Welcome to the Elementary STEM Coach Podcast. I'm your host, Naomi Meredith, a former classroom teacher turned K-5 STEM teacher and coach. With over a decade of experience teaching and a master's degree in STEM leadership, I'm here to coach you throughout the year to help you gain back more time to create innovative experiences for your students.

Today is a very fun episode and if you are watching the YouTube version of this, you might have noticed that my background is a little bit different than normal. We are almost 200 episodes in and there's only been a couple times where my background has changed and this is one of them. I am recording this episode inside my brand new to me mobile STEM trailer or that's what I'm converting it into.

It isn't very acoustically great for podcasting and my camera might be shaking a little bit because I have it on a stand right now connected to one of the counters, but I really wanted to record it in here because I feel like that this is very monumental in my STEM journey as an educator and also what this business has evolved into and how my passion for STEM has kept growing and growing. So with that, I wanted to give you a behind the scenes look at how I got here, why do I have a STEM mobile trailer, and what's going to go from here. So for some of you it might seem actually very random.

It seems very very random, but of course not everything I share on social media. I share quite a bit, but not every single little thing you know that. Ever since January 2020, I was updating my vision board with personal and business goals that I wanted to grow and one of those things was having a mobile STEM classroom and I have a picture of this cute little blue truck I think it's on there.

I didn't really care so much the color, but I wanted something where I could bring STEM to more kids in the community because at that time I was still teaching K-5 STEM. I was right in the middle of that part of my career and I knew how big of an impact, positively big of an impact that STEM has had on my students and I knew that after building that program up for a while, I wanted to expand it in lots of different ways and I still had all the things I was doing in elementary STEM. I'm not, I don't think I quite had the elementary STEM coach podcast yet, but I did have another podcast, but that was something with having a mobile STEM classroom was one of those many things that I really dreamed of having.

Here we are in the first week of November of 2024 at the time of this recording, over four years from when I created that part of my vision board and it's so surreal sitting inside of my trailer of something that I absolutely dreamed of and at this time I've only owned it for one whole week. Little quick thing that I did today, I'm getting better at connecting the trailer. I've only driven it a handful of times right and so I cleaned out the whole trailer today, wiped everything down and then you can see behind me that there's two different colors of white on the counter where I was filling in the holes and the cracks and then painting and then visualizing and measuring of the things that I'm going to add on this first level.

So realistically this trailer for me is moving ready, but of course I love to decorate and add that STEM twist. Okay, so how does a STEM trailer fit into what I am doing? Earlier this year, April 2024, I actually started my own community STEM programs and my side of that business is called STEM Explorers Club. You can check that out at STEMExplorersClub.com. So within that first year of me leaving the classroom, so I left the traditional classroom teaching K-5 STEM at the end of the 2022-2023 school year and I do have a podcast episode about my whole journey in elementary STEM you can go back and listen to, but during that first year out of the classroom I really was exploring a lot of different things within elementary STEM and things that I like and didn't like and still continuing my business and adding on things as well.

And one of the things that I really realized is I still love to teach and actually I did know that. That's actually not why I left the traditional classroom. I love to teach, but I also wanted to do it on my own terms and I did for a little bit partner with a local business and taught some Lego clubs after school and it really made me realize, oh I can actually teach my own programs in the community and bring STEM to kids who may or may not have experienced it.

Again, back to the vision board, it was really bringing that part out of it. So in April of 2024, I started doing teaching in the community and partnered with a local coffee shop which I still do a lot with them and excited how this trailer can fit in with our partnership. So I started teaching some drop-in STEM sessions for kids in my community.

I had a lot of kids from my old school come visit me. Also some kids from my Lego clubs come to my sessions and continue to dabble with that throughout the summer. During the summer I also started reaching out to schools near me that were interested in STEM after school programs and so currently I have three going on four schools that I partner with and each day I go to a different school after school and teach my own curriculum to kids who love to build and create.

So really through all of this, having a mobile STEM classroom wasn't 100% necessary. This is something that I've been building up, building those connections, learning how to create projects for kids who may or may not be familiar with certain types of things in STEM and also projects that can be done really really quick in about 45 minutes because when you really think about the teaching time and then the kids are building and creating and then the cleanup time, it really is 40 to 45 minutes where they start and finish this project. So that is something I am still working on.

Also through that I've also realized that there is so much potential and opportunity when it comes to different events that I could do for STEM such as field trips or partnering with homeschool groups. I have a homeschool group I'm currently working with. There was a trunk retreat that happened in my neighborhood that would have been really cool to be a part of.

All sorts of things that have been brewing in my head where it's really combining the business side of my brain and also the teaching side of my brain into one and having this mobile space, having this mobile trailer is definitely a dream, like literally a dream come true for me because really building up this space is so much fun for me and also thinking about okay how can I connect with different groups and how can I bring this into a lot of different spaces because that is the thing having this space where to have a program like this can be really really tricky and so I can be more mobile like legit a mobile STEM lab that can provide the opportunity. So it's been really fun to visualize it. Okay you also might be wondering how and did you pick this trailer and how did you find it? My original idea and back to that thing on my vision board, I actually had a little bus and if you were following me on Instagram at Naomi Meredith, I actually took a look at a couple of buses so I was looking on Facebook marketplace.

I also remember this is after I created my vision board seeing a teacher create a mobile classroom out of a small bus but it was for preschool and I thought oh I really should get a bus and I was really stuck on the bus like that was what I was really really focused on was to get a small mini bus to be my mobile classroom and that's what I was looking for. So I first was looking at Facebook marketplace and then a couple of local businesses that specialize in small buses and I actually went and saw two in person. The first one was so cute it was hot pink and the inside was all torn out and all flooring it had some shelving much like what I'm sitting in right now and it was used for a mobile boutique so it was super cute in the pictures went inside and all the tires were flat.

Now the paint job was fine actually but all the tires were flat and the whole inside of this bus was just filled with all their junk and they even said oh yeah we haven't ran it for like maybe four years so yeah I was just kind of sad about that like this isn't meant to be. So then I kept looking kept looking and then I found another bus also the full everything was torn out had flooring and went checked it out made a little weekend of it with my teacher honey we went and checked it out it was great for the space so I all I had to do was add furniture but we couldn't even get it to start and it had a lot a lot of miles and so we're like oh like it's already having issues probably shouldn't go along with it. 

So at the same time I saw that second bus I actually saw this trailer and this trailer was used also as a mobile boutique much like that first bus I saw where it was used for selling clothing at farmers markets and other events and I saw this one I'm like ah I don't know I think I want a bus like that way I can just drive it on my own but then after seeing the second bus I went back to the posting of the trailer and I'm like well if I did get a trailer then I don't necessarily have a full other vehicle that I have to manage so thinking about the gas a type of registration riding it these buses actually they're bigger than I thought like they're small but they're actually bigger than I thought and so finally I'm like you know what we are I'm gonna like go look at this trailer so I contacted the owner went and saw the trailer and like I got chills the whole time and this happens to me a lot like like you know when you get that feeling but I got chills I'm like oh my gosh this is perfect for what I'm looking for um same kind of size 

so I'm looking at it right now same kind of size all torn out it has shelving and in the pictures it looked a little bit smaller but when I'm thinking about how kids work and are in here I can do a lot of inside outside work which was what I was planning on doing anyway with the bus but the shelves are actually at kid height so I'm sitting in this video and it's perfect height for kids and definitely is moving ready for me so after some talking and negotiating and trying to figure out all of that finally worked it out and long story short got the trailer which I have never driven one before and luckily my car can tow so that was absolutely perfect that is where we're at so in like I said in those stages of decorating planning we're getting into those winter months which is perfect where I can get this trailer all set up build those connections really think about how I purposely want to use this and also I'm very open to ideas too I'm very much open and willing to try new things and excited to share with you all how it's going in a few months I bought these little gears 

so if you're in the video you can see these gears I bought these little gears that I'm going to paint and hang up in the trailer as a way to honor you and for any part that you want to be in part of this journey whether it is donating materials or if you have donating any funds that will help renovate this space and bring this program to life there are so many things that are to be added to this space to make it innovative and welcoming for kids and would love for you to be a part of it so I will add a link in the show notes for you. 

Any little bit helps that will help build this dream into reality and you can be part of this journey and you will actually be inside this trailer where I'll actually write your name on these gears! 

I'm so excited to share this all with you just a more personal episode but I love doing these personal episodes here and there because it's like documenting what I am doing and I actually go back and listen to these because sometimes they even talk about things that I might end up might end up wanting to do in the future and I end up doing it which is pretty exciting so I'm super excited for you guys to be here thank you for all your support and love all your kind words over on Instagram were so kind thank you so much and excited to check in with you even in six months to see where this mobile STEM trailers at. 

Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of the elementary STEM coach podcast I would love to connect with you over on Instagram at Naomi Meredith underscore or send me an email to elementary STEM coach podcast at gmail.com also make sure to check out my website Naomi Meredith.com to see all the show notes from today's episode and shop my K-5 STEM resources any questions you have needs for resources or ideas for episodes get in touch I'll talk to you soon