Naomi Meredith [00:00:00]:

The days are getting warmer, and you are finally finishing up the school year. What are some STEM activities that you can do with your students during these warm days? Or maybe you are hosting a summer camp, or maybe you're even looking for something to do with your own children. In this episode, I'm gonna be sharing with you 3 STEM activities that you can do during the summertime. Some of you out there are fortunate enough to have beautiful days all year long. So, really, these activities that I'm going to describe, you can do at any time of year. And you don't necessarily have to be outside, but I will be sharing some outside options for you. So if you do wanna take the learning outdoors, by all means, go for it. I'm not stopping you.

Naomi Meredith [00:01:03]:

I live in Colorado, and the weather is definitely up and down, and unpredictable. We can have very beautiful days, but in an instant, it can change to something else. So like I said, you could do these activities anywhere. The first STEM activity or theme of activities is all about STEM survival camp. STEM survival camp, if you haven't heard about it, is one of my favorite units that I have ever created from scratch, and I actually had it in mind for the outdoors. A little bit of background if you haven't listened to episode 4 where I explain every single challenge and what we do during this experience. I created STEM survival camp as a way to get my kids outdoors during COVID. It was the back to school time, so for me, the weather was really warm and nice, but I wasn't allowed to have my students share all of the supplies.

Naomi Meredith [00:02:02]:

I still wanted them to build and use the engineering design process, but I didn't have enough funds to supply everybody with their own items for their unique projects. So, during the summer, I actually developed this unit where students will use elements from the outdoors and minimal supplies from your Makerspace to solve various challenges that would happen if you were to survive in the outdoors. This is really great because if you're looking for a stem lesson that is camping-themed or you do want to build with those outside items, STEM survival camp is perfect for you. There are 6 unique challenges that go along with different ways that you would survive in the wilderness. I did this based on these challenges from the show alone. A loan does not fund them or anything like that or affiliated, but that's where I got the inspiration. But there are lots of different things that students have to do, like create a fishing pole and catch the fish. I had different fish templates for them.

Naomi Meredith [00:03:11]:

In one grade level, they actually learned how to sew, so they sewed a hiking backpack prototype, and sewing is a survival skill. That actually is a great thing to learn how to do. Funny enough, I learned how to sew at around 4th grade, but I still use that skill, maybe not so much surviving in the wilderness. But I did buy a dress the other day. And there was something like the dress didn't close the way that I wanted to at the top. So I actually sewed the dress while I was wearing it, and I was a little bit nervous I wouldn't be able to take it off. I was able to. I could take it on and off.

Naomi Meredith [00:03:48]:

I'm, like, alright. There we go. There's a survival skill. My cute dress that I was wearing, I fixed it, and it was good to go. But I also have had kids in that unit where they actually learned how to sew with me, and then they were able to sew things in their real lives, like sewing the patches on their boy scouts or girl scouts jackets, which was super exciting. So this is a really fun, exciting unit. You can do a new lesson each day. You can take this throughout the week.

Naomi Meredith [00:04:21]:

You can shorten it. You can lengthen it. It really is a great, great unit to take outdoors. I highly recommend it, and the summertime is a great time to teach it. The second summer STEM activities that you can do are quick one day challenges, and I call them STEM Career Quest Kits. Now, the reason for this name is that a lot of these kits connect with the episodes that I have recorded on my STEM Career Quest podcast or will be recording, and they are in the process of being renamed. So, if you already have these lessons, they're one day challenges. Like, you can complete them within an hour. They are pretty low prep.

Naomi Meredith [00:05:07]:

They might actually be things that you have at home, but I'm transferring the name from what used to be STEM snack packs to STEM career quest kits because a lot of kids and even parents thought that you eat them. I had a whole idea in mind, but it wasn't perceived how I thought. So they're in the process of getting named STEM Career Quest Kits, and currently, they are digital only activities. So I actually created these during the time kind of the same year. It's funny because I actually got really creative during that 2020-2021 year. I had a lot more time to think about things, which, funny enough openly, me working remotely was the same kind of thing. I'm always coming up with more ideas than I ever have before. Anyway, I created 6 different units, so 4 units in each, that had these STEM activities that were centered around the same theme.

Naomi Meredith [00:06:04]:

So at the time, the STEM Career Quest podcast didn't exist, but I did plan these activities with a theme, and I wasn't allowed to do after school club. So, instead, I had these paid take home stem kits. And so you're thinking, okay, but I'm not doing paid take take home stem kits. That's fine. I'm just kinda giving you a background about this, but the actual activities are activities actually I'm teaching currently in my STEM community events. So what's really great is they're one off lessons. So if you are short on time, you only see kids for 1 hour, You have only, like, a 45-minute session with them. You see the whole school.

Naomi Meredith [00:06:48]:

These are really quick and good activities for that. They do have some open-ended creativity. Some are a little bit more guided where they are creating a model, but they might add their own spin onto it. But I really love creating these because it's those quick one day challenges where all of the directions for basic things that you need to know are laid out for you in order. There is a video to give inspiration that needs to show how to do it. There are some extra challenges, the science behind the project, related stem careers, and additional resources to learn about the topic. So this is a growing collection I'm really diving into. As I said, I am beta testing them in the teaching side of things where I already know they work as a kit, but I'm also teaching them now in smaller groups and then hopefully in other ways as well.

Naomi Meredith [00:07:44]:

But these are really great because some of them actually lend themselves to the outdoors. There is a paddle boat challenge where there is water involved and kids can notice the kinetic and potential energy of the rubber band used. There are some other ones that will be popping up that involve water. So, if you do want very specific water challenges, that's really great as well. As I said, these are in the process of getting renamed, but some of the ones that are not in my TPT shop are actually in the STEM Career Quest club. So, every episode has its own listening comprehension guide and paired STEM activity, and they're usually things that I already have that pair well with that lesson. So there are some of these STEM career quest kit challenges that are in the membership already that I don't have anywhere else. Because at the time, again, I was testing these and pushing out this content where, they're not all beautiful and ready to be in my shop yet, but there are some things that I can put in the club.

Naomi Meredith [00:08:49]:

So, if you want exclusive access, make sure to join that. And there are a lot of other fun things as well, including my monthly virtual field trips. This is a bonus sim activity, but there is a virtual field trip with me teaching the lesson all about bugs. So that's a great connection to your outdoor learning. And the 3rd summer STEM activity that you can try is my engineer inspiration boards. Again, these are quick and easy to prep. They are a one pager. You can print in color or in bat black and white, and they are centered around various themes.

Naomi Meredith [00:09:27]:

I have them set up for the whole entire year. So I actually have seen a lot of teachers who purchase all of the themes, and then they put them in as a station. So maybe they always have this one building station, but they change out the inspiration board that they are using. So it's always changing up what the kids are creating, but the kids are used to that format. Some good summer themes that I have on these boards are pool, garden, and camping. I kinda feel like I'm saying, you know, in the Barbie movie, and they ask Ken, what's your job? And he says, beach. I kinda feel like just now, when I said the topics, that's what I was just saying. But, anyway, there are 9 different images that go along with that theme.

Naomi Meredith [00:10:16]:

I don't think the beach is a theme, but the pool is. But they go along with that theme, and then kids can build the items on those boards with anything they have on hand. And this could even be things from the outdoors. So maybe you have these boards printed out and ready to go. You have them in a binder or one of those 3 binder rings, 3-inch binder rings. And you have them on the go, and kids are building what you already have or things from the outdoors. So these are really, really fun. They're great for fast finishers as well.

Naomi Meredith [00:10:49]:

I actually bring these along to my community events, so I have some building materials on hand, some like hashtag blocks and some Lego bricks. And if I have kids who come in early or if they're finishing up fast, I have these as a fast finisher option. It just gives them some good ideas, some talking points to help build something that they see or remind them of something else that they already have thought of and seen before. One thing that I like to do as well, so I told you about the binders, is I also have those cool containers that are all colorful, and then they go in that carrying case or those photo containers, but teachers love them. I love them. I have a couple of them, actually. But I actually will print out the engineer inspiration board smaller and laminate and have the different options in those buckets. So when I actually create them, I create the smaller versions anyway.

Naomi Meredith [00:11:43]:

So when you get access to these boards, you have all those various sizes done for you. Just print the size that you want. This was a quick episode because I know that you are busy and on the go and you are looking for some quick solutions. So, as a quick recap, here are those 3 summer stem activities that you can try. First is the STEM survival camp. Next are those STEM Career Quest kits that are those quick one day challenges. Say that 5 times fast. And then 3rd are those engineer inspiration boards.

Naomi Meredith [00:12:20]:

What are some other cool summer STEM activities you like to try? Let me know. Send me a DM on Instagram at namiemeredith_. Or, if you are watching the video version of this, you can also add a comment below. Thank you so much. Hope you're doing well, and I'll see you in the next episode.