by Rachel Wells
Who doesn’t love a good theme?! Activities that are themed get children excited about learning, encourage them to work hard, and increase their overall enjoyment and takeaway.
STEM activities are an amazing way to combine Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, while providing children opportunities to focus on real world application, hands on problem solving, and conceptual thinking. Not to mention STEM activities are excellent at keeping children engaged in their learning for an extended period of time.
Whether you are a teacher looking to get your class in the spring spirit, or a parent looking for fun at-home activities this spring break, you definitely don’t want to miss these engaging spring themed STEM activities.
Jelly Bean and Toothpick Towers
Materials: toothpicks, jelly beans, ruler
Challenge: Using only jelly beans and toothpicks, see how tall of a tower you can build.
Questions to ask:
What are the most important parts of your structure?
How tall were you able to make your structure before it was no longer stable?
Rainbow Bridge
Materials: Play Doh, pipe cleaners, paper cups, and gold coins.
Challenge: Using Play Doh and pipe cleaners, create a rainbow that is strong enough to hold a cup of gold coins. Can you make a structure sturdy enough to hold 50 coins? How about 100 coins?
Questions to ask:
How were you able to add strength to your structure?
How many coins was your rainbow able to hold?
Make a birds nest
Materials: Paper towel tubes, construction paper, paper sandwich bags, plastic eggs filled with pennies (for weight)
Challenge: Using cardboard tubes and construction paper, create a tree and nest that is strong enough to hold at least 6 plastic eggs.
Questions to ask:
What surprised you about this challenge?
What about this challenge did you find the most challenging?
What about your design are you most proud of?
Peeps catapult
Materials: Wooden craft sticks, a plastic spoon, rubber bands, marshmallow Peeps, ruler, tape
Challenge: Create a catapult, and measure to see how far it can fling a marshmallow Peep.
Questions to ask:
What are the most important features of your catapult?
What did you notice about the catapults that made the Peeps go the furthest?
Penny rainbows
Materials: Pennies (or other coins will work too)
Challenge: Use pennies to create a rainbow shape.
Questions to ask:
What did you notice when designing your structure?
If your first design didn’t work, how can you find a new way to build it?
What about your design are you most proud of?
