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Goal

My goal is to inspire students with STEM activities that not only show science concepts through hands-on inquiry and design, but also builds a foundation of understanding on how STEM concepts like the engineering design process can be utilized in the real world or by combining multiple subject area concepts from their classroom. Students will understand key concepts like elastic energy and how it can be quantified with mathematics in order to make a catapult that can not only launch an object a certain distance, but also protect it from the physical stress of landing. Furthermore, students will investigate the best design for a solar paneled car that has it going the longest recorded distance. Students  

What will be done with my students

Students will have an opportunity to connect science concepts and engineering practices to conceptual knowledge and reasoning skills by having students show ownership of their learning by researching background knowledge and applying it to the engineering design process so that they may achieve a stated goal. This process will be cyclical because as they build a design they will test it, troubleshoot it for future improvements and rebuild it. They will have challenges like collecting the byproduct of carbon dioxide from yeast fermentation in order to eliminate pollution. 

Benefits to my students

These STEM challenges will benefit students because they transition from conceptual understanding of science concepts to the open design of a challenge that has students taking control of their own learning. It isn't achieving success of the challenge, but students understanding the barriers to the challenge and brainstorming HOW to overcome these barriers. This makes the concept more concrete to students because they have taken in the concepts, visualized them, and then conceptualized them in a plan that like the scientific method results in evidence that either supports the idea or contradicts it. These designs would be utilized between 5 periods. 

Budget Narrative

https://www.flinnsci.com/
On the Flinn Scientific website the STEM Design Bundles come with 14 different STEM Design Challenges. The manual comes with 22 activity ideas for the classroom. Included in the price of each is the shipping and handling charges. 

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