Childersburg Elementary School

Our STEAM Journey

The journey of establishing Childersburg Elementary as a STEAM school has been a rewarding adventure. In 2017, we began our process by launching our Problem-Based Learning planning initiative. Our administration set aside time for educators to meet as a school and grade-level groups to plan a cross-curricular PBL lesson. During the 2018-2019 school year, we were deeply involved in a few endeavors. First, we wanted to create an encouraging and supportive environment in which our students could build their STEAM identities. We began to immerse students in the vocabulary and processes of STEAM by creating a school-wide version of the engineering design process and hanging signs and posters throughout our school. As the year progressed, we created STEAM bulletin boards to display student products, achievements, and data. We created a fun song to sing each day during morning announcements to help students recall the EDP process. To further promote positive STEAM identities, we began to create displays of photos of our students participating in STEAM activities. Our library transformed into The Libratory. A portion of our Libratory was devoted to housing some of our STEAM devices and robotics. These areas would become valuable resources to our school. Our school began implementing STEAM Tuesdays to encourage teachers and students to "play", take risks, and learn new tech tools and robotics in a no-pressure environment.

The second focus was to plan and provide our teachers with scaffolded support as they became expert STEAM facilitators. Our educators and school leaders participated in many professional development opportunities in the area of STEAM. We began our Dynamic Learning Project coaching to help us incorporate technology in more powerful ways. Our DLP Coach trained teachers on using EDP graphic organizers to focus STEAM activities. As part of our plan, the media specialist, Dynamic Learning Project Coach, and others assisted teachers in the planning and implementation of PBLs and other STEAM activities and co-taught lessons in the classroom.

Additionally, we focused on creating extra-curricular STEAM opportunities for the students and families. We created our STEAM Clubs. The DLP Coach started a Tiger Tech Team that consisted of two students from each second through fourth grade classroom. These students learned a tech tool or robotic application in order to become an expert in their classroom and assist their teacher. They also monitored the devices in their classroom and submitted tech tickets to the DLP Coach requesting troubleshooting or repair. CES also hosted the first Family STEAM Night filled with several STEAM activity stations.

During the summer of the 2019-2020 school year, we conducted our first Summer STEAM Camp for our students. Students had the opportunity to be involved in a variety of STEAM activities. Our faculty also continued their professional development during the summer months in order to plan Project-Based Learning units of study that incorporated both STEAM and computational thinking. As we prepared for the beginning of the school year, we renovated our existing STEAM and Makerspace Labs. The STEAM Lab was designed with our upper elementary students in mind and housed our robotics. The Makerspace Lab was stocked with all of our recycled and craft materials with a design suitable for our younger grades. The STEAM Lab and Makerspace Lab are both utilized by all students at our school and would quickly become an important asset for carrying out PBLs and STEAM activities. As the gradual release continued during the school year, leaders continued to assist teachers with planning, but teachers progressed with independently implementing the lessons in their classrooms. Our teachers were excited as they increased to three to four PBLs that year. Teachers were also able to use our STEAM Lab and Makerspace to aid in successfully carrying out those plans. Teachers became more comfortable and confident with implementing STEAM activities as they continue to receive DLP coaching. The DLP Coach began monthly STEAM meetings with each grade level to revisit PBL plans, create rubrics, gauge effectiveness of activities, and learn new STEAM tools. Teachers were now better equipped with skills to engross our students in the world of STEAM.

We are working hard during this 2020-2021 school year to sustain our work and implementation of STEAM. Our teachers continue to participate in ongoing STEAM professional development in order to strengthen their STEAM skills. Our previous STEAM initiatives continue, but as always we are striving to provide improved STEAM experiences for our students. Since the pandemic began, our teachers have excelled in providing quality instruction for our students. It has been a time of great growth for us in blended learning. CES teachers have proven, now more than ever, that they are not scared of taking risks and utilizing new STEAM tools and platforms for our students. We are working hard to maintain our progress in a year of uncertainty. We are looking forward to all our faculty and students being back together for the 2021-2022 school and beginning the year full STEAM ahead!

Who Are We?

We identify as a STEAM school that is dynamic and constantly evolving our practices in order to provide the best STEAM experiences for our students. We offer authentic, creative, hands-on learning experiences for our students. We are facilitators driven by the idea that our students are part of the teaching process. This identity is solidified through our family of highly qualified and innovative teachers, risk-taking students, and a supportive community. At CES we have the motto, “If you can dream it, you can STEAM it!”.

What Do We Believe?

STEAM is for everyone! STEAM plays such an important role in our students’ futures, both academically and economically. STEAM jobs are the driving force behind our global economy and are essential in remaining competitive in the global marketplace. We also know that participation in STEAM activities leads to increased academic achievement. Our vision is that Childersburg Elementary should provide a nurturing learning environment in Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math to develop students’ skills and ensure that they are well-equipped to succeed in the world around them. Our mission is to prepare students for their future by engaging them in rigorous and relevant coursework while increasing their STEAM and critical thinking skills. We want our students to build a positive STEAM identity and know that they can succeed in the area of STEAM regardless of race, gender, economic status, or geographical location. Our school serves a rural community in which 75% of our students qualify for free or reduced lunch. The ethnicity of our school’s population is comprised of 54% African-American, 41% Caucasian, 3% Hispanic, and 2% Other. We strongly believe in fostering a positive, inclusive STEAM environment that provides quality, authentic experiences for all students.

How do we align ourselves within the Cognia framework?

Over the past few years, Childersburg Elementary has worked hard to create a rigorous research-based curriculum designed to foster the STEAM competencies. As we began, we knew that creating a strong STEAM community would be critical to our success as a STEAM school. We have put several initiatives in place to foster positive STEAM identity among all our students especially our most untapped demographics. These plans continue to grow and expand in reach to ensure that we are providing every student with equitable opportunities. An ingrained practice for our faculty is that of collaborative planning. We set aside protected time to plan within and among grade levels and incorporate tools such as graphic organizers to focus that planning. Additionally, we strive to provide our educators with the strong leadership structures needed to successfully plan and implement STEAM in the classroom. These leadership initiatives systematically provide support to empower our teachers and help develop their STEAM identity as facilitators. Another vital part of our success lies in partnerships outside of school. As our leaders and teachers plan programs and activities, we place an emphasis on seeking out the support of our external stakeholders. This support can take many forms such as, but not limited to, co-teaching, presentations, expert consultations, and providing resources and supplies.

As a school, we know that the ongoing education of our teachers is critical to strengthening STEAM education for our students. Our teachers participate in ongoing professional development in the area of STEAM. We also provide encouragement and information about opportunities outside of school and the district. In providing ongoing education, we strengthen our educators with the tools and confidence they need to carry out rigorous STEAM lessons with their students. We engage our students in authentic learning by creating problem-based learning experiences that require students to ask questions, research, experiment, use technology, and use the engineering design process to carry out these tasks. It’s important to us that our students find value and relevance in what they are learning. As we plan, we use guides such as the Collaborative Project Planning organizer to develop a cohesive unit of instruction. We plan scaffolding for our students with the ultimate goal of achieving self-directed learning. Driving questions are a great way to frame and set a purpose for our activities. As students explore these open-ended questions, they are able to choose their path to their desired outcome as well as access many choices of tools and resources to help them along their path. We work throughout the year to introduce our students to many technology tools and apps that they may choose to use. During the learning activities and projects, teachers provide feedback to students and guide them with carefully crafted questions. When it comes time to create, we have a well-stocked STEAM lab and Makerspace to allow our students equitable access to supplies. We want to ensure that our students have everything they need to make inquiries, analyze information, and create solutions in a collaborative group environment.

We try to structure our lessons and PBLs in a way that reaches across disciplines. We utilize STEAM courses such as Mystery Science as a way to incorporate cross-curricular activities. When planning, we align our activities with content, Digital Literacy and Computer Standards, and engineering standards. As a school, we have made a concentrated effort to plan for and develop the 5 C’s, computational thinking, critical thinking, collaboration, communication, and creativity as well as STEAM practices. The STEAM experiences that we offer to our students are designed to foster the STEAM literacy that is significant to our students’ success in understanding problems and innovating to solve them. We examine our learning experiences to evaluate and improve the effectiveness of each one’s components. We also want our students to participate in self-monitoring. We equip the students with resources such as checklists, rubrics, and learner’s notebooks, so that they can have the opportunity to self-assess and take ownership of their learning. We think it’s important that our students realize that STEAM is more than just an activity to do in the classroom. We have steadily increased our extra-curricular opportunities over the last few years. Whether it’s special in-school activities, after school and summer activities, or at home activities, we want our students to know that STEAM is an all encompassing part of their lives and our modern world.

Because of the important role that STEAM plays in our lives, it’s important that our students are prepared for the next level. We want our students to have a firm understanding of the core concepts and knowledge of the STEAM disciplines. So many of the changes that we have implemented in the last few years have contributed to the development of STEAM skills and cross-cutting competencies in our students. They have had many opportunities to develop and demonstrate their oral and written communications through discussions and presentations.

Continuous Improvement

It’s important for us to evaluate ourselves and our programs to ensure that our school is achieving the desired outcomes. Faculty at CES continue to attend numerous professional development opportunities, both required courses and voluntary sessions. We continue to make time for our teachers to collaborate in order to create the best possible learning experiences for our children. We continue to offer them additional support with assistance from in-house partners such as the STEAM Team, Dynamic Learning Project Coach, Instructional Partner, and Administrator. Monthly grade group data meetings allow us to analyze the collected data to evaluate our effectiveness. Teachers, administration, and district leaders conduct walkthroughs to provide feedback to our teachers in order to improve student learning.

Successes and Challenges

We are proud of our growth and success in becoming a STEAM school. We are proud to have 100% of our faculty and staff dedicated to achieving a strong STEAM environment. Their willingness to complete professional development and be open to looking at curriculum through a new STEAM lens has been an integral part of our success. Teachers have created fun, relevant, and rigorous activities for our students. The STEAM environment, activities, and programs at our school have allowed all our students to begin to build a positive STEAM identity. Students are more engaged and take greater ownership in their work. Students and teachers have become risk-takers and innovators. We are excited to see the increased involvement of our external stakeholders. Parent participation has increased as we have incorporated STEAM presentations and family activities. Students are eager to showcase their hard work and accomplishments.

One of the biggest challenges for us is transportation. A lot of our families have one or no vehicles. This makes it difficult for parents to join us during school and for parents and students to attend after school experiences. Living in a rural area, we also have little to no available internet in certain areas. Sometimes even if the internet is available, families may not have the financial means to purchase it. Due to these internet issues, our students sometimes have a difficult time working with technology at home. It has also been a challenge for our students to learn to effectively self-assess and self-monitor. These can be difficult skills to learn and to use effectively. Although we have provided opportunities, we have been inconsistent with implementation. Moving forward, we would like to be more frequent with embedding self-monitoring and self-assessment opportunities within the learning activities. The same is true for seeking the opinions and feedback of our students and external stakeholders. We plan to offer more frequent opportunities for our stakeholders to let us know what they need and to offer their opinions.

Becoming a STEAM school has been such a rewarding experience for all of us. Our community has been strengthened as we build stronger bonds with our external stakeholders. It has challenged our faculty and students to reach new levels of personal growth. Our students have blossomed with newly found excitement and confidence. Through the STEAM opportunities presented to them, our students have developed the STEAM skills and interpersonal skills that will propel them to greater success in the future.