STEAM

With the Hummingbird Bit STEAM kits from BirdBrain, students are able to combine robotics, programming, art and design, and the micro:bit into one valuable learning experience. With the micro:bit board powering their robot builds, elementary and middle school students can get super creative with their design while coding and inventing in the classroom or after school.

STEM includes a massive area of content and subjects, making it possible for educational leaders to implement any number of strategies, technology tools, and ideas for creating STEM learning that’s suited for their particular students. And, one of those areas is early childhood STEAM—the relevant, hands-on learning experiences that students can have early in their lives.

For those we select, we create a feature on their project, background, and hopes for enhancing STEAM experiences for students as well as providing new EdTech tools for their classroom. Plus, educators can choose from the hundreds of fun STEM supplies on our store once they’re selected—mixing and matching however they please to meet the $500 target.

This week, for our Rising Resources feature, we explored the Screencastify screen recording platform and how it helps K–12 educators boost student learning. Since it takes only seconds for students to create, edit, and share original videos by using the software to capture the content from their own screens, Screencastify is a legitimate favorite among K–12 digital teachers.

If you’re excited but stressing just a little bit about your plans for including STEM instruction in the classroom this school year or, even potentially, on a district-wide scale, we encourage you to share your ideas with us. We’re happy to set up a consultative call to help us better understand your STEM goals with an eye on how our

Cynthia will combine various STEM and real-world elements through PBL, including teaching kids to research organisms, underwater environments, the importance of ecosystems, and more. Besides this research, students will also read nonfiction books, explore the geography in this environment, and collectively design an oceanic ecosystem mural to cap things off.

Despite its prominent presence in the real world and elements of STEM in so many of today’s most lucrative careers, not every student pursues it. More importantly, many children lose almost all interest in STEM before they even reach middle school. So, in a lot of cases, educators need to reach their students while in elementary school. But, how can

STEM experiences help students in many ways and educators are always finding new ideas for improving them. One of those popular options, of course, is through enrichment programs. The benefits of STEM learning are great but they’re often capped in the classroom, meaning more school leaders are encouraging students to participate in STEM outside of school.

Perhaps for the best, there’s no blueprint for creating a school makerspace but there are some strategies educators can employ that might help to set theirs apart. Whether your makerspace is big, small, stationary, mobile, or full of high- or low-tech tools, these are some of the coolest characteristics that the best makerspaces share—both physical features and attitudes.

As a mobile application or desktop program, Screencast-O-Matic can help make mobile video recording and editing easier on any teacher who likes to customize the content they teach with. Plus, students can get creative with the projects they produce thanks to the simple user experience that makes Screencast-O-Matic a great tech tool in creative education.