WHAT ARE STEAMaker SESSIONS?
Our STEAMaker program is a true gem of Barclay Brook. During these cyclical sessions, students are given various tasks using a variety of media. The core goal of all of these session is the same... DEVELOP GRIT! The library transforms into the "I Can Do It Myself" room and the teachers are LARGELY hands off during STEAMaker times. Help is only given when it is NEEDED. When the students simply WANT help, they are redirected to dig deep and find those self help skills which are the cornerstone of this program. All too often our students give up when a task is hard. They will look to their teachers to "solve the problem" for them instead of working to find the solution on their own. We describe it in terms of building the brain muscle. You've got to lift those heavy weights to get strong :-)
1st Grade
During the 1st STEAMaker Cycle, 1st graders will be practicing problem solving while increasing their perseverance and grit with ThinkRolls. Students will be presented with a series of puzzles which will need to be solved. They will move a character through the course, managing road blocks that arise along the way. This session is designed to show students that "failure" is temporary and to help them struggle through and figure out what to do AFTER they fail!
2nd Grade
In the 1st STEAMaker Cycle, 2nd graders will jump right into rudimentary coding (Blockly Jr.) with Lego Education's Lego WeDo. Here, students are challenged to build and code a replica "space rover". When the prescribed task is complete, students are challenged to see what else they can make their rover do through coding and building ingenuity.