it to life instead of just drawing I know not all kids love to draw. Why not have them create those vocabulary words and maybe the other kids in the class can try to guess what word they’re trying to show. Stop Motion can  be another way for students to publish their final piece, they could create a stop motion to visually show their writing. So maybe as they maybe they do still type a final piece. And then they add a stop motion to go with it. And they could put a little QR code in their published piece to show kids the animated part of it. So that would be really, really fun. A great extension to writing. You could also use this in math. So with stop motion, you could have kids visually show a word problem and what’s actually happening happening in the word problem. So if Tommy has 100 watermelons and gets rid of 50, how many legs does he have left? Well have the kids make a stop motion animation, and then they could show the work to solve it. And I bet you would have some great submissions for that. And that helps with that comprehension. Again, you can also have students show visually how things grow and change over time within science. And I have a similar example to this that paper example I’ll show you in a little bit. But you could have them show a process. So if you’re doing lifecycles, you can have the kids just with paper, draw each stage of the lifecycle and show that through stop motion, you can even again with that, instead of doing the circle form of the lifecycle, you can have them actually show the progression of it growing up, I’ve had kids do both. Both are pretty awesome. So that can bring those kinda like I guess, a little more boring, which I never think science is boring, but maybe it’s boring for some of you to make it more fun with stop motion. And then if you’re doing some history, you could have them create a stop motion of historical events on a timeline. So each group could have a different point on the timeline, acted out with stop motion, and then they could you could show those stop motions in order of when it happened to help them connect something visual to the abstract idea. So here’s the fun stuff. Student examples. Here is one we did with fairy tale. So I mentioned fairy tales are a really good one for stop motion. This is like one of the best ways to get started. Have kids pick a fairy tale that they are familiar with and show it visually with stop motion. This one you probably can guess is, you guessed Jack in the beanstalk. You are correct. I love this one because this little guy he didn’t speak a whole lot in my class. But his video was so clear and made sense. And he made his little beanstalk with the LEGO mixed up the greens and then wrapped around some modeling clay to make the vines. I was like, oh my goodness, can I take a picture? And he’s all Yeah, so thank you little guy. This one with comprehension. I’ll show you a little bit is where we took a story we took the day the crayons came home or the day the crayons quit. I’ve done both. And each group had a different part of the story. This is a good story you can break up if you haven’t read the book. Go get it. It’s amazing. It’s hilarious. But each group had a different page and they had to create the character this character is made with modeling clay paper and then a marker cap and then no crayons were harmed in the making of this video. We hung that up in our classroom. And then we put all the videos together into one. So it’s actually a stop motion retelling of the story. I’ll show you a little bit you will have access to this video. But just so you can kind of see what’s going on. We added them some sound of course. Come home by Drew and Al. Parents, Charles and Charles to taught me to always make room for everyone.


Naomi Meredith  19:00

They wanted to read it together. One day we’re happily coloring together with a strange stack of postcards arrived for him in the mail My name is the only close so you didn’t get the point they ended up doing some editing later. So this is like towards the end this took a week in a club. But and we also filmed with green screen. And so that was just another way that we could bring a story to life each kids work separately and then we brought it together as a group so that was really really fun and they were so excited to show their families. Couple other examples fairy tale. This challenge was pick the fairy tale and you have to create a stop motion and we have to guess what it was. There is no sound in these videos. So I will show you you can see the answer already. But this is Little Red Riding Hood no Sound, we didn’t have any grade for the wolf. So that was the hunter getting them off. And then began. So that was a 13. Second video, there was probably about 200 pictures taken and four kids actually worked on this stop motion. And they were from different classes. This was an after school club, but I’ve done this regular class too. Okay, this one tortoise and the hare. So they mix together LEGO and clay, and they found the eyeballs from the LEGO bends. This one is pretty smooth, I think they took about 300 pictures, and it’s only 16 seconds. So you see, the more pictures you take, the smaller the movements, the better it’s going to be. So those are linked down below. Again, you can also use paper as a medium, when you don’t have a lot of materials like or money to spend paper is also a great option. So we will pull up this one is how a fossil is formed, I probably won’t show the whole thing. This one is pretty long, and they have sound if it will pull up for us. So they actually wrote words, they wrote a letter took a picture, data, great job selling fossil, and did little movements along the way they wanted to add sound we just did not have time. So you can get the point that one is a minute long. And then here’s another one. So it’s showing a process. This one was about the human body for fifth grade. So fifth grade, they studied each studied a part of the human body, and then they had to explain all about it with a stop motion. The kids in this group were amazing artists, I was just shocked they did not trace it. But this was all done was stop motion and paper. And this was done with the free app the year I didn’t know I had the paid one. One thing you notice there’s a lot of flashing in the background, I suggested to them to put paper on a solid background. So they wouldn’t have that flashing, but it’s pretty smooth. So great stop motion example right there. You kind of seen this in the examples I’ve shown you but you can have other extensions. So if you want to add in green screen, you could upgrade to the Stop Motion Studio Pro. Or if you just want to go ahead and purchase the Green Screen by DoInk, this is a wonderful green screen app for any project anyway, I would suggest purchasing that that would be worth your investment very, very, very easy. And great for kids to see how green screen actually works. They also have an animation app. So not stop motion animation where you take tiny, tiny pictures, but you can actually add layers of characters and cartoons on top of your work. So that’s again, another great investment. iMovie actually has the addition of green screen I haven’t played around with it yet. I’ve heard mixed reviews about it iMovie screen, but you also have to have a Apple device to use that. But I love teaching kids iMovie I think it’s great for kids to know lots of different platforms so they can transfer that knowledge. So I will oftentimes, I won’t always show them in the stop motion app that they can do editing because I want them to learn iMovie and use everything. So that’s something I try with them stick that studio is an alternative stop motion app. I’ve had kids like it some kids not this is also free. I’ve had more success with the Stop Motion Studio app. But that’s just up to you for you can have kids try it out, especially if they’ve done it before. 


Naomi Meredith  23:33

There’s lots of books out there. These are a couple I would recommend for you to check out these were at Michaels. I’m sure you can find them on Amazon, but they have some great tips and tricks for getting started and those be awesome to have in your classroom library for kids to learn more who are interested. Excited to jump into stop motion animation even more. I put together a collection of resources to help you get started. You can grab the video recording of this episode. The video slides I referenced throughout student examples and bonuses for only $5 I wish I could buy a new Kindle book for that cheap. Let me tell you, it’s not usually that good of a deal. The bonus PDF includes a plot storyboard for students to brainstorm their stop motion story in a sequential order a project checklists to help students stay on track throughout their project and an anchor chart where you can add ideas as a class when discoveries are made as to what makes a great stop motion animation. If you’re looking for even more than that, I even created a special bundle for you that will not only include this whole video replay with bonuses, but a stop motion animation guide to walk you through the whole process with a detailed week long collaborative less than a paleontologist and fossil project and a zoo ologists and pollination Project everything you will need to kick off your stop motion animation journey and using lessons that my own students have absolutely loved. This will be linked in the show notes and you can check it out all here. Naomi meredith.com/stopmotionbundle.

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

Ask me Anything! Q&A Time with Naomi [ep.46]

Ask me Anything! Q&A Time with Naomi [ep.46]

Check out the full episode on Ask me Anything! Q&A with Naomi:  

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Episode Summary

Today is a special episode that you helped me plan. I told you to ask me anything.

You sent me questions on Instagram and via email. I’m answering those questions in today’s episode.

Some of these questions are STEM-related, but some are personal, and I’m answering them all.

 

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Today is a special episode that you helped me plan. Ask me anything. You sent me questions over on Instagram and by way of email and I will be answering those in today’s episode. Some of these questions are STEM-related, but some are personal, and I am answering them all. So let’s jump in. 


Naomi Meredith  00:21

Thank you so much for submitting your questions. It was so much to read what you wanted to know. There was quite a variety of things, and they were so much fun to answer. I always take notes before I record this podcast. So it’s very reflective for me. A few of them had me stumped for a minute. So I’m definitely excited to talk about these and answer the things that you wanted to know. Also, I hope you enjoy it. So we could definitely do another one like this. Again, I’m sure you will have more questions after I answer all of them. So let me know if that’s something that you’re interested in. Also, don’t forget to join the waitlist for my virtual workshops coming in 2023, it will be a good time to learn and connect with other STEM teachers. I definitely don’t want you to miss out on this new opportunity. So jump in on that waitlist at Naomimeredith.com/workshopwaitlist. 


Naomi Meredith  01:48

Now let’s get started on these questions. I’m going to read the question out loud. I’m not going to name names. I didn’t ask if I could read your name. So if you asked it, you know who you are. If you wanted to ask it, you know who you are. So let’s jump in to these questions. Question number one is, what is your absolute favorite thing about teaching STEM and what is your least favorite compared to being a classroom teacher? So most of you know by now that I am a former classroom teacher turned current K through five STEM teacher and coach. I taught in the classroom for six years at two different schools by choice. So second grade for two years at a title one school. Then third grade for four years at the district I actually grew up in. So I taught in the classroom for six years, and I wanted more of a challenge. So I took on this role as being a K through five STEM teacher with zero curriculum, and minimal tools. So here I am five years later in this K through five STEM position. I will say my most favorite thing of all is being able to teach all of the kids in the school. I’m not surprised by this because that’s actually the main reason why I got into teaching K through five STEM, I wanted to impact more kids than just my classroom of 20 for which that is actually something I really do miss is having your own little group of kids that you see every day. But I do love seeing all the kids in the school. I love seeing them year after year, because as a classroom teacher, you don’t get that opportunity all the time to teach all the kids and have that relationship with them. Sure you see them in the hallway. But it’s really cool that my fourth graders now I’ve known them since Kindergarten. So I’ve really gotten to get to know them throughout the years, have them in my after school clubs, just all of those really cool things that we have been able to build upon every year. My least favorite thing and it also is dependent on the day, my energy levels is when you are a K through five specials teacher, especially if you’re teaching in that position all day, there were years that I would co-teach. So that was a really nice mix up. But the thing of being in the specials rotation is that you always have to be on and that can be very exhausting. Some days, especially when the days are like sunlight is getting shorter, and I need some coffee when I get home. Like for real. I actually drink coffee when I get home from work. But always being on is a lot. It’s like being the cool aunt, hosting sixth birthday parties at a time. I have five to 10 minutes transition time depending on what class that’s in between. I covet those 10 minute times. Sometimes I just need to sit there and decompress for a minute, because I don’t even know what just happened. So it can definitely be a lot being on and you have to be excited and pumped up for all of the classes. Even if it’s your fourth time teaching that group of kids I always say that the first rotation, “Poor kids,” especially if I’ve never taught it before they get the kind of like the worst version. Then I would say, the third group of kids, the third time I teach the lesson get like the best version of the whole lesson. When we get to the fourth, I’m so over it and I want to move on. So you might be feeling the same thing. But I’m the kind of person you probably know by now, I will dive in and do everything to the best of my ability. So I am definitely drained at the end of each day, but those are my favorite and least favorite things. 


Naomi Meredith  02:32

Next question is would you ever record yourself teaching the STEM K through five curriculum. As you now I have built up my whole K through five STEM curriculum from scratch, which you can actually see the whole year long plan at Naomi meredith.com/year long plan, there’s still several lessons on the way where I am perfecting those for you. But you know, I have created those things. And they are very detailed when it comes to the Engineering Design Process. And it’s a yes or no for me when it comes to teaching those and recording myself. No, I’m not going to record myself teaching every single lesson while in the classroom, I just want to make sure that I am protecting my students privacy. And when I’m teaching, of course, I’m saying their names and all of that, that would take a lot of editing. I feel like that’s just a lot of pressure on me and also for those students as well, knowing that we are being recorded. So for me personally, I’m not going to record myself in my actual classroom. However, I am planning forward and we’ll be doing this for like kind of like a 2.0 version of the year long plan where I want to create something where I am actually talking about the behind the scenes, and how to set up each stage of the Engineering Design Process materials, differentiation opportunities, and even how to set up some specific things. So I want to have that but also I would teach where I would be teaching and you could even use the lessons with your students or you could watch me and give you some ideas of how to relay that information to your kids. So it’s a yes or no for me so not completely now. But that is definitely something I have. Of course thought about. I am making notes when I am teaching so I can help create that opportunity for you. 


Naomi Meredith  02:32

The next question is, how much time do you put into your job outside of contract hours. My first year teaching K through five STEM was obviously a lot of work. And in a lot of ways, I felt like being a first year teacher. So not only was I new to the position, I was in a brand new to me district. And I had to get to know the people get to know the kids learn how the school ran. So that was a lot in itself. So it really humbled me to learn reading and relearn some new things. So I would say my first year in the position, I spent a lot more time outside of work, preparing and researching and teaching myself how to use even some of the basic tools, and even get to know my students what will work best for them. That first year, I was doing things with kids that I definitely don’t do now I had to build up simple things like learning how to log in how to use Google Slides and Google Docs, just basic, basic things. And we are definitely in a different place now. So likewise, I was spending a lot more time out of work to get all of those things ready. And make sure that I was prepared K through five because oftentimes, my plan time was not enough time, or is it really ever enough time. But it wasn’t enough time for me to really have thoughtful plan that lessons. Of course, over the years I have built upon those lessons, I have modified things, I have streamline things. You even hear on this podcast, how I live for systems and routines and structure. And everything I teach even that first year is very purposeful. And I have a lot of meaning behind it, I am still testing out things and seeing what works and doesn’t work. And that might even change class till class. So that it self reflection is super important to me to always be a better teacher, even a better teacher than the hour before. So the time I do spend outside of work is mainly business related, which is STEM related, which also impacts my job in a good way. But I will say I don’t spend a whole lot of time outside of work working on actual school things. But when I do work on school things, it’s often related to my after school clubs, mainly my school, my news that I run where we record five days out, and we have an episode come out every single day. Last year, I actually was editing majority of the videos on my own, I figured out how to have kids helped me edit a lot more. So the time I spent outside of work is usually when it comes to a brand new unit that I need to revamp or when it comes to after school clubs. 


Naomi Meredith  08:11

Okay, the third question is what is my top or favorite STEM activity your students have tried. This is my most favorite one. I love talking about it because this is definitely born out of absolutely nothing. And it was my whole unit that I love to start off the school year STEM survival camp. I talk all about this in episode four. So if you want to hear it all in detail, I go through the whole thing and how I set it up. But basically, at the time, I was going into the fall of 2020, I needed a set of lessons that if my students were to go remote at any moment, we were starting off in person, I needed something where they could have materials at home and I wasn’t sending home about love of supplies. So at the time, I was watching a lot of alone with my teacher, honey. And it’s about these people who are sent off to the wilderness their extreme survivalist. And they have to literally survive alone. But if you keep watching the show, there’s a lot of patterns of things that people have to do to survive. So from there, I created a whole K through five STEM unit of different challenges that are based off of the show, and things that they could do to learn that Engineering Design Process and start off the year in a fun way. So definitely one of my top favorites. I love that unit. The kids still talk about it. They love that unit as well. They always beg for it they always ask if we’re gonna do it again. So that was a really great challenge to start off the year with all of my kids. 


Naomi Meredith  09:45

Okay, along with that there’s a similar question but different and this one is What do you think is one of the best Engineering Design Process activities to do with Kindergarten in first grade. So aside from STEM survival camp, when it comes to the Engineering Design Process with these younger grades, I love doing things that are quick. So things that you can do within two to three days is a perfect amount of time. And they can actually go pretty deep within that timeframe. What I will say is my favorite is doing things that involve Makerspace with Kindergarten and first grade. They are so creative and imaginative, they are willing to try anything. And I love how they believe in themselves. And they are so excited about what they build, and they still have that magic in them. So that is definitely my favorite type of project when it comes to Engineering Design Process to do with those younger kids. And a specific lesson that I really have loved with my first graders you could do with Kinder is where we talk about bioluminescence, where we talk about how living things give off their own light, and they love they’re so amazed they cannot believe and I’m like, Oh my gosh, these things do not plug in into an outlet on the wall. They don’t have rechargeable batteries, they glow on their own. They’re super amazed. And so like, oh my gosh, I can’t believe that. So we talk about that. And then students think of a living thing that they wish had bioluminescence and then they have to create that item, and then explain what that bio element what that bioluminescent part helps them so Makerspace definitely a winner, it can get crazy. But if you have systems and routines in place, it’s totally a lot of fun with those younger students. 


Naomi Meredith  15:02

This question made me laugh and there was emojis on this one. So this question was, Do you have any kind of class reward for behaviors asking because my kinders are, they had some emojis on here, and I’m going to just say cray cray. Yeah, I kind of do. Kinder is crazy. And I feel like for some reason this year, they’re even crazier. So at my school, we have a PBIS system where whole classes can earn a tiger paw. So they can earn this through specific behaviors that they represent and as the class, so I talked about this in a past episode when it comes to behavior management. So I list all of those factors. So when they are crazy coming in, we reveal all those factors. Sometimes I’ll even practice them coming into the room, we will do a lot of hand signals, like if you can hear me point to the ceiling, if you can hear me hands on your shoulders, point to miss Meredith point to your ear segment. Listen really well. Fun fact, I worked at Build A Bear in college for a few months. And I was that person who would be at the little like fluffers station, where they have their heart. So if you haven’t been available bear, it’s a little creepy at first, where they have these shells of bears, you pick out your shell, you could pick out a heart to put in your bear and you go to the station, they fluff up the bear, they literally put the fluff in. So I was the person at the fluffing station. And I had to talk to the kids, a lot of them even Kindergarten, where oh, put the heart to your heart. So it’s extra loving, like you put it to your brain. So it can be as smart as you. So I kind of do those things with Kindergarten and pay, it works well. So those little things are helpful, giving them our behavior, incentive stickers, or even any stickers in general. I don’t give kids candy. That’s not for me, but I am not against bribery. So if they’re having a hard time, like if you’re good, if you’re doing what you’re supposed to do, I have a special surprise. Sometimes a special surprise is the story bots. He’s singing some songs and they have some really great songs about space. So if you’re doing a space unit, check it out. Highly recommend. I have most of the words memorized by now. Another time The surprise was I’ll show you the hole in my tooth. So one day, I was eating oatmeal for breakfast. And I thought I had oatmeal on my teeth. But it was a filling from when I was a kid it fell out. And I had a hole in my tooth that day. So the kids are in Kindergarten a little crazy. And they clean up really really fast because they wanted to see the hole in my tooth. So I let them. They all sat around me and I showed them the hole in my tooth. And they were actually pretty good that day. So I’m not against that bribery, if you can make it a surprise. Super helpful. 


Naomi Meredith  17:43

All right, next question is how can I grow my STEM page? So this person reached out to me on Instagram, I just started this year and want to connect so much love here. I totally agree. I love me some teacher guy um, and I’ve met a lot of really cool people on there, including Kelly Hogan, who I recently had as a guest. And I also have future guests who I’ve also connected to on Instagram. So it’s a really cool way to reach out especially since most of us are the only STEM teacher in our building. So I love having that teacher gram aspect, Instagram, it’s been so awesome. I started my Instagram when I was a third grade teacher, I had another username, and I just posted random stuff. And it was super ugly scroll back to the bottom of my page. They’re still there, you could see what I was doing as a third grade teacher, which I’ve always been all about hands on learning and technology. So you’ll see some trends in there. But definitely if you’re looking to connect with other STEM teachers, go to some of your favorite accounts. You can go to mine and see who is following them and also who they’re following. That’s a great way to find other people in the STEM community. And you can comment on people’s pages you can send them a DM most of us teachers one thing gets creepy unless you are being creepy. So don’t be creepy. I appreciate some good DMS and answering your questions. So like this podcast, but that’s a good way to get started and get connected and definitely share what you’re doing in your classroom. That’s a great way to connect as well and give help to other teachers and inspire them along the way. Also, I have so many things for you guys coming out you’re just super inspiring and I love creating for you and just bringing us together that coming up soon I’m thinking of ways how we can meet virtually and chat with each other. So obviously you could tell I have a lot of things coming up in the future. So keep an eye out for that as well. Just join the waitlist you’ll be notified about everything. 


Naomi Meredith  19:46

All right, next question is the fun one and not stimulated, which is totally cool. When and where is your wedding? Because there’s so many you know, I got engaged on Christmas Day of 2021 and you didn’t ask for this story but I’m Gotta tell you. So we were on a cruise, I had no idea I was getting proposed to, I knew he had a ring, but I didn’t know I was gonna get proposed to. I didn’t think he wanted to travel with a ring. And that’s a whole other story. So somebody asked me that question. I’ll do another Ask me anything. And I’ll tell you the non engagement story. So anyway, he proposed we were on a cruise with a couple of friends. And we had a great time we went to a show. And then we got a phone call that we were in close contact with COVID, there was still covered protocols going on. And it was my friend, she had COVID, she was texting me, she and Phil while and then got tested. So they told us, we had to be in a room for about 24 hours, they’ll come back and test us. So when they called us it was midnight, and we’re like, Okay, we’ll come back at midnight the next day, like, No, it’s too late for us. We’ll come back the next next day. So it was 36 hours. But you know, when you can engage to have fun and you’re celebrating and kind of don’t really remember the whole conversation. So the next day, we went out and got breakfast. And then we heard our names over on the intercom at the boat and we had to go back to our rooms. And there were security at the door. And we were locked up in a room for a while. So I learned how to make towel animals we still do all you can eat all the food and drinks and made the most of it. And here we are. We’re going on a cruise again pretty soon. So that’s how we got engaged. But our wedding is June in June in Colorado of 2023. So super excited about that. It’s a winery that we really enjoy. So that will be a fun and beautiful time. I’m super excited. 


Naomi Meredith  21:36

Next question, what is your favorite pen and marker? This is such a T Trick question and I am here for it. Okay, my favorite marker 100 per million percent are the Mr. Sketch smelly markers. I love how all they smell. But I always wanted to be a teacher when I grew up and all my teachers use the Mr. Sketch smelly markers. I would ask for them for Christmas. I just thought that’s what real teachers use and write with. So when I got the call of my first teaching job teaching second grade, I ran over to Lakeshore learning and bought myself a pack of Mr. Sketch smelly markers, because that’s what real teachers write with. So hands down, still my absolute fave. When it comes to pens, I’m not super biased. I leave kind of like some bad pens on my desk because people leave me notes all the time for about computers or whatever. So I do love a good flare pan. My handwriting looks really good in a flare pen. But I’m always open to other options so you can hit me up with your ideas. I try the other day this really cool ink joy 300 T pen. I was like, Oh my gosh, this is beautiful. So not quite a gel pen is like in between. So love me a good pen. I don’t like pencils at all. I actually don’t even like sharpening pencils. I don’t leave a pencil sharpener out in my classroom because I don’t like the sound. So I’ll sharpen pencils, like once a month. So yeah, that’s where I’m at with the marker and pen situation. 


Naomi Meredith  23:10

Alright, a couple more. This was a good one. If you weren’t a STEM teacher, what other career would you love to have? You might not be surprised by this that I am definitely an entrepreneur at heart. I’ve always wanted to be a teacher. But even as a kid, I’ve always had this entrepreneurial side to me. I was the kid where oh no, no, we’re not hosting a lemonade stand. We’re gonna upgrade this to a snow cone Stan and have 30 different flavors. And the sign is going to match all the names of the flavors. I made a lot of money doing that as a kid I even had the kids I nanny do a snow cone stand and we made a lot of money. So I love me making some good side hustles I even was set up garage sales for my family and wait all day to make a couple of bucks. I was the person in college I paid my way through college so I worked three full time jobs went to school full time paid my way through college was debt free when I graduated in four years, but I always had a lot of different side hustles to make ends meet and I just love meeting new people and I love learning new things. So not surprising that I have my own teacher business and I love supporting you because STEM there’s so much to learn. And just even running a business there’s so much so when it comes to a specific job if I wasn’t a STEM teacher, I think I’ve needed to be a STEM teacher first but I would love to be some sort of STEM coach like being able to reach out to schools across the world and or either being a STEM consultant so using my knowledge when it comes to being in the classroom, and just having those opportunities to meet teachers like you in person and really merging those two things together my passion for education and also entrepreneurship. So I think I would always be a STEM teacher at heart I I always thought I wanted to work for a magazine, which I thought would be really cool, but I think everyone wanted to work for a magazine. But I think that’s what I would definitely do if I wasn’t a STEM teacher. 


Naomi Meredith  25:11

All right, last question. It’s all about my little Freddy boys. So Frederick is my 10 going on 12 pounds chihuahua mix. And I think he was so freaking cute. I’m so in love. And so these questions are about him. What’s Frederick story? When did you get him and how did you pick his name? So Frederick is my first ever dog as an adult. And I got him in September of 2020. And he actually came with that name Fredrik, and we loved it so much. He’s looking at me right now, because I keep saying his name. He sits and listens to me podcast. But we thought it was such a good big boy name for such a tiny little boy who was seven pounds when we got him. And he lived on the streets for a week. He ran away from his family, and they didn’t want him back. So now he is our little fur baby and are his forever home. And so this leads into the next question that was asked, Does Frederick have any brand deals yet? Okay, so Freddy, Fred is the perfect dog for me. He does pose for pictures and he is super photogenic. He doesn’t have any brand deals. But if you want to reach out you definitely can. Well, you can go follow him on Instagram. It’s at little Frederick the dog. And he’s I think he’s cute. It’s just a way for me to spam his account with pictures and not always spam you guys on my Instagram for him? Because I know not everybody is a dog person, but you might become one when you see him. So no brand deals yet but if you know of any or if you want to connect, hit me up. All right, well, thank you so much for playing along with me and this episode, totally different vibe. But hopefully you got some good nuggets in there and had a good laugh. While you are listening to this, you kind of get to see a another side of me always a good time. It’s always a little awkward. Sometimes. I’m just standing here in my office at home, looking at my camera and talking into the microphone. So I hope that you had a fun time listening. I had a lot of fun with these questions. We definitely should do this again sometime. If you liked it. Let me know if you didn’t like it. Let me know I don’t ever have to do it again. So thank you so much again and we will chat soon.

 

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

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From Classroom Teacher to STEAM Teacher with Kelly Hogan [ep.45]

From Classroom Teacher to STEAM Teacher with Kelly Hogan [ep.45]

Check out the full episode on From Classroom Teacher to STEAM Teacher with Kelly Hogan:  

 

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Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

In today’s episode, I chatted with Kelly Hogan from mathematically enthused.
 
Kelly shares her journey from classroom teacher to STEAM teacher and provides tips and tricks for strategies and activities she has incorporated into her classroom.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • How Kelly became a STEAM teacher
  • Kelly’s favorite part about teaching STEAM
  • How Kelly structures projects with her students when she sees them once a week
  • How Kelly stores her students’ projects
  • What surprised Kelly about being a STEAM teacher

Meet Kelly Hogan:

Kelly Hogan is a former classroom teacher turned K-6 STEAM teacher on Long Island, NY. Kelly loves all things Math and is passionate about bringing practical, functional Math skills into STEAM lessons. Kelly is a Level 2 Google Certified Educator and loves helping other teachers simplify their day through the use of Google Technology. When she’s not teaching, Kelly loves working out and hanging out with family, friends, her husband, and Rowdy, her puggle.

Connect with Kelly:

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

In today’s episode I am chatting with Kelly Hogan from mathematically and I have been chatting with Kelly a bunch on over on Instagram over the past few years when she had a different instagram name and throughout her different teaching positions. Kelly is a former classroom teacher turned K through six STEM teacher in Long Island, New York. She loves all things math and is passionate about bringing practical and functional math skills into her STEM or STEAM lessons. She is a level two Google certified educator and loves helping other teachers simplify their day through the use of Google technology. When she’s not teaching Kelly loves working out and hanging out with her family friends and her husband. And of course, her little Puggle rowdy, this episode was so much fun. And Kelly has such a great experience from being in the classroom and into the STEM space that I know you’re definitely going to connect with. And she even has some awesome tips and tricks of what she has done in her classroom that I definitely want to use and mine and I’m sure you definitely want to use in yours. I can’t wait for you to listen to this interview. 


Naomi Meredith  01:07

Well, Kelly, thank you so much for being here. today. We’re chatting a little bit before this. And you and I have talked over the years and we message each other all the time. And you’re so sweet when you tagged me in your stories. So I knew I had a hat? Well, I asked you a while back, I think when I was first launching, well, you’d be a guest. You’re like, yes, so they finally got it all together, I figured out how to invite guests, blah, blah, blah. And then I’m just so excited to chat with you and your position because I think your story and I don’t know all of it. But I think your story will really resonate with a lot of teachers, because most of us have been teachers who are in the classroom, and then we get thrown into this role. So tell us more about yourself and your background and just how you stepped into your STEAM are STEM will probably say both, but how you stepped into your role.


Kelly Hogan  02:29

So for those who don’t know me, I’m Kelly Hogan and mathematically enthuse on Instagram and Teachers Pay Teachers. And to tell you my full STEM STEAM story. I need to go back like way, way back. So before I was in college, I was looking to Yeah, I was looking to be a teacher from as long as I could remember. And I was preparing to go to school for music education. So I was focusing on being a music teacher and being heavily involved in music ensembles that were curricular and extracurricular. But when I got to college, I realized that that was not necessarily the best fit for me. I loved doing music and being part of ensembles. But I realized that as a teacher, I’d be kind of limited in what I was doing with students and impact was important to me. So I graduated from college in 2005, with my bachelor’s in elementary education, and in New York State Teachers are required to get a master’s degree. Oh, I didn’t know that. Yes, after a certain amount of years now. But the time when I graduated, there was no limitation on how many years you had. I think now, once you graduate, you have to have your masters within about three years. So choosing the Masters was hard for me because at the time in 2005, the big push was reading and literacy. And I knew definitively that I didn’t want my masters in reading and literacy. So I shopped around for a while. And at Hofstra University where I got my masters from at the time they had a program that was elementary maths, science and technology. Oh, basically. Yeah. So it was Elementary, MSP, and it was lots of integrated projects. One of the things I remember very distinctly about that program was that I had to make a scale model bed for a stuffed animal of my choosing. We had to make board games, we had to write papers about the process. I actually fell in love with math through that program, which is kind of interesting. But I had friends who after we graduated, were getting jobs as the science teacher in schools where science was a push in, or where they were just specializing departmentalized at the elementary level. STEAM and STEM wasn’t a thing. It wasn’t a job at the time. And I was just kind of using it to enhance my toolbox and my work in my classroom with my kids. I have taught every classroom grade except for second. It’s So at some point in time, I have taught everything from K through six. And I was happy in the classroom. And then I ended up teaching math as for about a year and learn that that was not my thing. love math, did not love math is. So I was kind of looking around and thinking about where my next career move would be, what would my shift be. And the district right next door to mine had an opening for an elementary scene teacher. And I read all the ballpoint bullet points on the job and was literally floored. Because I was like, that’s the job. That’s that’s the job I won. So they interviewed in April, I was offered the position a couple weeks later. And then I was appointed in May of 2021. And I have been in that STEAM mindset ever since I’ve never looked back. But the irony is that if I go back to my high school experience, I always did want to be especially right here. So it was kind of looping back to what I wanted to do without knowing exactly what I wanted to do. So I definitely am in the right space right now. I love my job. And even on my worst days, it’s so energizing. So it’s the right place for me to be


Naomi Meredith  06:17

Oh, yeah, well, I guess I think really, you’re it’s a very creative space. And I think your experiences definitely lead us into the STEM position. Because I thought about that, too. Like I had a class. In middle school. I wasn’t called STEM because like that term is so new. But it was called technology. But all this stuff was STEM based. So you had all these stations, there’s robotics, there was stop motion, there was like these laser cutter things and like, I’ve always loved science and the hands on stuff. So it just makes sense. Like, so probably stay with you like, oh, this makes sense why I’m in this role, and your masters pretty much is STEM.


Kelly Hogan  06:56

So yes, that that program has evolved. And it’s actually now called masters in elementary STEM education. So it’s it’s really interesting, but I was also always a very love science and technology. So it just, it was the right hat to put on. And it kind of found me at the time that I needed it to find me so I could not be any happier than I am right now.


Naomi Meredith  07:18

Oh, good. I’m so glad. I’m glad it was like a it’s a hard but fun transition.


Kelly Hogan  07:23

Yes. Yes, definitely hard. I would yes, definitely describe it as hard. It is.


Naomi Meredith  07:29

Yeah, it’s hard. I think being a classroom teacher though before I bet you see those two is super valuable. Because you know how to plan you’ve obviously taught all the grades. So I think having that experience instead of there’s nothing wrong with just jumping into sand. But I think having that background and education and classroom management and planning a lesson and figuring it out really, really helps in your role a ton. I see that a ton for myself.


Kelly Hogan  07:54

100% 100%. I can’t imagine coming out of a teacher education program into STEM without having a little bit of classroom time first, because it is amazing how much management it takes.


Naomi Meredith  08:08

Oh, yeah, I that’s like the biggest thing. I’m like, Oh my gosh, it’s like, wow. It’s like sometimes I’m the mean, and I’m not the nicest. Most mostly nice, but sometimes mean. What have been your favorite parts so far? Because I mean, I know you love it, but like, what are your favorite parts about it?


Kelly Hogan  08:31

I don’t want to be too cliche and say everything. But to some degree. Yes, it’s everything. But the most important things that I would stick with is that every day is exciting. My students love to come into the STEAM lab, I would say that out of the 360 students I serve. Maybe I have two students who aren’t engaged when they walk into the STEAM lab a week, which is outstanding, and the energy that they bring in really energizes me. So that is a huge part of it. The 40 minute periods are lovely. They’re I actually they’re a blessing and a curse, kind of like what you were saying about being me. And it’s great to have 40 minutes when it’s a tough day for a certain class and you’re just trying to muscle through it. And then you get to send them back to their teachers. Like you’re being the fun auntie, right. But I also only get to see my students for 40 minutes a week. And that’s the downside is that there’s so much I always want to do in STEAM that I’m always strapped for time. And then I think seeing every kid at school so I teach all the kids in my school K through six, which means I have a relationship with all the kids in the school I have relationships with their siblings, and so far I’ve only been there for this is my second year but I’m already really enjoying seeing kids grow from year to year and how they change. And it’s really just it’s amazing how I was concerned about the show worked periods not being able to build relationships with my students, and you have a different kind of relationship. But it’s so long term. And I love that.


Naomi Meredith  10:08

It’s so true. Like I was talking to my kids by fifth graders. And I think my first year with them for a second, I’m counting on my hands. Second, third, fourth it, so I knew them since first grade. And it was cool. Like, they’re like, We don’t remember the person before. I’m like, Well, that’s nice. But it’s just like, cool to see them over the years. And I have like pictures of them. And it’s just like, that is something you don’t get always get as a classroom teacher, unless you loop with them, which I don’t know why you want to do that. But yeah, it is so cool. I love that. And I didn’t know you only taught was that once a week. So how do you structure your projects? That’s a big, a lot of people do that. Like that’s hard.


Kelly Hogan  10:51

Yes. So to add on to that, I see them 40 minutes a week. And I have one minute between classes.


Naomi Meredith  10:58

What? Yes. Oh, yeah, I need to know what what do you do?


Kelly Hogan  11:02

Which normally means I actually have students waiting outside my room as I’m releasing them. Because as teachers, most of us are on time, if not early. So structure was really important for me. And I knew that in order to be really productive with all grade levels, my structure would have to vary a little bit only seeing them for 40 minutes a week. So my k one, two lessons, especially in the beginning of the year, they get an instant build when they come in, and I have short challenges up on the board where I give them some free build time I give them a material, I try to rotate materials, so they get a new material, usually every month. And they’ll have about three problems they need to solve by building something with their materials, then they get a quick brain break, because my little guys need movement. So if I can beam it with what we’re doing for the day, I theme it with what we’re doing for the day, then I usually have a short video or short read. And then we go back into a challenge. The second half of the year, I stretch out the lessons more to be like one week is our background and plan. And then the next week is our built, then with three through six is a little different. So obviously a lot faster pace because those kids are doing more in depth projects. So they kind of come into a do now and they do now sometimes it’s just as simple as get your materials from last week and chat with your group about what your next steps are. And then I do a mini lesson I know I was just listening to I’m not sure if it was your most recent episode, but your structure of your classes, I was doing like the same thing. I’m thinking about the pie piece, right. So you have the the large IPS is not really teacher time. So I do about five to 10 minutes, some weeks, it’s honestly just reviewing what we did last week and reviewing hot glue safety because that comes down again and again. And then they’ll have about depending on how much talking I do 2020 to 25 solid minutes of building, and then five minutes of cleaning like crazy. And I tried to get them in line early. So really, my time on teaching is about 35 minutes with the cleanup with everything else that’s going on. So the Do Now time is super valuable for me in my structure, because it gets them moving and doing something from the moment they walk in the door. And it helps me transition because I only had one minute on the clock between classes. So sometimes when I’m really desperate, I’m very behind with my littles all instead of reading them the book that we’re working on problem solving from, I’ll play it on YouTube, just to give myself time to set materials as much as I love to read to them. I do sometimes just need the time to swap over from my kids to my little kids, because sometimes my Thursdays especially today happens to be a Thursday when we’re talking to each other. And my Thursdays are I have fourth, second. Sixth, second, fifth. So it’s a lot of flipping materials all day. And then yeah, yes, yes. So if I could choose, I would love to have all of my fourth grades one day and my sixth grades and other day, but that really wouldn’t work in our school. So yeah, so it’s similar structure to what you’re doing. But my pacing, obviously a little bit different, very similar to your structure. However, our projects from whatever do you talk about on the podcast and seeing you share is that your projects last about a week where my projects my student, my fourth graders finished up their mini golf design project and it took them about probably eight weeks, but it was one session per week. Yeah. So I really have to I have to backwards plan a lot. I have to really think about what I want the end of the project to be where I want it to land. So my sixth graders right now are making playable winter winter carnival games for the week before our holiday break. And they have to Have you done without a doubt by Thursday, December 15? Because we’ll start on Friday, December 16. So I really had to count back. And I’m, I’m hoping we’ll make it because I gave them more time than last year. We had Veterans Day on a Friday, and we had our school fundraiser on a Friday that the kids were in all days a lot like Field Day. So when I lose a week with them, it’s it’s a big hit. It’s a big Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  15:22

Oh, yeah, it totally is. It is. But I’m glad I appreciate you like explaining that. Because I think, like I said, your situation is more common. Seeing the kids once a week. And I think some teachers, you might have experienced this struggle with like doing a longer project with the older kids just like how do you structure that. And of course, it’s not perfect all the time. And you just have to figure out how it will work out. And it’s okay, if it takes long. But I think if you have natural breaks in the project, it’s probably really doable, carrying it on every week. It’s not ideal. But you know, your older kids can handle it, too. So how do you store everything? I’m sure people are asking.


Kelly Hogan  16:04

Goodness gracious, I that is my biggest, I would say the biggest pit in the peach, right. So I have a classroom that prior to my arriving there was converted from what used to be our computer room and a very small science lab into one STEAM classroom. So I have a lot of space, I have about 1300 square feet, which in theory sounds like a lot of storage space. Yeah. However, I do have cabinets, and the cabinets are chock full of stuff from science kits and stuff from donations and storing is really hard. And what I learned last year in my first year was that if I’m having kids do cardboard projects, there needs to be one grade level doing a cardboard project at a time. I learned last year that one of the things that I can’t do is have multiple large builds going at the same time. So my fourth grade does a large build the first part of the year, when they’re done, my sixth grade right now is doing a large build than my fifth grade will do a large build next, because I have about three or four storage cabinets that I can use for student storage. And beyond that I don’t really have storage space. So we do a lot of what I call with the little guys deconstruction project. Yeah, put it up for a day, take it down, we’re using paper towel tubes, and we’re taking them back down and putting them away. So that really helps with the space management and the project storage. Last year, I made the mistake of doing a couple of cardboard projects at the same time and I was literally buried in cardboard in the lab and I was miserable.


Kelly Hogan  19:20

So I made that change because I just couldn’t live like that. I am not comfortable with clutter. And that’s been my biggest point of growth in this job is that it is cluttered all of the time. Yeah, my brain is healthy clutter. Yes, it’s healthy clutter, and I generally know where things are. But to the untrained eye, it looks like a hot mess.


Naomi Meredith  19:44

Oh yeah, minus two. It’s like what I’ll say make mistakes get messy and like my room crashed. Like I will say like I have like a big room but also like no storage. So there’s just stuff everywhere. Like I have my wife Lillian, you know you’re good. Getting a wagon soon. I have a wagon just chillin. I have like, all my stuff I have like I’m cutting. I have my Cricut machines out cutting sticker like that’s it’s trashed all the time. But it’s very, very organized. Is there anything else that surprised you? I mean, the storage your time, like what like coming out of the classroom getting into this, you’re like, Whoa.


Kelly Hogan  20:25

I touched on it a little bit earlier. But honestly, it was the amount of classroom management that I took. Because as a fairly established classroom teacher, when I left the classroom to go to AI s already had about 12 years under my belt. And then when I went into STEAM, so now I have 13 years, and I thought, Alright, I have systems, I know my systems pretty well, I feel very comfortable with them. So I thought I had it on lock. And I was just going to walk in and my systems were going to work, and some did, and some didn’t. So what I didn’t realize was how many more systems I needed last year. And this summer, I spent a lot of time just thinking about systems that would help class run smoother, and create a common experience with clear expectations for my students. So I have even more systems this year than I have probably ever had. And could I use a few more? Probably yes. But it actually it feels a lot better in my classroom this year with more systems. So I would say I have at least twice the amount of systems in place that I did when I was a classroom teacher and I didn’t expect it to be that much more.


Naomi Meredith  21:35

Yeah, yeah, I agree. Yeah, I felt the same way. Because I’m all about classroom management. Ever since I started teaching. I was like the biggest thing I had to work on. So I’m like, huge on that. And I had, there’s so many things I did so wrong. My first year like I’ve had, I think I talked about this, like the crayons, I had a big bucket of crayons, someone ate them and spits them out. Like a lot didn’t work. That’s not good. But yeah, I totally agree with you. And it just comes with time and how things are moving in your room? And it depends on the project. Sometimes I think I’ve noticed that for sure. Like, oh, or the grade some grades, do certain things. And some?


Kelly Hogan  22:16

Well, and I was just going to say that. And I think yes, some grades can can manage a lot of materials, some grades can’t manage as many materials. And also from year to year. Sometimes the grades are not the same personalities. They’re not the same kind of maturity. And I’ve had to adapt and change some things even from last year that I did, because they just didn’t fit with the incoming group. And not because they couldn’t meet the expectations. But because the constraints have had to be modified a little bit to require less materials to be used or to simplify some of the building that we were doing or be really specific about how to use scotch tape. Yeah, is something I never thought I would have to teach anyone had to use scotch tape because I I remember using scotch tape as a kid. I am shocked at how many young hands need explicit direct instruction about how to use a tape dispenser. I did not expect that last year, but this year I’m rockin and rollin.


Naomi Meredith  23:16

Yeah, it’s like dangling everywhere. Like no, no. Oh, my goodness. Oh, no,


Kelly Hogan  23:20

We were just making parade balloons today was second grade. So I was teaching them that. If we can’t rip the tape off, we can use our scissors and we can cut the tape off the dispenser. Because otherwise we’ll be there all day trying to take things


Naomi Meredith  23:34

Oh yeah, it’s so funny. You said that was one girl I interviewed as Jen, we were talking about tapes. It’s a real thing. I never thought seriously. I’m all about the tapes.


Kelly Hogan  23:46

I did last year too. That was one of my other big shockers was masking tape kids who couldn’t physically rip the masking tape without like closing it. Like it would just be a string of close tape. And that didn’t even dawn on me as a muscular skill until kids started doing it. And I was like, Oh my gosh, I need to teach them how to rip the tape.


Naomi Meredith  24:10

Yeah, we’re in the business of life skills right here. If any, they don’t learn anything from us, at least they know how to use tape.


Kelly Hogan  24:16

Oh, how do you see they’ll be able to wrap a present like you won’t believe Oh, yeah,


Naomi Meredith  24:20

Actually have a lesson. I’ve done that. And the kids got so mad at me. It was like, they had to find the area and perimeter of the wrapping paper that they were doing and how many pieces of tape. They did choose a method and the kids did not like that project like how to give most kids had it like oh, well this is good life skill. I haven’t done that in a while but it was interesting. Yeah. Oh, I’m


Kelly Hogan  24:47

sure it was.


Naomi Meredith  24:49

I’m so I know because you okay, you leave the nicest feedback on my TPT store. I always know it’s Yeah, and it’s just so kind of Yeah. I like oh, you remember Did you realize someone the other day, but I’m thinking other resources, I know you’ve used what have been some of your favorites of mine, that you’ve seen success in your classroom.


Kelly Hogan  25:10

I’ve used a lot of them. My my favorite, honestly, this year is the Makerspace menu. I know you also have an episode that where you talked about that. So I’m gonna plug you for you, people should go back and listen to that episode if they’re interested in this. So the Makerspace menu has been a huge time saver for me. When I took the same role. Last year, I always had STEAM budgeting on my mind, and my kiddos thinking differently about their tasks and having some strong constraints in place. And in my mind, I was going to create STEAM lab money thing out, and then I heard you talking about it. And I was like, why am I going to sit down and build this all out myself when I can just get the resource and give myself peace of mind. And it’s actually been really great because you have the front of the menu page where you have all of the items set already. So I go in and take out things that I know I either don’t have a lot of that I know it’s in the past have not used in a way that made sense for the material, or something that just doesn’t fit a certain project. And I just have it out. And right now in my classroom. Just this week, I set up like a $1 $2 and a $3 drawer that they pull out of a cart. So that’s cool. And what my kids shot like that. So that’s been huge for me. And like I said, I’ve used a lot last year I use the spider web.


Naomi Meredith  26:45

Oh, yeah, you sent me a video. I remember you tagged me the spider polies.


Kelly Hogan  26:49

Yes. So I did that with my Kindergarten last year Kindergarten this year is not quite ready for that. They’re very young. They’re Yes,


Naomi Meredith  26:56

same.


Kelly Hogan  26:59

Five and six. They’re not ready for that just yet. But when we did push pull, we did that last year that was super fun for them. And my students do a board game project and we use a lot of the materials from your seam survival camp board game unit, but what I do is we don’t use exterior outdoor materials because we do ours in the winter. Oh, perfect. And the thing I’ve been using a lot lately is your Google Classroom Google Suite posters and your hot glue gun holsters. So I use them when I’m teaching my students have glue safety because they don’t really know a lot about a part of the hot glue gun. And so I have them in Google Classroom for instruction but then I also have them actually framed and hanging up in my lap.


Naomi Meredith  27:42

Other frames.


Kelly Hogan  27:46

Listen, they’re printed on cardstock with color they need to stay nice


Naomi Meredith  27:54

Framing the poster that’s adorable. Get to so frame.


Kelly Hogan  27:57

Yes, I will frames and command strip frame hangers are like Velcro. Yeah.


Naomi Meredith  28:06

That makes me so happy like I’m so all these like things have helped to save time. I love them, then you tell like that i i was playing around with it for years. And then I was like, How can I make this makes sense for other people. And I just added an update. I don’t know if you’ve used it yet. I just added it like a few weeks ago. But it’s like a table. So they have to write down like the items how many and then the the total costs which your your math brain would love and I just added it and my kids are like, Oh, I like this update. I’m like perfect.


Kelly Hogan  28:40

I’m chuckling listening to you because I made one really quick because I want them to have a budget ledger. So my kids have been using a budget ledger with I’m gonna download. I’m gonna download the update because I didn’t know it was there.


Naomi Meredith  28:52

No, like they had like a few weeks ago. I’m like, I should probably have this in there. So that’s so funny like, well, you. I’m glad I made you proud with my mask.


Kelly Hogan  29:01

Yeah, I was like, oh, we need a budget ledger. Yes. Because it’s, it’s easier for them to kind of track what they’re spending. So that’s awesome. I’ll download that as I just been printing all of mine from a single project I made for the kids instead of actually adding it to my resources. Not so yeah, so I’ll download that. Yeah, I love the menu. And it’s great. I love what I love about it. And what I love about having budgeting as a constraint in STEM and STEAM is that having done it without the budget last year going to using the budget this year, the change in the conversations and gathering materials is so powerful and so impactful because they’re really evaluating what they actually need versus I’m just going to take it because it’s there. And I find that we’re creating much less waste because of that as well as as a human being but also as a STEAM teacher waste is really important to me and I’m trying to reduce reuse as much as I can. It’s inevitable because we do build out of recycled materials. But I like to think that before we recycle, those materials are kind of getting a second life before they actually become actual recycling or trash. But I do try to reduce waste as much as possible. And the budgeting has really changed that piece.


Naomi Meredith  30:18

Oh, I see that too. And you probably say this, you don’t have to restock as much. And it keeps them super independent. Like they have their little list and they’re very thoughtful. They’re like, Oh, I don’t have enough money for this. And like, while you’re gonna have to make a choice, like that’s how it is, if you’re remodeling a house, you don’t have unlimited money. That’s just, you have to be creative with what you got. I love it, too. I’m like, obsessed, and they don’t have the kids laughing like, I’m the banker, and I’m the cash register. I am all the roles, and they just start laughing.


Kelly Hogan  30:51

When I when I framed it for when I started budgeting with the kids was when you decide you grew up, and you might want to be an engineer. Engineers do have constraints like this when they’re working for companies to engineer video games. They have a finite budget for that video game, maybe? Yeah, they pitch their idea. And their idea, oh my gosh, it’s kind of like my mom. They pitch their idea. And their bosses love it. But then they say, okay, yeah, you can make a mock up for $3,000. And if you can’t do it for $3,000, then you can’t do it. Yeah. So I’m trying to drive home the message that for those who already know, they have an engineering mindset, and they want to be engineers, that it’s not all sunshine and roses, and just making what you want, you have to actually budget and plan. And just think about what you’re doing. And that is part of the Engineering Design Process. But and you you might like this, too. So part of my process for them is, after they budget, I also have them write up a plan, I have them write up from third through sixth, they write the first five steps of their plan. So as a group, they’ll write what they’re doing. And we talked about how we’re not writing, get the materials, but we’re writing attach cardboard, a cardboard. So after they write the first five steps and their budget, because I am working like one week at a time, they’ll submit it to me, I bought a stamp that says building permit approved from Zazzle. It read through their plans, I look at their diagrams and labels. And I look at their budget and just check that their math was right. And I stamp them for approval. And then the next time they come in, they get to shop and they can get whatever change they need and all that kind of good stuff. And it has been so much fun for me honestly, even with the stamp, but it’s really changed the way projects are flowing to have those, you know, and some kids for some kids, yes, they don’t want to work with a plan in front of them. They just kind of want to dive in and go. So that’s why I only said five steps because after those five steps, they are going to dive in and go. But I want them to have something to start with. Because often I found last year that when they didn’t have a place to start definitively. There was a lot of I don’t like this anymore. I want to start again. And I don’t see that as much this year,


Naomi Meredith  33:12

saying, but how does Yeah, cool. I’ve never thought of having it’s almost like writing a how to I never thought of that. That’s so smart. And especially carrying it on the weeks for them. They’re not Oh, I remember I was going to do this like, oh, that’s what I was working on. That is so that is a cool way to plan. That’s like that’s really good.


Kelly Hogan  33:33

I was in part from hearing the I heart STEAM podcast, she had some ideas that were similar to that and my own thinking about it and then the stamp I just kind of got the idea in my head so I it just really took off and that stamp was not cheap, but it was worth the money.


Naomi Meredith  33:53

Yeah. Well on YouTube everyone so you’ll use it a ton. Yes. Well, I appreciate you sharing all this stuff and I’m so excited for I’m no other teachers are gonna want to reach out to you. Because I’m sure that your story is so much like, they’re like mine. But do you Where can they find you and do you have anything you want to share with them? Just that they would love?


Kelly Hogan  34:20

Cool. I am mathematically enthuse, which is a really long handle, but I’m mathematically enthused on Instagram. I’m mathematically enthused on tick tock though I don’t post as much or interact as much on tick tock, but I consume a lot. And mathematically enthused at Gmail. I do have a blog that I am slowly building at mathematically enthused blog.net and I am super responsive on Instagram. So that’s really the best way to get me. But I’m happy to answer any questions that anybody has, especially if they’re considering making the change from classroom into STEAM as I’m sure you are and your role is As someone who’s also a STEAM coach, so I anyone has any questions anyone wants to figure out how to turn a math lesson into something STEM or STEAM just to put some energy into it. I will talk to anyone I also happen to be an extrovert. So there’s, there’s no wrong way to contact me. I’m good.


Naomi Meredith  35:21

Well, I love chatting with you. I appreciate you so much. And I’m just excited for this episode and just where your journey and STEM is going to be. So thank you again for being so excited today.


Kelly Hogan  35:35

Thank you for having me. This was a blast.


Naomi Meredith  35:37

Good. We’ll chat soon. 


Kelly Hogan  35:40

Yes, yes.

 

classroom-teacher-to-steam-teacher

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

robot-ideas-for-winter-time

5 Robot Ideas for Winter Time [ep.44]

5 Robot Ideas for Winter Time [ep.44]

robot-ideas-for-winter-time

Check out the full episode on 5 Robot Ideas for Winter Time:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Looking for some fun robot ideas for wintertime?

In this episode, I will be sharing with you five winter-themed robot lessons that you can teach in your classroom.

These are lessons that I have taught my students that they have absolutely loved, and I know that yours will too. 

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • 5 winter robot ideas
  • How to implement each of these ideas in your classroom
  • What the children learn during these activities

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

What are some fun robot ideas for wintertime? In this episode, I will be sharing with you five winter-themed robot lessons that you can teach in your classroom. These are lessons that I have taught my students that they have absolutely loved, and I know that yours will too. 


Naomi Meredith  00:48

Before we jump on in not a whole lot of announcements today, but I have one very exciting one. So in 2023, I’m going to be hosting live virtual workshops. I definitely don’t want you to miss out on all the fun. So it will be a great time to learn and connect with other STEM teachers about various topics. Again, I don’t want you to want to miss out on that. So you can join the waitlist here, and you’ll be the first to know when they are open. You can join the waitlist at Naomimeredith.com/workshopwaitlist. 


Naomi Meredith  01:26

For all of the lessons that I’m going to be talking about in this episode, I use various specific robots and a variety of robots in my classroom. However, don’t be so stuck on the robots that I’m going to be talking about for each of these lessons. You can definitely mix in whatever robots you have on hand. For example, if I’m talking about the Sphero robot for a specific lesson, you don’t necessarily have to use it. So it can definitely work with whatever robots you have. Also, I’m just sharing with you a snapshot of how I taught these lessons. For second through fifth grade, I went through the whole Engineering Design Process throughout the week, so this wasn’t a one-day challenge. You could, of course, modify it to be a one-day challenge, but we really went through all the stages of the Engineering Design Process for each of these lessons, besides the Kindergarten and the first one that I will be sharing at the end, the one for Kindergarten and first grade was for a STEM station. So it was one of many activities that we did throughout the week. So just keep that in mind when you’re hearing about these lessons. They’re way more involved than what I’m really talking about. I just wanted to give you an idea for winter theme robotics lessons that you can use Well, of course, during the wintertime, and help spark creativity with all of these fun, different themes. 


Naomi Meredith  02:48

The first robot idea for wintertime is Sphero sleds. As I said, don’t get too caught up in the type of robot that I used. For this lesson. I was inspired by the Iditarod, and I’m not quite sure why I got inspired by it. But I was inspired by the Iditarod, and I’m so glad I picked this topic for this lesson because where I’m at in Colorado, most kids actually don’t know what the Iditarod is. Now once I started talking more about it, they had a little bit of background based on maybe some movies that they had seen. But overall, most kids had no idea what the Iditarod was. In general, if you can pick very obscure topics, that’s going to really help with the engagement. So not only were the kids engaged in the topic of the Iditarod but they were also excited to code and integrate some engineering challenges as well. So a whole lot of things to be engaged in. So basically, the Iditarod is a dog sled race, a very famous one that takes place in Alaska in March. That’s a basic snapshot for you to look up, but the kids are super into it. Of course, if they love animals and dogs like me, like my little dog, Frederick, he could definitely not do a dog sled race, that would not be happening. He doesn’t even like going outside when it’s sprinkling water outside. He will avoid sprinklers when we go on a walk so he would not be an Iditarod dog. But the kids love seeing videos of this. There are a whole lot of great things out there. 


Naomi Meredith  04:24

The Iditarod website is awesome for research. They can research a musher and learn more about that and their sled race, all of that. So students will research and learn about the Iditarod, and then they will design a sled for the robot to pull through the race. So depending on the type of robot, this could definitely vary your materials. When I did this in my class was Sphero. I had red solo cups or similarly shaped cups that they could cut and manipulate plastic straws, paper, and tape, and that was actually it. Those were all the supplies that students had to work with, so they really had to be creative. This actually helped that the weight of the sled wasn’t too heavy so that the robot could pull it while it was being coded. Then students would have to code their robot through the Iditarod race. So I have a race track that has all of the checkpoints that are actually listed in the actual race. Students can learn about that pathway and how treacherous it is, and how there are so many different angles to go through. It’s really fun, too, because depending on their sled design, it really changes how the robot moves and how it affects the race track. This is a really fun challenge. The kids are super engaged and super excited. Then they get to learn about something that they may not have heard about before. 


Naomi Meredith  05:46

The second robot idea for wintertime is Sphero snowflakes. Again, use whatever robot you want. I did this lesson with the fourth grade. Students learn about different types of angles, lines, and symmetry. This is really well represented in snowflakes. There are some awesome videos out there when it comes to the math behind snowflakes and how they have all these different things. It really helps students build on that vocabulary when it comes to lines and angles and even how to measure angles. Depending on the type of robot that you have. You can even code the robot to go in certain angles, which is really helpful as well because we know this is a very hard math concept for students to grasp. So why not implement it within your STEM classroom? After students learn about the math behind snowflakes, they will create their own snowflakes that will be taped onto the floor. In my classroom, I have tiled floors, so I actually have pulled out the sidewalk chalk, and the students will sketch out and measure their snowflake designs on the floor. They were going absolutely nuts that I let them draw on the floor like it’s just chalk is totally fine. 


Naomi Meredith  06:57

So again, there’s some engagement, but students would draw their snowflake design on the floor, and then they would cover it up using masking tape. It’s so much fun too because it looks like Buddy the Elf decorated your classroom for Christmas or the holidays. So you have these fun snowflake designs for the week, and then students can pull them up when they are all finished. You could build your own snowflakes, but it’s way more fun to have the kids build the snowflakes, and they get so creative with their designs. Now, if you get really strict with a snowflake design, where it’s not just a free build, and you really have students measure using protractors and yardsticks, they can actually have a snowflake that is legit symmetrical. They can have parts of their code where they can actually loop the code because there are identical lines at angles. So this, again, is a great application of their math skills and putting it in a concrete way. So this was so much fun for the kids. It really differentiates itself based on its snowflake design and what they create. 


Naomi Meredith  08:41

The third robot idea for wintertime is Winter Games robot mapping. This is a lesson that I did with third grade, and we talked about the Winter Olympics and all the places that they have been located within a certain amount of time. We used Google Earth to explore all of these places and learn a little bit more about them and just some cool facts about the Winter Olympics in general. Students placed them on their maps. Likewise, we realized that the most current Winter Games are all located above the equator, and we talked about the reasoning behind that. So this was a cool integration to actually expose students to Google Earth. Noticing those tools and even practicing their mapping skills, and where things are located on a world map, from there students coded their Ozobots, their little tiny robots to travel to each of the places where the Winter Games were held in the order when they happened. When the robot landed on that location on the map, then it had to perform an action. So this also helped too, where they had to code in chronological order, and in some places, they had to go backward. So it really helped again, really notice the pattern of where things are located in the world. If you did this with larger robots, you could use the same map template that I used, and you could blow it up even bigger. If you Google ways to print a PDF on multiple pages, you could print the map and make it very ginormous. Then you could laminate it if you wanted to and then use larger robots. So don’t feel limited if you can’t use the Ozobots. I know at the time of this recording, those are actually hard to get your hands on. So you can use a variety of different things as well. So it was just a really cool connection to think about the Winter Games, what they are and where they’re located in the world. 


Naomi Meredith  11:37

The fourth robot idea for wintertime is winter animal migration robots. This one was for second grade, and we did mapping in a different way. We talked about different animals, the reasons why they might migrate, and how there are a bunch of animals that decide to migrate during the wintertime. Students are given articles about specific animals that migrate during the winter time that I pre-researched and wrote articles for them, shared the articles in Seesaw, and recorded my voice. So they had all of that information for them. They chose an animal out of that selection that they were most passionate about. Then they had to code their animal with the migration path that it takes during the wintertime on a specific map. So I had all this created for them, they had the specific maps, and they had an idea of the locations of where the animal migrated to. But then they actually had to create the path and where it stopped at different locations. Again, the robot had to perform an action. So this was super engaging for them. We even made the little Ozobots be the animal that was migrating. So I have little pictures that they could tape to the robot, and it was super fun for them to even record the robot in action on Seesaw, I didn’t mention this with the other ones. But I actually have students record a video of their robots in action with Seesaw, which you could do with Flipgrid or whatever you use. But this is a great way for students, I have air quotations, to take their work home because sometimes it’s hard for kids to really talk about what they did in STEM class because we use such obscure things. So I highly recommend taking photos and videos of their work. So then it feels like they are taking the work home, I say you’re taking the work home by taking a picture, it doesn’t always have to be a physical object. So it’s just super fun for this winter animal migration project and all the other projects for them to share the learning with their families. 


Naomi Meredith  13:38

The final robot idea for wintertime is build a snowman robot coding. This was part of a STEM station rotation out of all the different winter-themed STEM challenges that I did throughout the week with the younger students. So this was one of many where we didn’t go through the full Engineering Design Process. Students were given different images of fun snow people and characters that had different accessories on them, they had a full image of that character, and the cards that they were given had all the different parts that would make that specific snowman. From there, students had to code their robots. I use Beebots but again, definitely up to you what robots you would like to use. But students would code their robot to collect the pieces to build that snowman character in the order of how they thought it should be built. So this even included the round ball at the bottom of the snowman, the middle, if there was a middle, would you put the eyes on first before the glasses or would you not so it really helped them with that sequential order of how things are being built. So it’s almost like that reverse engineering where it actually is taken apart for them, and they have to think of what order would it be to build that snowman character. So it was super fun for them. They could definitely take turns, they can take the cards off the grid as soon as they collect them. You can even add in more snowman stories if you would like. But this was a really fun and engaging STEM station. It was quick, it was engaging, but there was plenty for the students to interact with. 


Naomi Meredith  15:16

As a recap, here are the five robot ideas for wintertime that you can implement in your STEM classroom. First, we had Sphero sleds. Next are the Sphero snowflakes. Third are the Winter Games mapping, which I used Ozobots. Fourth, the winter animal migration, again with Ozobots. And fifth, build a snowman coding. I hope you enjoyed all of these different fun winter-themed robotic lessons. Of course, mix in the robots that work best for you, what you have on hand and the age level of your students. If you’re interested in grabbing all these lessons and getting them in full detail, I have them all packaged together nicely in a bundle in my TPT shop. Or you can even purchase the lessons individually based on the students and the needs that you have. But that way, it will save you some time, and then you can see the engagement in your classroom that I saw and mine.

 

robot-ideas-for-winter-time

robot-ideas-for-winter-time

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

best robots for elementary students

Best Robots for Elementary Students [ep.43]

Best Robots for Elementary Students [ep.43]

best robots for elementary students

Check out the full episode on Best Robots for Elementary Students:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Have you been wondering what robots you should buy for your elementary STEM space? 

In this episode, I will be giving my recommendations for the best robots that you should invest in for your elementary classroom.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Dash robot
  • Robots by Sphero
  • Robots for directional coding

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Have you been wondering what robots you should buy for your elementary STEM space? In this episode, I will be giving my recommendations for the best robots that you should invest in for your elementary classroom. 


Naomi Meredith  00:11

All right, before we jump in, I have a couple of announcements for you to get you going for your day. I am working on planning one of my last few episodes of 2022, and I actually wanted you to help me create it. It’s going to be an Ask Me Anything episode. So you can ask me anything STEM or personally related that you want to know about me, and I will answer it on the show. You can send me a DM on Instagram at Naomimeredith_  or a recorded voice message at Naomimeredith.com/voice. I will answer your questions on the podcast. Also, I have some upcoming virtual workshops that are going to be launching in 2023 that I would love for you to be a part of. It will be a good time to learn and connect with other STEM teachers and about topics that are important to us in the elementary STEM space. You can join the waitlist to be the first to know when they’re open, and you can do that at Naomimeredith.com/workshopwaitlist. All of this will be listed in the show notes, so you don’t have to stop your car or stop what you’re doing. You can go get those links when you’re ready. 


Naomi Meredith  01:56

When it comes to purchasing robots for the classroom, it doesn’t have to be super scary. You really don’t have to buy everything at once. All of the robots that I’m going to be talking about I’m not sponsored currently by any of these companies. But of course, if you’re listening to this and you work for those companies, let me know because I would love to chat. But these are robots that I have used in my elementary STEM space that has definitely been worth the investment and that I could use with hundreds of students for a variety of different lessons. All of these robots have different coding languages, and there are some similarities and differences that we will talk about. So again, these are things that I have used with kids and that have worked well over the years. So let’s jump in. 


Naomi Meredith  02:41

The first robot that I would recommend to use in your STEM space is the Dash robot by Wonder Workshop. It is a teal robot that has a round head and then three round parts at the bottom with two wheels. There are different pieces to attach different accessories. This robot is recommended for K through five, which you can definitely use with all of your students, which is a great investment. If you don’t have a whole lot in your budget, you have a robot that you can use with all of your students. I talked a lot about Dash and Wonder Workshop in general with Bryan Miller, who works for the company. Make sure to check out the interview I did with Bryan Miller back in episode 32. At the time of this episode, they’re about $180 per robot, which is slightly pricey, but again, it can be used with all of your students, so it’s worth the investment. When you’re using this with the younger students, there are apps that really help the students understand how the robot works in a more simple coding language. When you move to the second through fifth graders, there is an app where you can use block-based coding to get more into higher-level coding. This robot is super durable and easy to get started with. You just unbox it, turn it on, push through any updates, and you are ready to go. 


Naomi Meredith  04:01

Dash has a rechargeable battery that you can use a power cord with. The battery lasts for a long time. So if you’re using this with multiple classes throughout the day, you might just have to charge Dash in the middle of the day, and you should be good to go the entire day. That’s really awesome, too, as you can code Dash with tablets and Chromebooks. So with the web browser, as long as the device has Bluetooth, you can code Dash, which is awesome because I know not all of us have tablets in our classrooms, so you don’t have to be limited to that option. As I mentioned that there are parts to Dash where you can attach various accessories that are available to purchase separately. There are also these really cool simple attachments that you can put on Dash that students can actually build with LEGO bricks to help them solve their solution. Not only that, Wonder Workshop has an annual competition that you can do as an after-school club and use this robot, and they have various challenges that you can have students problem-solve and collaborate together. The challenges and themes change every year to keep your students excited and engaged year after year. So I definitely recommend this as an after-school club opportunity. Again, this robot is so amazing, it rolls, it can make sounds, and it can perform different actions with those accessories. So again, if you only are able to purchase one type of robot, this guy, Dash, could be your go to.


Naomi Meredith  05:29

You may notice there are other robots that Wonder Workshop offers. They have Dot, which is a smaller robot that doesn’t move but can interact with Dash. Then they have Cue, the older sibling that we like to say. They can interact as well and can perform multiple coding actions that Dash can’t currently do. But you don’t need either one of these robots, Dash is just fine. If you get about 6 to 12 of these for your classroom, you will be set. When you’re first getting started with Dash, they have some coding cards that are excellent for learning the basics of Dash. There are many challenges that students can complete and work on with groups. I love using these when I first get Dash out with my students, and they have no prior background when using these robots. They are perfect challenges that students can progress through. It teaches them how to use the coding language and to see how Dash responds when different coding actions are performed. 


Naomi Meredith  06:30

The second robot that I would recommend for the elementary classroom is the Sphero robot. There are a lot of different variations of these offered by Sphero. There is a Sphero mini that is the size of a golf ball, Sphero bolt, and Sphero Spark Plus. There are a lot of different variations, and they all do about the same thing. So you can always try to purchase the newest version that they have at the time. This robot is shaped like a ball, and it rolls like a ball. They move very, very fast. So different than Dash. Dash has wheels on the bottom, and Sphero rolls around, but it has a very similar coding language. I will say a big difference between the coding of Sphero and Dash is that Sphero can perform more tight turns and angles. So when you have more obstacle courses or things that have corners and turns, Sphero might be the best robot for this. Dash has a bit more of a personality. It’s cuter, I would say. So students really connect with that, that it has a personality. But again, robots are things that perform and automate a task. So it’s really awesome that these companies have different robots, and they look different. Some look like they have a personality, and some don’t. But either way, that’s okay. The goal is to teach students that it’s performing an automated task that you code it to do. There are a lot of different apps that you can use for Sphero. The one that I like to use is the Sphero education app. The coding is a bit more complicated, so if you’re looking for a challenge for students, I would recommend using Sphero with your older students, like fourth, fifth, or even sixth grade, because the coding can be even more complicated. You can talk about the speed and rate of things, again, those lines and angles. So you can even have very specific degrees, which Dash can too. But the way that you can code Sphero can get even more complicated, which is great for students who want more of a challenge. 


Naomi Meredith  08:54

There are other offshoots of Sphero that also I would recommend looking into for your classroom. There is the Sphero rover. It’s not spelled rover, it’s RVR. But this is recommended for even the higher up grades, so sixth grade and beyond. So if you’re a teacher who teaches K through eight, this would be a great investment for you, because the students would be used to the black base coding, like with the Sphero, the ball Sphero. But there is just more of a challenge when it comes to the coding and the capabilities of that robot, and it looks like a little car. So that is pretty exciting as well. Likewise, there’s a younger student offshoot the Sphero Indi, which I talked about in that holiday episode, things to buy for your classroom. This one is really cool, too, because this robot reads the color codes on the cards. So you don’t necessarily need a device to code that robot. But it reads the cards, and then students can put the cards in a different formation on the ground. Then when that robot drives across those colors, it will perform the action. So there’s a whole line of variation. So if you have more room in your budget, I would mix this type of robot in, especially if you teach all the students in the school. It is pretty cool to have a variety of robots for students to experiment with because if you’re using the same one, year after year, they might master that type of coding, then you definitely want to mix up the lessons that you’re doing. So again, if you have more room in your budget, mix these robots in so you have more variety. Students can compare and contrast the type of coding and the different challenges that they’ll perform in your classroom. 


Naomi Meredith  11:52

The very best robots to use for students in the elementary classroom are robots that use directional coding. There are a lot of options for this type of coding. When I describe directional coding, that would be the code that uses the arrows. So this is definitely used for primary students or pre-readers, where there’s an arrow that shows the direction the robot is going to be moving. These robots definitely are cute, and they have a lot of personality. There are a lot of different options out there, and I’m going to describe the difference between those to help you with your purchasing decision. Because all of our coding languages are pretty much the same thing with the arrows. But here are the differences between those robots. The cheapest option is the code and go mouse. It’s about the size of your fist, and it doesn’t use a screen. It does use batteries that you have to replace. It’s not a rechargeable robot, and they are the cheapest. So if you are on a tight budget, this is the cheapest option. Now, I will say the coding is great. But if you’re using this for hundreds of students, they don’t really last a long time, and they come up with some weird little issues and kinks where it might go the opposite direction. The wheels don’t always work. So if you’re looking for longevity of a product, I wouldn’t really recommend the “mouse.” Love the coding since it’s super simple to use. You could just buy the robot, you don’t need the whole kit that has the squares that come with it. They are these green squares that students can build on, but you don’t really need those. The robot is awesome. If you’re on a tight budget, if you’re a classroom teacher, let’s say you only teach about 25 to 30 kids, definitely invest in this code and go mouse or if you are a parent, perfect for at home. But if you teach hundreds of kids, if you can swing it, I’m gonna give you a couple of different options for that. 


Naomi Meredith  13:49

A robot that does the same exact thing that is more durable, and you don’t have to replace the batteries are the Bee-Bots. Yes, they are pricier, but they are extremely durable and hardly ever have any issues. I’ve had the same ones for years, and I know that they were in my classroom even before I got this job. They were used for years before that. So they are definitely worth the investment if you can splurge a little bit more. This is the top one that I would recommend for primary students, and it is the Blue Bot. The Blue Bot, again, also has the arrows that you press on the robot, the directional coding, it’s see through so it looks just like the Bee-Bot but it’s see through with kind of a bluish tint so students can see inside of the robot and what all of its components are. But not only does it have the screen-free option, it does have the option of being able to be coded by using an iPad. I like having this option because this is a great progressive robot, meaning students could start off in Kindergarten or in first-grade coding by using the arrow keys on the back of the robot, and then at the end of first grade or beginning of second grade, they can code the robot using a tablet connected with Bluetooth. They can code using the arrows on the iPad, but you can also code using block-based coding that is even more simple than the Dash robot, which I love. If you have a variety of robots, then this type of coding with the Blue Bot will help them with the Dash robot. Let’s say you have the Sphero, then if they can master Dash, then they can go with Sphero. So like I said, I love having a variety of robots in my classroom to have that progression of learning. So when I’m teaching robotics, we’re all doing robots at the same time, and we are interacting with robots where there is that progression of learning. There are different challenges along the way that students can explore different coding languages and things that are exciting for them. So that’s why I like having that variety. 


Naomi Meredith  14:08

There’s also another robot that uses directional coding, and that is the Botley robot. There are two versions, there’s the Botley, and then there’s the 2.0, where there are just more capabilities with the Botley. The 2.0 basically does the same thing. Instead of having the arrows on the back of the robot, there is a little remote. Now again, it’s a really great robot, not as terrible as the Bee-Bot with a ton of hands. Just be careful that the remote doesn’t get lost. I haven’t used a bunch of these with a whole class. I’ve used this before, just one robot with a station. So I’m not sure when it comes to the remote if the remote can control all of the Botleys in the room or just the one that comes in the kit. As I said, try it out, and if you know, let me know. But this one is a cheaper option. It’s a little more expensive than the Code-and-Go-Mouse. But cheaper than the Blue Bot and Bee-Bot. It can do a little bit more than the Code-and-Go-Mouse. It has a few more functions. So there’s just a variety of price ranges when it comes to that directional coding. They all do the same thing, perfect for the same grade of students. But if I were to have to choose one, I would choose the Blue Bot robot. 


Naomi Meredith  17:16

As a recap, here are the best robots for elementary students that I would recommend for your classroom. First, we have the Dash robot by Wonder Workshop. Next are the different robots that are offered by Sphero. We have the Bolt, and the mini, which are both shaped like a ball that can roll around, there is the Rover RVR, and there is the Indi. Finally, there are robots that use directional coding. So we talked about a variety of those. There’s the Bee-Bot, the Blue Bot, the Code-and-Go-Mouse, and the Botley. I hope that this helps with your decision-making when it comes to the robots to use in your classroom and what is available out there. We will talk more about specific lessons in future episodes. But I don’t want you to be overwhelmed with all the decisions out there. These are ones that I have used with students or ones that I know people have used and that have worked well. So hopefully, this can take out that decision fatigue and find a resource that will work best for your STEM space.

best robots for elementary students

best robots for elementary students

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

winter-stem-activities

5 Winter STEM Activities to Try [ep.42]

5 Winter STEM Activities to Try [ep.42]

winter-stem-activities

Check out the full episode on 5 Winter STEM Activities to Try:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Looking for some fun winter STEM activities?

These five winter-themed challenges are perfect for sub plans, one-day lessons, and even classroom parties.

My students have had a really fun time with these. So you can definitely implement these winter STEM activities in your classroom.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Area perimeter wrapping paper challenge
  • Snowman states of matter
  • Toothpicks and snowflakes activity
  • Gingerbread man STEM challenge
  • 10 on the sled book activity

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Looking for some fun winter STEM activities? These five winter-themed challenges are perfect for sub plans, one-day lessons, and even classroom parties. Let’s jump into these five fun winter ideas.  


Naomi Meredith  00:22

I want to try something new with you guys and update you on all the things that are happening over here in my STEM world, so you don’t miss out on anything, especially if you listen to these podcasts live when they come out. So all the fun announcements, and I love a good organizational thing before we jump in. So, first of all, I am planning the last episode of 2022. The podcast is not going away, only planning the last episode for 2022. I actually want you to help me create it. I thought that would be super fun to have a fun episode for the last episode of 2022. So it’s an Ask Me Anything episode. You can ask me anything STEM related or even personal that you want to know about me, and I will answer it on the show. You can send me a DM on Instagram at Naomimeredith_ or you can record me a voice message at Naomimeredith.com/voice. That was so much fun when you guys recorded those voice messages for me. I loved hearing your voice. So either way, totally fine. I’ve already got some over on Instagram already. But let me know what you want to know. If it’s super detailed, I’ll keep it brief. But that will help me even for big episodes, but I think this would be super fun. Thinking about the new year, I am going to start hosting virtual live workshops, of course, they’ll be recorded. But I thought that this would be an awesome time to learn and connect with other STEM teachers because I know how it feels being all alone and also needing a space to collaborate and learn. I don’t want you to miss out on these virtual workshops, so join the waitlist to be the first to know when it’s open. You can join the list at Naomimeredith.com/workshopwaitlist. Of course, all of this is going to be linked in the show notes. So if you’re driving, don’t worry about it, just click on the show notes, and then all that info will be there. So super excited to collaborate even more and make this elementary STEM world smaller. 


Naomi Meredith  02:48

So let’s jump into these winter STEM challenges that I know you’re definitely going to love. My students have had a really fun time with these. So you can definitely take these on into your classroom. Of course, these are also linked in the show notes and will be in my TPT shop. So if you really need to save some time, it is all packaged together for you nicely. The first winter STEM activity to try is an area and perimeter wrapping paper challenge. I used to teach them only three days out of the week when I first got started. So I was always looking for quick activities. Oftentimes, these themed challenges would pop in and would be perfect for the week. All you need for this challenge is some cheap wrapping paper. You can even use butcher paper that is in your classroom that’s a little bit thicker. It’s a little bit harder to wrap with, but if you want to save some time, grab that from your school and some small boxes. If you can make sure all of the boxes are about the same size, this will make the challenge more even for all of the kids so that all of their numbers can be compared but definitely up to you if you don’t really care about that part. 


Naomi Meredith  03:57

So the goal for this challenge is for students will be presented with three different methods for wrapping a gift, so you can look up different videos on YouTube. I have created a few different methods and quick little videos for kids that are included in this resource but show them three different methods for wrapping a gift, and students will choose one of those methods or a method that they already know and then wrap the gift. From there, they’re actually going to unwrap the gift carefully. They’re going to measure the wrapping paper that they used and measure the area and the perimeter. You can have students measure in inches and in centimeters. They can measure in both and then see what are the similarities and differences if you want them to practice different types of measurement. If the kids have the same size box, you can actually record the data using a line plot. Or you can graph all of that data as well. Even further, you can even compare the wrapping method that students use and really talk about what methods are better or worse. 


Naomi Meredith  05:05

This challenge was inspired by a volunteer opportunity I did in high school, which was way long ago. But I did a volunteer opportunity with one of my friends in high school where we were at the mall, and people would bring in their gifts. We would wrap the gifts for free. I think any tips that were collected were for donations. We didn’t receive any money, but it was super fun. I learned how to wrap gifts in a very concise and precise way. So this is really a good challenge for students too because it’s not always a winter challenge wrapping gifts. But I was super shocked. So many kids didn’t know how to wrap gifts. A lot of them were actually getting really frustrated because they had never done this before. Some kids were telling me it was impossible, which, as I said, everything new is hard at first. So this was actually a really good life skill. But again, practicing that area and perimeter in a real-life way and learning which wrapping method might work best and using the least amount of paper. 


Naomi Meredith  07:42

The second winter STEM activity to try is snowman states of matter. One of my all-time favorite books is the snowy day. This is such a cute book. When you read this book it has the three states of matter when it comes to solids, liquids, and gases for water. So reread it with that frame of mind because it will definitely pop up at you. After reading this book with students, you can talk about the three states of matter. So there’s that S in science. Then students can build the different states of matter of a snowman-the solid, liquid, and gas using playdough or modeling clay. I prefer using the Crayola modeling clay that I’ve talked about this in past episodes. It doesn’t dry out, and it can be reused over and over again. It’s not as crumbly as playdough. I get really frustrated with playdough. Sometimes when it gets all crumbled up, the kids don’t put the cap on, I know there are ways that you can re-infuse it with water, blah, blah, blah, but not for me. I don’t have time for that. So the Crayola modeling clay works well for this activity. They can demonstrate their learning by sharing it with other students in the class. Or, if you want to take it even further, you can integrate technologies such as Seesaw, and Flipgrid, all of those things, where they can take a video and talk about how the three states of matter are represented in their snowman. 


Naomi Meredith  09:06

The third winter-themed STEM activity to try is toothpick snowflakes. We know in the older grades, it can get a little bit confusing to remember what the different lines and angles are and how to measure different angles. So why not do that type of lesson in a hands-on way? There is so much science and math behind snowflakes and how they’re naturally created. There are tons of videos that you can check out on YouTube that talk about the symmetry and the math behind a snowflake. After you discuss this and go over key vocabulary, students can create their own unique snowflakes using toothpicks. You can have them tape them together. They can even glue them on paper using liquid glue. After that, they can record the math that is represented, and they’re snowflakes, such as the lines of symmetry and the different types of angles, and they can even measure the angles that are in their design. To have students be really precise with their snowflakes, I would recommend having them measure using a ruler, and then really be thoughtful about their snowflake design. This will actually take longer than you think because students are really trying to be precise with their snowflake design. So this is a great challenge that you can really dive in deeper when talking about those lines and angles. 


Naomi Meredith  10:24

The fourth winter STEM activity to try is a gingerbread man STEM challenge. You can do this if you are reading different variations of the gingerbread man, which is so fun to read all of these different ones. I still have a collection of those books in my classroom, because you know me, I love a good theme, and I love holidays. I love this season and time of year. So after reading different versions of the gingerbread man, you can talk with the kids and say, “What if the gingerbread man had a streak of engineer creativity and decided to create a way to cross the river so that the fox wouldn’t be able to eat it?” This is a great lesson about sinking and floating and noticing what materials will obviously sink or float and why. You can talk even more about the why behind it. Students can engineer a way for the gingerbread man to stay safe and travel safely across the water. You can fill up different buckets of water, I recommend putting these on the floor and having plenty of towels available. Students can engineer their fun designs. When I want students to share their work, I take the videos with my phone quickly and upload them to the students’ journals in Seesaw. I don’t trust kids with technology and water in the same vicinity as each other. So that’s just definitely my recommendation. But this is a really cool way to think of an alternate ending to the original gingerbread man story. 


Naomi Meredith  11:54

The fifth winter STEM activity to try goes along with the story 10 on the sled, and students will be building a sled. After reading this cute counting story, students can create the 10 animals that are in the story. Or you can give them pictures of the 10 animals that are listed, and students can design a sled that can keep all 10 animals on the sled when it’s being tested. You can give students any type of materials that you would like. I like to use popsicle sticks, straws, pipe cleaners, and tape if I’m being nice. Sometimes I won’t use tape, but you can use some tape, and students can engineer their sled and even test it. If you have a giant piece of cardboard, they can test their sleds and see if all 10 animals can stay on top. Now a little trick with the animals is you can put them on unifix cubes, so they’re more chunky. Print little pictures on paper, put them on unifix cubes, and then they can maybe take the animals on or engineer a way to create seat belts or whatever. But this is a cool way to bring this simple counting story to life and make sure that all 10 animals stay on top. 


Naomi Meredith  13:00

As a recap, here are the five winter STEM activities that we talked about in this episode that you can try in your classroom. First, we have the area perimeter wrapping paper challenge. Next are the snowman states of matter. Third, are toothpicks and snowflakes. Fourth is the gingerbread man STEM challenge. Fifth is the 10 on the sled book activity. If you try any of these winter STEM challenges in your classroom, make sure to take pictures and videos of them in action and tag me on Instagram at Naomimeredith_. I would love to see how these go in your classroom. These can all be found in the show notes linked for today, where you can have it all packaged up nicely and have all the things that you’re looking for to have success in your classroom.

winter-stem-activities

winter-stem-activities

 

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

stem-coach-do

What Does a STEM Coach Do? with Becca McMillan [ep.40]

What Does a STEM Coach Do? with Becca McMillan [ep.40]

stem-coach-do

Check out the full episode on What does a STEM Coach Do? with Becca McMillan:  

 

Subscribe to the podcast HERE on your favorite podcasting platform.

Have a STEM question? Leave a voice message for the podcast!

Episode Summary

Do you teach STEM, but you are exclusively in a co-teaching or coaching role?

Or, if you are a classroom teacher and you are looking for ways you can co-teach and plan with an instructional coach in your building, this episode is for you.

In today’s episode, I interview my longtime friend Becca McMillan. Becca gives us insight into what a STEM coach does, tips for co-teaching, and lesson plan ideas. 

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • What a STEM coach does
  • Co-teaching tips
  • STEM lesson ideas

Meet Becca McMillan:

Becca McMillan is a STEM Teacher and Coach at a Title 1 elementary school in Colorado. After teaching in the classroom for 9 years in all different grade levels, she took on this role as a new passion and challenge. For the past 4 years, Becca has taught K-5 STEM and also coaches teachers to integrate STEM into their classroom curriculum. She is in a unique, flexible role that allows her to meet the needs of her school community. Becca plans and co-teaches with teachers, which allows STEM to be applied in all content areas rather than being an isolated subject.  Becca believes that STEM education is more than just Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math, it is a mindset that provides engaging, real-world problem-solving experiences for students.

Connect with Becca McMillan:

Instagram: @beccaroniandcheese22

Email: becca.mcmillan22@gmail.com

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Do you teach STEM, but you are exclusively in a co-teaching or coaching role? Well, part of my role in the past included co-teaching along with teaching K through five STEM specials. My longtime friend Becca has more extensive experience when it comes to this role. Becca co-teaches, plans, and coaches exclusively in our building for K through five STEM. You are going to take a lot of valuable information away from this episode when it comes to her role and lesson plan ideas. If you are a classroom teacher and you are looking for ways you can co-teach and plan with an instructional coach in your building, she has some great takeaways for you as well. 


Naomi Meredith  00:40

Becca McMillan is the STEM teacher and coach at a title I elementary school in Colorado. After teaching in the classroom for nine years in all different grade levels. She took on this role as a new passion and challenge. For the past four years, Becca has taught K through five STEM and also coaches teachers to integrate STEM into their classroom curriculum. She is in a unique flexible role that allows her to meet the needs of her school community. Becca plans and co-teaches with teachers, which allows STEM to be applied in all content areas rather than just being an isolated subject. Becca believes that STEM education is more than just science, technology, engineering, and math. It is a mindset that provides engaging real-world problem-solving experiences for students. I’m excited for you to listen to this episode. I adore Becca with all my heart, and I am so glad that you get to hear from her and all of her amazing experiences. 


Naomi Meredith  01:37

Well, thank you, Becca, so much for being here. today. We are on take two, we actually recorded this podcast a while back, and then half of it, they record, so it’s gonna be even better the second time. I’m so excited about this. I’ve known Becca for a long time. I don’t know how long, maybe eight years. Sounds right. Yeah, we kind of knew about each other before we even met. So I worked with a girl at my first school who was getting her Master’s at the same time you were getting your Master’s and so you two connected. Then I ended up applying to the school you were working at to teach. I really wanted to teach Kindergarten, and I ended up getting the third grade. But I got the interview. Then my friend put two and two together. Then you had heard about me before, so then you talked to the principal at the time, and then I ended up getting a job. So I like I remember I made you a plan book. You know, we like emailed or something, and I made a plan book, and I gave you something else, but then we were friends ever since. 


Becca McMillan  03:10

The rest is history.


Naomi Meredith  03:11

The rest is history, in the classroom out of the classroom, and we’ve been taught together. So I am so excited to have you because you have such a unique role. Even though we teach in the same district. Your role is so unique and so cool. So I think other people really resonate with what you do because I know not everybody has their own STEM classroom, they do more of what you do. So if you wouldn’t mind telling us about yourself, your teaching background, and then how you stepped into your unique role in K through five STEM. 


Becca McMillan  03:43

Yeah, so this is my 13th year in education. I’ve taught first, second, third, and fifth in the classroom as an elementary teacher. I did that for nine years. Then this opportunity for this STEM position became available at the school that I moved to after I taught with Naomi at the school where I’m currently at. We had a technology class as part of our specials rotation, and that technology teacher was retiring, and my principal wanted to kind of add more of a STEM aspect to our school, so she transformed the technology position into a STEM position, but we also had lower enrollment, so we didn’t need for specials. So my principal’s goal was to have kind of a STEM teacher/coach role that could be flexible to make STEM more integrated into all of the content areas of the grade levels. So not in the specials rotation but more flexible so that I was available to create projects with teams and with teachers as it became wanted and needed, and based on what kids wanted to learn and do. So yeah, my position is awesome. I feel really lucky, like you said that it’s very unique in the district, which comes with its challenges, but it is also amazing. I love that at our school STEM isn’t necessarily an isolated subject, it’s integrated, and the kids get to do things with the content that they’re learning in real-life problem-solving in a hands-on way. So it’s really fun to get to work with all of the teachers and all of the kids in the school to kind of bring us together, I guess.


Naomi Meredith  05:43

And I love it, too. I know that from what you’ve told me, your principal is really supportive of STEM, which isn’t always the case with admin, so you have a really great admin because she really fights for your position. I know that you’re a valuable asset in this school, but it’s so cool too. We’ll talk about some of the lessons that you do with the kids. But like you said that they are integrated. I feel like the lessons you teach are more authentic because a lot of times, we’ll see lessons just even on social media that “Oh, we played with robots today, good job.” But really, what you’re doing is you’re really looking at the standards, you’re using that classroom experience. Then the lessons that you’re doing are real in your work in Title One, too. So you’ve gotten your kids to do some amazing things. We’ve talked about this with other guests on the podcast, like having them shine in really unique ways. So with your co-teaching and your role, how does that work out? When you’re implementing lessons with the teachers, do you have a set schedule? How do you set that all up with the teachers in your building? 


Becca McMillan  06:45

Yeah, so my schedule is hardly ever the same from day to day, which I love most of the time, because it keeps me on my toes. It’s all based on the needs and wants of the teachers and the kids. So sometimes it’s me knowing what content is coming up for teachers and suggesting trying something different, or sometimes it’s teachers coming to me and saying, “Hey, I have this unit coming up, and I’m wanting to make it more engaging for the students. What are some ideas you have for that?” Sometimes it’s let’s give some extra plan time to teachers who need it in a busy time of the year like parent-teacher conferences. So it’s nice to be able to be flexible based on what our school community needs and wants. So one of the things that have been helpful is if I’m doing a project with teachers, and they’re wanting to try something new, it’s helpful to have an extra adult in the classroom to make it feel less scary for the teacher and for the kids. I think it is important to create a safe space where kids and adults can take risks and try new things that maybe they wouldn’t have tried on their own. So sometimes, I’ll even help with a project. If there’s a new tool that we need to learn, a tool to review or say we are using the robots in a project, I’ll take the kids for an hour, give the teacher some time to breathe, and I’ll review the tool with them. Then the teacher and I will co-teach our content, which has been beneficial in many different ways for the teachers at my school and the kids. 


Naomi Meredith  08:37

That’s super smart, too, because since you don’t see them in a specialist rotation, they need a little bit of experience just using the tool just as a tool. So that’s really smart. Where you build that background, the expectation, so then the classroom teacher may not know those things. So then, when you come back, you’re like, “Hey, we are ready to jump right in. We’re ready to go.” I know you’ve done something too because you’re also the tech person like me where you manage the school-wide technology. You did something really cool at lunchtime with the boxlight touchscreen boards. What did you do to help teachers with that?


Becca McMillan  09:15

Yeah, we did a lunch and learn because, as we know, sometimes it is hard to find time for teachers to meet because there’s a lot happening. So we did this at the beginning of the school year during our teacher work week. We had an hour-long optional lunch and learn. We had just got the new box light interactive panels for all of our classroom teachers. This is something that they’re using every day, so I knew they would need some direct instruction with that. So Naomi and I actually took a training together, and then I took what I learned and did a little more research based on what I knew teachers would need and created just a lunch and learn experience with a note catcher. I’ve organized it so that it would be easy for teachers to look at the notes and remember what they needed to press or do to use the screen when I’m not there. So that was how we did that training. And yeah, teachers are doing awesome with those interactive panels. 


Naomi Meredith  10:23

Oh, and your slides are really good because I use them to help train my staff. They’re like, wait, go back to that slide. So it was just very simple. You took screenshots, had little arrows, and it was really helpful. You even help my building. Yeah, well, I know when I’m in professional development and I take notes, I oftentimes do not remember what I meant if I’m just writing down scribbled notes. So I wanted it to be notes that teachers could take away and use later when they had the time. Oh, definitely. So with that, back to the lessons that you teach, have you had any favorites that you’ve taught in this role? I’m sure it’s really hard to choose because you do a lot of cool stuff. But you mix it up to like, is there anything cool that you’ve done with your kids that you think other teachers would love hearing about? 


Becca McMillan  11:10

Yeah, definitely. Last year, my favorite project that I did with the fourth-grade team. Some of their new science standards are not necessarily new but new-ish. The Next Generation Science Standards talk about learning the internal and external structures of a living creature that helps it to survive. So we did a project where the students first learned about lots of living things and what their internal and external structures were. Then their kind of culminating project was to create an imaginary creature that had structures that helped it to survive. They went through the whole Engineering Design Process of imagining solutions and creating a plan. Next, we built, out of recyclable materials, their creature, and they also used our hummingbird robotics, which is really cool. They come in servos, or motors, and different things that kids can then code to make their recyclable creations come to life. Then we hosted a zoo for the school, so groups of kids could show off their creatures that they created and had their code ready to go so they could flap their wings or light up their eyeballs and explain how the creature protected itself and used its structures to survive.


Naomi Meredith  12:45

 I remember you showing me the videos there. It was cute. And now what I love is younger students ask like when are we going to do we get to do that in fourth grade, and we’re going to have our own Zoo. So that’s what I love. Was the coding part hard with that because I haven’t tried the hummingbird robotics? I think last time when we first recorded this, I was waiting to see if I got the grant, and I did. So I will get to try these out. Was that hard? Because we’re used to building stuff, but you took it to the next step where they’re actually building a robot. Was that a hard process for you?


Becca McMillan  14:18

It was. I remember taking a kit home of the robotics and when trying to build something and then doing my own code. I eventually figured it out. But it is hard to learn something new. So I was a little nervous going into the project, not knowing everything. But then what was so cool was I didn’t need to know everything, the kids, it’s kind of an innate thing. I think this generation figures it out. Before each day of creating, we would gather all the fourth graders in the library and have groups share what they learned about coding the hummingbird robotics, and then they would become the experts. So I remember one group figured out how to make their creature make noise. So then they were the experts to go help their kids if they wanted to do that with their creature.


Naomi Meredith  15:49

Oh, that’s so smart. You’re gonna have some teachers like, “Oh, you’re the one kid who knows all the tech stuff.” Like you had, it just very differentiated itself. Like, oh, you figure it out. Alright, go ask this kid like is more on the spot because you never know. Yeah, so that’s so good. I’m gonna have to steal some of those pictures and videos to put in the show notes for this because it’s hard to visualize what you’re talking about. But it’s super cool. Like, it’s really cool what they did with her. I know your little kids, they’re not there yet. What have you done with your little kids that’s been a cool project?


Becca McMillan  16:27

Yeah, something that is happening right now, which I am really excited about, is with one of our second-grade teachers. She was hoping to find more of an authentic audience for her kids with their writing, which one of our school-wide goals is to help kids grow in writing. Also, one of her personal goals is to use Seesaw in more authentic ways. So she reached out asking what my suggestions were. Something I had always wanted to try and never had was connect using the Seesaw blog with another classroom somewhere else outside of Colorado. It just so happened that the writing that they were doing at the time was descriptive essays about Colorado. So we were imagining that it would be really cool to connect with a class outside of Colorado. That’s an authentic audience of teaching them about where we live, and then hopefully, they would teach us about where they live. So I posted on the Seesaw ambassador Facebook group, just hoping to find someone that would want to connect, and the teacher that ended up reaching out was a teacher in Tanzania. So she is actually from Colorado, and moved out there and teaches third grade in Tanzania. So now the Seesaw blogs are connected, and they just happen to also be writing informational texts about Tanzania. It just worked out really cool. Kids read their descriptive essays in front of a green screen, and then they picked a Colorado background. So that was how they published their writing. Then we posted it on Seesaw for their pen pal to listen to, and they also did an introduction of themselves. So that’s been a fun way to integrate writing, technology, global citizenship, and building relationships. 


Naomi Meredith  18:32

Yeah, and that’s a real authentic audience because I talk about Seesaw all the time in this podcast. But we know on Seesaw, it’s usually their peers, their parents, and their teacher who can see it, which is really great. But it’s someone who’s their age across the world. I bet that would motivate kids who have a hard time staying motivated with writing and might not be their favorite, but they know that someone their age far, far away is going to hear it, and they have to produce something because they’re going to produce something for that. 


Becca McMillan  19:00

Exactly. They’re loving it. They’re learning about Tanzania, and now too, which I don’t think they ever would have before, and with kids their age that actually live there. 


Naomi Meredith  19:11

That is so cool. That is amazing. 


Becca McMillan  19:14

Making the world a smaller place. 


Naomi Meredith  19:16

Yeah, I love that. I know like you’re super connected in your school, too. I mean, it’s super cool that you’re in the classrooms all the time. I know your co-teacher, the PE teacher, and that you’ve even brought your whole school community altogether. Like even having that authentic audience. Tell me more about what you’ve been doing this school year. I talked you into it, but you’ve been loving it. 


Becca McMillan  19:40

So Naomi was my inspiration to start school-wide news broadcasts. Naomi is doing the same at her school. So we have a performing arts teacher this year instead of a music teacher, which has been really cool for our school as well, and she was on board with starting the news broadcast as well because that’s in her wheelhouse. So it was nice to go into it having a partner to do that with. We’ve become this team where she organizes the kids to record the news, and then I edit with some help from the kids. We’re slowly putting more responsibility on the kids to do all of the recording jobs and the editing jobs. What I love is that it is really bringing our school community together. We started out recording teachers to do the news, and then hilarious just seeing the younger kids now, the older kids, the teachers, and vice versa. We were having teachers do book recommendations, and I’ve seen multiple times kids who aren’t in that grade level go to that teacher and ask to borrow their book. So that’s been really heartwarming. We’ve come up with some quirky segments we just started, would you rather Wednesday, and two of our fifth-grade teachers are hilarious and give us all kinds of bloopers. But they did our first would you rather Wednesday, and it’s just an authentic way of also getting kids to talk about their opinions, kind of a little debate, which is only going to help their writing as well and bring their classes together to talk about those topics. Yeah, it’s been fun. Kids are begging to be on the news there. So it’s just been strengthening our school community even more. It’s been really fun to be on the other side of it and connect people in that way too. 


Naomi Meredith  21:46

Oh, totally, it’s one of the most favorite clubs I’ve ever done. I’ve done clubs my first year teaching, and it’s like one of those things. You’re building the airplane while it’s flying. I started last year. Like when I was telling you like, Well, we tried this, and then this, when you probably see the same thing. I have to do a whole podcast episode about how to set it up. But yeah, it’s pre-recorded, not live. You do pre-recorded also, which I highly recommend just thinking about your time. I feel like when you do things live, it’s just something’s bound to not work. But it’s so much fun. It’s such a cool thing too, and your role. It’s almost like having your own class again, have you felt that way?


Becca McMillan  22:27

Yeah, because now I have my editing kids, they come down at their lunch and recess time on certain days. Even if I have a class in the Makerspace or I’m doing a project, they still know where to find me. They can sit and do their editing work while I am doing what I need to do. So that’s been a nice way of building independence for them, too, in our little crew. They’re really proud to be on that editing crew and the same with the kids who report the news as well.


Naomi Meredith  22:59

Oh, yeah, it’s living their YouTube dreams. Even though it’s not on YouTube, they’re living it out. So I know that I mean, with any role, it’s not all perfect and beautiful. Everything has its challenges. Is there any advice that you would give to somebody who might be in a similar role to you? Anything that surprised you, since it can be a little bit scary working with teachers and then making connections with kids? What would you say to someone who’s doing something like you or wants to get started in that role? 


Becca McMillan  23:30

Yeah, I think with any big change, it’s important to just start small and grow from there when you’re doing anything new. I’ve leaned on Naomi a ton and other people that are in similar positions. I think that’s super important. Reach out to people who have similar mindsets that you can learn from and grow from, and then put your own twist on things and be inspired by other professionals. I would say that in a role like mine, it was really important to capitalize on teachers and students who were already ready to try new things and get on the STEM bandwagon and share the strengths and the successes that we’ve had to inspire other people to take those risks and try new things as well. That’s how it’s spread at my school. That would be my advice in a similar position. But with anything, it’s a big change or something new. I think that it’s important to start with the positive, and then it will spread like wildfire.


Naomi Meredith  24:37

Oh, I think so. I mean, you’re doing a great job. As I said, your principal wants to keep you and does everything she can to keep you around. So I know that you’re doing a great job, and as I said, I love seeing the pictures and videos you send me or text me. We always text all sorts of that stuff, but I love the STEM stuff especially because it’s just so exciting to see what you’re doing. You have a really cool role. So I think your advice is really good for people because it can be like, I don’t know, some teachers might not like to be told what to do, but you’re not someone who tells people what to do. You’re very good at collaborating and meeting them where they’re at. So I think you’re the perfect person for the role with your growth mindset and willingness to try new things all the time. So yeah, great advice. So if teachers wanted to connect with you, what would be the best way they could reach out if they have any questions? 


Becca McMillan  24:42

They can reach out to me on Instagram at beccaroniandcheese22. I’m happy to get any emails. You are welcome to email me. Yeah, I’m happy to connect.


Naomi Meredith  25:44

Perfect. Well, I’m sure you’ll be hearing from some people. I know they got a lot of good ideas from the lessons you talked about. I’ll grab some pictures from you, too, especially those hummingbirds. Those are super cool. Yeah. But thank you so much again for take two. It all worked out. I would have never known this is a second time. But I appreciate your time. I’ll have to have you come back and talk about some other things. I know there’s something else I want to ask you about in another episode.


Becca McMillan  26:10

That’d be great!


Naomi Meredith  26:13

Yes, please. Perfect. Well, thanks again, Becca.


Becca McMillan  26:16

Thank you for having me!

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

best STEM toys 2022

Best STEM Toys 2022 for Your Classroom [ep.39]

Best STEM Toys 2022 for Your Classroom [ep.39]

best STEM toys 2022

Check out the full episode on Best STEM Toys 2022 for Your Classroom:  

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Episode Summary

The holidays are creeping in, and it’s a great time to look for deals to purchase new items for your STEM space or even start creating your wish list of must-have items.

In this episode, I share five of the best STEM toys in 2022 for your classroom.

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • Sphero Indi
  • Items to improve video and audio production
  • Osmo Genius Kit
  • Lego Education Spike Essential Kit
  • 3D Printer

Resources Mentioned:

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

The holidays are creeping in, and it’s a great time to look for deals to purchase new items for your STEM space, or even start creating your wish list of must-have items. In this episode, I’ll be sharing with you five of the best STEM toys in 2022 for your classroom. 


Naomi Meredith  00:49

Before we jump into all of these goodies, I have put together an extensive holiday shopping guide for 2022 that you can download for free and created some special Black Friday deals for you to check out and up your game and your STEM classroom. You can grab all of this at Naomimeredith.com/black-friday-22. Now the products that I am going to be sharing with you in this episode, I am not currently sponsored by any of these companies. But if you would like to, you can definitely hit me up. My contact information is below. But these are just some things that I have definitely seen success with students in my classroom or in other classrooms that you definitely want to get your hands on. So let’s jump right in. 


Naomi Meredith  01:35

In no particular order, the first STEM toy to check out is the Sphero Indi. Now, most of us are familiar with the Sphero robot that is shaped like a ball, rolls around like a ball, and is coded. Well, Sphero has come out with a product that is fairly recent that is better suited for K through three. It is chunky and durable, which we love as STEM teachers because we know when we see a lot of kids, we want things that are going to withstand a lot of hands. This one is really cool. Think about it like the Ozobots, which are those really tiny robots that read colors to create actions. It’s similar in the sense that this robot looks like a little car. There are colored cards that, when the Sphero Indi drives on top of the colors, will perform the action, the colors can go in next to each other, or they can be spaced out. Then students can problem-solve to see where the Sphero Indi is going to go based on the color that it read. Now it seems simple, but as I said, it does take a lot of problem-solving. Even your third graders might have a hard time with this at first. The cool thing about it is that it is geared towards the primary. So this is another great robot that you can add to your collection. They have different options for you to purchase these robots. They have class sets that you can buy individually. My recommendation always for robots is to start with four to six, you do not need a class set, the whole goal is to have students collaborate, and we all know that we’re on a tight budget. So if you can even have a station rotation that students can go to test out the Sphero and that would be an excellent start. 


Naomi Meredith  03:20

The next best STEM toys for 2022 are a collection of items that I love to use with students to improve their video and audio production. When I first got started with video production with my students, I only used iPads in my classroom, which is an excellent start. But if you keep doing some videoing with your students, they’re going to want to up their game, and you are, too, as a teacher. So these are some tools that I love to use in my classroom. Again, they’re very versatile from K through five, so you will get a lot of use of them. And these tools that I’m going to mention aren’t very expensive in terms of STEM tools. First are portable green screens. There are a lot of different options for these, the ones that I have really loved kind of look like a tripod where they pop up, and they have a long bar at the top, and then it comes with a big thick piece of fabric that is green on one side blue on the other, and you can clip on the side that you would like students to use. It is the perfect color green and the perfect colored blue. And it is so nice to set these up wherever you want students to record. We know it’s a little bit hard to find a quiet space so it’s nice you could spread kids out in the hallways or other areas in the building, but then you can clean them up and easily store them when not in use. Likewise, I like to use pop-up tripods in my classroom. Again, these are portable, easy to set up, and broken down if needed. I actually keep mine up all the time on the tripods because I do a weekly school-wide news that is pre-recorded. It really helps the improvement of students’ video production because the camera is steady and not shaking around and making you feel like you’re on a roller coaster. When you watch, I highly recommend if you have any tablets in your classroom and you’re hoping to do video production, having tripods are an absolute game changer. Now we also know the sound quality can be a little bit iffy. And I realized the other day that, again, finding a quiet spot to record is very difficult to do in a school. When I moved kids around with the tripods and the green screens, I wanted to have the option of their sound to be even better. So I tested out these tiny microphones. And I mean tiny, they’re about the size of your thumb. And you would think, Oh, that’s just gimmicky. They don’t work. No, they’re actually really, really good. And the cord is really long, which is helpful because when you have the tripod a bit of ways, then the student can still hold the microphone. And the sound quality is superb. I was super impressed. And I was so excited because I could hear their sweet little voices. And I just know that our videos are going to improve immensely. I’m also going to be using these when I’m doing podcasting with my fifth graders again, it will improve the sound quality a lot. This is a side bonus when it comes to video and audio production. If you have any of those fabric cubes on hand, those big giant ones from Ikea that pop up, I like to lay those on their side. And when students are recording their voices for a video when it’s not showing on their screen, I have them put their heads in the box with the script. And then they have the microphone, and it creates a little sound booth for them where their voice is echoing out. And it’s really soaking in that sound inside of the box. It looks a little bit awkward, but it helps a ton. So that’s just a little side tip, go ahead and invest in a few. But really investing in these video and audio tools, they definitely can be reused so much and really improve the quality of these things that you’re creating with your students. 


Naomi Meredith  07:11

The third STEM toy of 2022 to try in your classroom are Osmo Genius Kit. I am so impressed by Osmo. And this is a tool I recommend to families all the time who have primary students, they are such a cool tool. And it creates this Augmented Reality experience where it is a self-checking app where students are using real-life objects and the Osmo. This little attachment, it’s like a mirror that is reading what is being done with these little hands-on tools. And when they’re in the app, it will self-correct and then read what they are doing with their hands. It is so amazing. And the kids aren’t really staring at the screen, they’re really focused on the materials in front of them. There are a ton of different Osmo kits to choose from. Just make sure that when you are purchasing, if you have Kindles, you can buy the Kindle Osmo. And when you have iPads, there’s an iPad Osmo. They are different, they’re not interchangeable. Pretty sure they have the same kits for both, you just have to make sure you buy the right one for your device. The kit that I have is the genius kit, which includes a number of tiles that students can add using the actual numeric form or the Dot version, there is a tangrams game. And then there’s also a spelling game, which I still do in STEM, I think it’s super important to have literacy within your STEM instruction. I have those three options. I use this as a STEM station, I have about five or six Osmos. And I love to use this with my primary students. It’s super engaging, it differentiates itself. And again, it’s self-checking, again worth your investment. The little tiles and pieces are super user-friendly. They’re fairly durable, and they come in some nice containers as well. When you’re done using them, you can keep it all organized, I highly recommend checking out the cosmos, I know that there’s a kit that has some hands-on coding. So if you need some more coding elements, that would be a great addition to your space. 


Naomi Meredith  09:13

The fourth best STEM toy in 2022 to try in your classroom is the LEGO education spike essential kit. There are a couple of different versions of the spike. So there’s spike prime and their spike essential I have this spike essential K I have a few of these kids, and I am utterly impressed and obsessed. If you love LEGO, we do point out you’re gonna love the LEGO spike essentials even more. They’re even more versatile than the LEGO we do to point out I’m not getting rid of those kids. I just like having a variety for all grade levels, so I try to build up my LEGO education kits every year. That’s usually what I spend most of my budget on, to be honest. So these kits are really cool. There are so many challenges for Are first through fifth grade, they’re completely different that use the same kit. That is pretty amazing. There are not a whole lot of tools out there like that. And so I highly recommend getting your hands on some of these because you’re going to be super impressed. Like LEGO, we do point out there are coding elements, there is the option of picture-based block coding for the younger students like LEGO we do to point out, but for the older students, they have something like Blockly or Scratch where they have the words and more complicated coding for their level. So it’s super cool. And the little hubs that are connected don’t use batteries, they are rechargeable, like a cell phone. So I know that it can be really frustrating when you buy STEM toys when the tools aren’t rechargeable. These are, and it’s amazing. I am so excited to keep trying these with my students because they have so much potential. And the parts are a bit different. They’re usually LEGO parts that kids don’t often see in their own LEGO kits. This is a really great addition to your classroom if you’re looking to buy more LEGO kits for your room. 


Naomi Meredith  11:07

And finally, the fifth best STEM tool to try and 2022, if you can swing it, is to invest in this pair of 3D printers. There’s so much talk about 3D printers and what to buy, there are so many complicated options. I’ve seen teachers on Instagram who have received 3D printers, and they have to build the 3D printer. Girl, I don’t have time for that I can figure it out. But I’m all about like, let’s open the box and be ready to go. I researched and found this pair of printers, I actually received them a week before the shutdown in the spring of 2020. So I was able to take the 3d printers home and play around with them. And I was actually printing some projects that kids were completing with me online. But I love these printers that I got. The brand is MakerBot, which you may or may not have an opinion about that. But I love this. It’s the MakerBot sketch classroom. And I am not kidding you. You get two printers for under $2,000. But on top of the two printers that are plugging go, you get six ginormous spools of filament that will last you forever, I have so much filament left, I haven’t really had to buy any since then you get six giant rolls you’ve also got a teacher training, which is so helpful because we don’t always get that when it comes to STEM tools. And there’s student training. So if you’re thinking about having an after-school club, they can go through this as an after-school club and learn with you. So that would be a really cool club to do. What I love love love about these printers is they are cloud-based, you do not have to set up a device and have it chillin by your printer while it reads the prints. You don’t even have to plug in a USB drive, you can have the option to send it all through the cloud-based system. So I can literally sit at home and log into Tinkercad. So Tinkercad is what students would create their 3d prints in, I download the prints at home if I wanted to. And then put it into the MakerBot platform, the cloud-based printing, and I get all of my prints queued up and ready to go. And then, when I log into my work computer, everything is there, and I can print and feed everything throughout the day. I have print 1000s and 1000s of prints for my students. And I have not had one single jam are any issues whatsoever. I am very picky about the filament I am still using their MakerBot brand filament. I haven’t bought any other off brands off Amazon. I’m really iffy about that. But I’m telling you, I print things for K through five every single student creates a project, and I have been absolutely impressed. They aren’t anything fancy. So I’m not doing overly complicated projects before in elementary space. They are wonderful. They are quiet. They’re these cute little clear boxes like you can see everything that’s happening. And so, coming from someone who had zero experience when it comes to 3d printing, I am super impressed. They should literally sponsor me for this because if you’re not going to buy the 3d printers after listening to this, I don’t know what you’re gonna do. But I recommend these to everybody who’s looking to upgrade the 3d printers. They are so so so so easy. Perfect for elementary, I’m telling you, so good. 


Naomi Meredith  14:35

As a recap, here are my recommendations for the best STEM toys of 2022 that you should definitely get for your classroom or just put on your wish list. We have the Sphero indie robot Osmose all the awesome video recording tools, LEGO education spike Essentials Kit, and the MakerBot sketch classroom 3d printer combo When it comes to shopping for items, I am all about how I can use things for multiple grades for multiple years and things that will age out super quickly. I am very, very picky when it comes to the things that I buy from a classroom, and I’m all about durability. You can even go back and listen to a past episode, I have a whole episode about purchasing things for your classroom. But I have seen great success with these tools. And I know you well, too. Now don’t forget I have that free holiday shopping guide I put together for you like a beautiful magazine side. Now I always wanted to work for a magazine company when I grew up, aside from being a teacher. So when I’m creating things for you guys, that’s just like the magazine editor and me, the creator, that I just love doing this. So make sure you go and check out that free guide and all of the special Black Friday deals that have going on for you. They’ve been going on, and they’ve been open up and early, but you definitely want to check those out, so you don’t miss out. So make sure to grab that free guide and all of the awesome deals at Naomi meredith.com/black-Friday-2022

 

best STEM toys 2022

best STEM toys 2022

best STEM toys 2022

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More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!

hour of code ideas

Hour of Code Ideas for Elementary STEM [ep.38]

Hour of Code Ideas for Elementary STEM [ep.38]

hour of code ideas

Check out the full episode on Hour of Code Ideas for Elementary STEM:  

 

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Episode Summary

Are you looking for Hour of Code ideas for elementary STEM?

There is an abundance of free resources available, but it can be overwhelming navigating them all and finding what will work best for your classroom.

In today’s episode, I break down how to navigate Hour of Code resources for K through five, review devices you can use and options for unplugged coding, and provide instructions on how you can set up the Hour of Code in your classroom. 

 

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • How to navigate the Hour of Code resource
  • Examples of device-based coding and unplugged coding and how to implement each
  • Tips for structuring your time with station rotations, whole group exploration, or a mixture of both
  • How to utilize extra resources on the Hour of Code

Resources Mentioned:

Some items are linked to my Amazon Affiliate account. When you purchase through my link, there is no added cost to you, but I receive a small commission in return.

Episode Transcript: 

Naomi Meredith  00:00

Looking for Hour of Code ideas for elementary STEM? While there is an abundance of free resources out there, it can be overwhelming navigating them all and finding what will work best for your classroom. In this episode, I will break down how to navigate the resources for K through five, what devices you can use or not use, and instructions on how you can set up the Hour of Code in your classroom. 


Naomi Meredith  00:55

Before we jump right into this episode, I have created a freebie for you to help capture all the learning that you’re going to have throughout this episode, and all of the resources and how to get that all organized for K through five STEM. So you can download that free resource at Naomimeredith.com/tpthourofcode. This will also be linked in the show notes, so you don’t have to memorize this. I love the Hour of Code. This is an excellent unit to implement into your K through five STEM classroom. Or, if you are a classroom teacher who’s interested in STEM, you can definitely jump right in because most of the resources I’m going to be talking about are absolutely free. To get me in the mood for this episode, I am wearing my create with code shirt that I got from Target a little while back. So it’s super fun. You all know by now I love a good theme. So, of course, I have a coding shirt or two in my closet that I pulled out during this time. I will say that the Hour of Code is one of the few units that I actually don’t write or create everything from scratch. This is because there are so many great resources out there that I personally know I don’t have as much experience as the people who are creating them. And it’s always changing. I want to make sure that my students are exposed to these materials. That is why I have that free guide for you that helps you sift through all that information. But again, these are things that I’m not always creating from scratch because there are so many coding languages out there, even for kids. I want to make sure, again, that kids have access to those. 


Naomi Meredith  02:32

Now, if you have never heard of the Hour of Code, that is okay. I am so glad that you are here! The Hour of Code started in 2013, and it was a way to get kids exposed to the world of coding at a young age. It was initially to be an hour in your school and to get kids pumped up and excited about computer science. It is also hosted in conjunction with computer science week, which they have its own website as well. The official Computer Science Week for 2022 is from December 5 through the 11th. and the Hour of Code is usually hosted around this time. But you can do coding at any time of the year. So don’t feel like you have to do it this week. The first time that I was exposed to the Hour of Code was in 2013, my first year teaching third grade as a classroom teacher. I remember it was just so amazing seeing my students code the Angry Birds to get the little piggies. I had never seen anything like this, and this was my first real exposure as a teacher to seeing children coding. In hindsight, this could have been one of the many sparks that I had to get me into K through five STEM now. But at the time, I thought it was so amazing, and I still think that it’s amazing to see kids being able to write a language using blocks to control what is happening on the screen. This was way more problem-solving than just clicking arrows and playing a video game passively. The students were collaborating and problem-solving. I loved the excitement that they had when they completed each of these challenges. 


Naomi Meredith  04:13

If you haven’t done the Hour of Code, either, you’re gonna see the same excitement in your students. It is just so much fun. Because there are so many different options out there where students can explore again, a lot of different coding languages that work best for their grade level. At the time, my students, they had the Hour of Code as an actual hour where we went into our computer lab, and they got to play around with the different coding languages that were available at the time. So you could still do this as a school-wide promotion. You could do this as a week-long STEM unit. You could start it in your STEM classroom and then keep promoting it within the classrooms or at home. There are so many different possibilities. So don’t feel like you have to limit yourself to one hour or one unit. There are just so many different ways that you can do coding and the Hour of Code throughout the year. 


Naomi Meredith  05:03

So first, let’s talk about navigating the Hour of Code website. This is going to be your hub for finding the different coding activities that will work best for your classroom. As I said, this can be overwhelming at first, and over the years, they have been making the navigation of the website so much easier. The first thing you’re going to want to do is to sign up to host your Hour of Code event. This is absolutely free. I feel like this is a way for them to keep track of how many kids are participating. They will also send you some free resources or things to get you excited leading up to the official Hour of Code week. So make sure you sign up, put in a little bit of information, and then you are on your way to navigating the Hour of Code website. You’re going to see that there are different types of coding activities that are organized by grade level, which are the main types of navigation. Over on this side, you can get even more specific with the types of coding activities you would like to have your students exposed to. Some of these categories that are listed are the types of devices that you have. There’s even an option if you have slow internet. You could filter out the activities that would work best for that on the devices. If you’re an iPad-only school or vice versa, a laptop-only school, you can click on that filter, and then you can search through the activities that way. If you don’t have access to devices at all, which we’re going to talk about this in a bit, or you would like to have a station that is screen-free or unplugged coding, you can search for those options. 


Naomi Meredith  06:41

But it gets even better with these filters. You can filter by the length of the lesson if you do want it to last an hour or if you do want it to last for over a week. You can search through the different accessibility options. Play around with those filters. As I said, it can be overwhelming at first. I actually don’t have students jump right into the Hour of Code website because they can get lost pretty easily. As a teacher, you want to pick through and play around with the things you think will work best developmentally. Then you can make a simple one-page choice board. I like to make mine in Google slides that are view only. Then there are clickable links for the students. Or you could just send the links along to students in whatever LMS system you like to use or even create QR codes that the kids can scan. Definitely try to play around with the devices that you have, and see what is going to work and not work. Then you can go from there. I like to share the website, the Hour of Code website, with students after we completed the unit, so they can play around and explore at home. But I always want them to jump right in and get to the task at hand. So that’s why creating those very specific links for students is helpful. This helps prevent decision fatigue. Then you know that those specific links are going to use on the devices or, if you’re not doing devices, the materials that you have students to use. 


Naomi Meredith  08:08

At the very top of the Hour of Code website, there’s also a promote tab, so play around with that. There are some posters that you can print that have some diverse and even some famous people on there. My fiance’s favorite is the Shakira poster. He loves Shakira. So he likes that Hour of Code posters on there. But there are some really cool posters and handouts that you can print and send home with families or teachers. There are some email templates, there’s even a sticker template that you can print out, and students can proudly wear a sticker saying that they participated in the Hour of Code. There are also some really awesome videos that you can show your students where they are talking about the Hour of Code and the importance of coding. Again, some famous faces are in a lot of these videos. These are really awesome resources to check out and really dive in to get kids excited about computer science and coding. I mentioned this a little bit ago, but you have the option when you’re doing any type of coding with kids, you can have device-based coding, which is what most of us are accustomed to when students are coding on the computer. Or you can do coding unplugged. Both have a lot of value. Even if your students have experience with computer coding, having the ability to code unplugged and being able to problem solve in that way can be very valuable. In fact, you are really working on computational thinking and having students be able to really think through those problems. They might not always have that instant gratification from what is on the screen, but it’s going to help them slow down and really think through if the information that they are moving or writing down is correct. You can even pair unplugged coding with device-based coding and have students write down some of the things that they’re hoping to do in the program, and then they can apply it to their learning. 


Naomi Meredith  10:08

Here are some of my favorite coding unplugged activities that can work for a variety of grade levels. One really fun one is to do binary beads. I’m pretty sure Hour of Code has a lesson related to this. You teach students about binary code, the language that computers use to talk with the zeros and the ones. Then there is a binary code alphabet. Students can have little pony beads, different colored beads to represent the different codes and the binary code chart, and then spell their name or a word that resonates with them. This is a really great one. Then students have a physical takeaway from the actual project.


Naomi Meredith  12:24

Another fun one that I did when I was teaching third grade for computer science training is we did cup coding. With this activity, there are different pictures of combinations of cups that are stacked in a lot of different combinations. The goal of this is you have a programmer, and then you have the robot. So the goal of the programmer is to write the code out using the language of this cup coding program. So up means to hold up the cup one cup length to a turn would be flipping the cup over at 90 degrees. A down would be putting the cup down at a cup length and so on. There’s a cup coding language for this activity. As the programmer, you are writing the code that will match the picture of what the robot needs to complete, then the robot has to read your code with the arrows and the turns. And hopefully, they are able to complete the picture without seeing the picture and only reading the code. Again, this is a great computational thinking lesson and a great problem solving challenge. 


Naomi Meredith  13:36

Another one that is very similar and really popular with younger students is to do human-robot coding. You can have different cards that have arrows that have different meanings, forwards and backward. You can add in a jump, or a spin, whatever you would like. I have this all created for you in my TPT shop. Again, you have a programmer and a robot, and the programmer writes the code using the cards, and then the human-robot actually has to perform the action. This is so much fun, and the kids like to have control of each other. But it really does get their body moving. It helps those younger students with directional coding and understanding left and right, and forwards and backward, which they can apply to a lot of the computer-based programs or even when you do robotic coding. 


Naomi Meredith  14:24

Another coding unplugged option that I like to do is having a paper grid or even a digital grid. There are different markers in the grid that students need to collect using a code. They can write down the code again using arrows, or you can have your own coding language written out, like block-based coding. Block-based coding is when you see the blocks with the words written inside, and then you drag the blocks over. Usually, read it from the top to the bottom, and the robot or the program will read it from top to bottom with those different blocks. So this is like the in-between of more complicated typing programs. Anyway, with this coding unplugged option, students can write the code using arrows, or they can write using their own language of block-based coding to collect the different tasks on the paper. Again, I have a lesson created for this already, it’s all about donuts. There is a lot of fun and different challenges within this that are all completely device free. You can have students complete it together. There’s even a fun one where students have to complete it like battleship. So that is a goodie, but an oldie, and it’s fun. It’s all donut themed. 


Naomi Meredith  15:33

When thinking about adding other devices to your Hour of Code time, a fun tool that you might have in your classroom, or you can invest in Makey Makey. These are really cool because they connect to the very popular program, scratch, and students can explore conductive and not conductive materials. Basically, how the Makey Makey works is you have different clamps with wired connections that go into this hub, and the hub is connected to the computer. On the computer, you have the coding program, Scratch, open, and then you play around with the Makey Makey options. Then you can connect the clamps that are connected to that hub to different things that are conductive. When those conductive things are touched, then it will trigger the code that is written for that actual connection. It sounds like a lot, but very simple when you see it in real life. Trust me, I saw something very similar in real life, and the STEM teacher in me got really excited. One year I went to Meow Wolf in New Mexico, and they have a part of the exhibit where it’s this big mammoth with ribs showing. When you touch the ribs, it makes a sound. Well, in my mind, I knew exactly what was happening when it came to the coding and the connections because of the Makey Makey. It’s like the raw version of it. So Hour of Code is a great time to implement those physical materials as well. 


Naomi Meredith  17:05

Another thing that is really fun to teach students during the Hour of Code is the difference between hardware and software, especially for those younger students, but older students will benefit too. Younger students really like to understand the difference between the two because there is a difference. With my younger students, I have created a paper tablet where they get to color and add in the different apps, the software. Then when they open up the tablet, there are different pieces of hardware, which is a very basic version. I knew that they would love it. They were literally obsessed with having their own paper tablet and just wanted to play with them. Definitely recommend a lesson like that talking about computer hardware and software because that’s also valuable when it comes to coding and understanding how our computers work in our world. 


Naomi Meredith  17:51

When it comes to structuring your time, I mentioned some different options of how you can get your school involved or even classroom teachers, or you might even be the classroom teacher who’s getting involved. When I first did our code, I had students three days a week. So I did station rotations and had a lot of different options when it came to coding unplugged and different websites that were appropriate for their grade level that I navigated from the Hour of Code website. Now I have students for five days. So again, I still like to implement those coding unplugged choices. But I also have the option where students are exploring different coding languages. They can try those out. I like to give them a variety, whether it is block-based coding or it is coding by typing or coding with arrows. I like to give them that choice and see what languages that they’re really connecting with. I also like to start off my lessons, whether it’s the station rotations or it is with whole group instruction, with different videos that are related to coding, which I’m going to talk about in a second because it’s good for students to hear the explanation where I’m at. I’m not the ultimate expert when it comes to coding. I am a great facilitator when it comes to elementary STEM coding, but by no means am I an expert on this. I realize that not all students are going to be computer programmers, but you never know who’s going to be. So I always want to expose kids to a lot of different things in general when it comes to my STEM class. So this is a really great time to do that. 


Naomi Meredith  19:23

Me personally, I do robotics as a whole separate unit. I don’t really do a whole lot of robotics during my Hour of Code unit because I want to dive deeper when it comes to robotics. So for me, I like to start with Hour of Code. I do typically teach this around December or January. Then my unit immediately after is my separate robotics unit. That way, students have a background when it comes to different coding languages. Then they can really play around with those languages when it comes to the robots that we’re using and see the output of what the robot’s task is going to be. That is a personal preference. But what has worked well in my STEM classroom, it’s definitely up to you. I know people also like to implement robots in their Hour of Code. So do what works best for you and the time that you have with the kids. As I said, in this Hour of Code unit, I don’t create a whole lot for it because there are so many great things out there. This even includes a ton of video resources that I love to show my students when it comes to computer science and coding, BrainPOP and BrainPOP Jr have a lot of great videos. They have added a lot more over the years. When it comes to learning about computational thinking, different ways to code, such as looping, or even parts of a computer and coding in general, definitely check those out. 


Naomi Meredith  20:44

In the free guide, I even break up which videos I like to use with each grade level so you’re not always repeating the same ones. You also know that I am a huge fan of SciShow Kids, which I talked about back in episode 17, where it’s all of those different resources I like to use for imagining. SciShow Kids also has some great videos when it comes to teaching about robots and the parts of a computer. If you want to dive in even deeper when it comes to coding, some of you might even be a technology teacher and not necessarily STEM. Code.org, separate from Hour of Code, has more extensive materials, actual units, and a progression of learning when it comes to coding in your classroom. This is also great to look into if you’re thinking about a different after-school opportunity. You don’t need to go and create anything because there are so many things on there that you can just plug and play, especially for those kids who really are getting obsessed with coding. Again, another great after-school activity with very minimal prep. One of my favorites for after-school activities is the Google CS first curriculum. There is a whole theme and a different challenge that they have to create. They’re always improving this curriculum and really making it self-guided, and kids can access the information at home. So definitely recommend checking out that resource. 


Naomi Meredith  22:03

As a recap, there is so much to do for Hour of code, but it is such a fun unit to implement. It should be your least stressful unit out of your entire year because most of it’s already done for you. You just have to go in, explore and check out the free guide that I have for you because that’s going to help you really wrap your head around all the different things that you can do during this time. We first talked about navigating that Hour of Code resource. So definitely play around with those filters that can help you with your experience. Then we talked about how you can have a mixture of device-based coding and coding unplugged or unplugged coding. Then also think about structuring your time if you want to do station rotations, a whole group exploring, or a mixture of both. Then really utilize those extra resources out there, especially when it comes to videos, where you can see coding that is relevant in their real lives. Again, make sure to check out the Hour of Code freebie that I have created for you to help you organize your time with your students. This will be linked in the show notes, and you can also grab it at Naomimeredith.com/tpthourofcode.

 

hour of code ideas

hour of code ideas

Related Episodes/Blog Posts:

 

Connect with Naomi Meredith:

 

More About your host, Naomi Meredith

Naomi Meredith is a former classroom teacher turned current K-5 STEM teacher and coach. Her role not only includes teaching over 500 students in her school, but also leading professional development and co-teaching with teachers to help them integrate STEM & Technology.

With over a decade of experience along with a M.Ed. in STEM Leadership and STEM certificate, she helps teachers navigate the best practices, strategies and tools out there.

She truly believes that any teacher out there can learn how to use STEM & Technology in their classrooms effectively. She can’t wait to connect with you and be your guide!

More About The Elementary STEM Coach Podcast

Are you tired of scrolling online for your next great STEM lesson? Do you feel like there is no time to plan, research and test meaningful STEM lessons, so you throw together a hands-on activity and hope that it works? What systems and routines should you set in place to help students be creative, critically think, and collaborate? 

The Elementary STEM Coach is a podcast for K-5 STEM teachers, classroom teachers, GT specialists, and homeschool parents looking for actionable STEM solutions. Each week, Naomi Meredith will share tools, resources and lesson ideas that are actionable in your classroom and create highly engaging experiences with your students. You’ll learn systems and routines that will create control in the chaos and that will keep you organized all year long. 

Your mindless scrolling days are over! Your new STEM-best friend is now here in your ear buds!