Middle School STEM – Meet the Teacher Idea

Meet the teacher at my school is a challenge. Students rotate through and spend about five minutes in each classroom.

So, how do you explain what middle school STEM actually is to parents and students in about five minutes?

I wanted it to be more than STEM is science, technology, engineering, math, because STEM IS more than that! I wanted to give a taste of my classroom philosophy:

• STEM is about thinking.
• Students will build and make things.
• Failure is part of the process.
• There isn’t always one right answer.
• Students will be expected to question, adapt, persist, and collaborate.

I decided on four stations. I created stations based on materials I thought were immediately understandable. Basically, I wanted students to pick up items and start exploring.

I paired each with a poster that highlighted a STEM skill related to the station.

Overall, I wanted the environment itself to invite students to think and act.

This is the perfect time to pull out those fun classroom items you don’t normally get to use because you only have one. You don’t have to use the same materials as me (it’s a very flexible system), but here is what I used:

Uzzle Game → problem solving

• I didn’t have students play by game rules, they simply tried to recreate the pattern on the card laid out.
• I didn’t like that one of my groups mixed up all the pieces. Hey now. They were being creative and having fun, so I really can’t fault them. There are numbers 1-5 on each puzzle set. If you don’t know that, it’s easy to mix them up.

Microscopes (I have two handheld microscopes , but I’d buy a Carson if I had a choice) and Insect Specimens → noticing/investigation

Marble run → systems/design

• The Marble run is new to my classroom and I’m not sure if I’m going to leave it up on my whiteboard. I didn’t like that the marble kept dropping, so long term I will need a solution to this (any ideas?).

Impossible Scramble Squares puzzle → computational/spatial thinking

Each of the “STEM thinkers” skill posters are linked below:

• Canva Link for Station Posters
• Downloadable PDF for Station Posters

Of course, tours get behind and some groups stayed 2 minutes, while others stayed 10 minutes. This setup accommodated both time frames.

I really liked it and more importantly, students like it. It wasn’t perfect, but there are just some minor tweaks needed (that dropping marble!). Even though it was just a small experience, I liked that my students got to have an experience in my classroom in line with what they will actually do.