Is your child interested in building, seeing how things grow or how things are made?

 

These STEM activities can be a great addition to your classroom or home curriculum!

 

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Are you intrigued with all the latest gadgets and how they are being created?  How Elon Musk; owner of Tesla Inc. came up with multiple fully electric vehicles and the world’s first fully electric semi-truck?  Ever wonder how a 3-D printer is made?  I know I am curious and downright fascinated by the inventions that have taken over our world in recent years.  Without showing my age, I remember being in high school and the technological innovations that were all the rage were the world wide web, DVD’s, and when the Prius; the first mass-produced hybrid was introduced!! Isn’t that crazy?!

 

 

With everything we do being so technologically based, it is no wonder that STEM is becoming one of the fastest growing educational programs out there.  All the newest advances, all the newest ideas and all the newest breakthroughs are science, engineering and technologically based.

 

 

The importance of STEM

In order to keep up with the technology of the world, it is important to introduce these types of activities, skills, and thinking to children.  STEM has slowly made its way into the mainstream public school system, but has had a place in private schools, Charter Schools and alternative schools around the country.  STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math.  According to the U.S. Department of Education website, the goal of STEM is to provide opportunities for the youth to thrive “where success is driven not only by what you know, but by what you can do with what you know and have the skills and knowledge to solve tough problems, gather & evaluate evidence, and make sense of information”.

 

 

 

 

Children must be exposed to situations in which they can learn, develop and use the skills necessary to compete in our ever changing world.  I have compiled a list of 20 STEM activities that you can incorporate in your classroom or home to give them exposure to these objectives.  The activities are geared for children three years of age and older.  Due to small parts/objects, these activities are not intended for use with children under three years of age.

 

 

20 STEM Activities for home school or classroom use

 

 

1. Exploring Circuitry Light Blocks

 

Explore circuitry and creativity through illuminating open-ended play! Using LED technology, each block lights up when connected to the base or another lit block. A glowing introduction to engineering and STEM.

 

2. Primary Science Color Mixer

 

This activity let’s children learn and experiment with primary colors, and also learn about secondary colors.Let’s mix some color up and experiment!

 

3. Tornado Tube

 

 

Tornado Tube employs hydraulic principles to create the vortex of a tornado within a bottle. Connect 2 empty plastic soft drink bottles together, fill one of the bottles 2/3 full with water, turn it over, spin, and watch the tornado appear.

 

4. Rainforest Cloud Biome Kit

 

Grow your own tropical rainforest in this unique planter! Rain swirls on top of containers help regulate where water falls to maintain the best conditions for your plants to flourish.

 

5. Solar Eco Home

 

Easy build-it-yourself home powered by the sun! Children will learn about solar energy and solar panels or batteries indoor.

 

6. Brilliant Builders

 

Make structures big enough to sit in or as small as a shoe box. This toy construction set challenges your kids to build ​creative designs & aids in social development.

 

7. Blue Sands Alive

A soothing sensory experience! Fun to use in any creative way your kids can think of! Fun for adults too!

 

8. Magnet Building Set

Imaginative open-ended hands-on fun! Use this to build geometric structures, use your creativity to build cool structures

 

9. Measuring Tape

Introduce students to measuring through play. This can be used in a variety of ways to measure all sorts of things! Even each other!

 

 

10. Platform Scale

 

 

See and compare weights and measurements. Easy to read and accurate with metric and standard English display. Scale measures liquids and solids in the removable pan.

 

11. Microscope for kids

 

This is ideal for the little scientist to experience, observe, learn and explore more about biology, bacteriology, histology and drugs.

 

12. STEM Force & Motion Set

 

This STEM toy allows kids to explore the science of “how things go” as you conduct investigations, solve problems, and explore early engineering

 

 

13. Hydroponics Lab

 

View the entire plant, from roots to leaves, throughout the growth process, with this no-soil hydroponics set!

 

14. Botany Lab Experimental Greenhouse

Students learn about plants and seeds by conducting experiments in a specially-designed botanical laboratory with greenhouse domes.

 

15. Snap Circuits

 

Build over 300 different electronics circuit projects with 60+ electronic components

 

16. Classroom Measurement Set

 

Children can practice customary capacities, liquid measurement and metric conversions with this set.

 

17. Smartcar Logic Puzzle

 

Challenge kids to build a car with 5 different blocks in this unique logic game!

 

18. Crystal Growing

This science kit contains all the materials needed to perform seven different crystal growth experiments.

 

19. Code & Go Activity Set

This coding set for kids turns coding into a hands-on analog activity for tactile and visual learners

 

20. Root-Vue Farm

 

Watch carrots, radishes and onions take form before your eyes through a sturdy, styrofoam surround with break-proof acrylic viewing window. Complete instructions plus tested experiments.

 

STEM Related Books

 

1.How Things Work

How Things Work: Inside Out explains cell phones, 3D printers, lava lamps, skyscrapers, and everything in between!

 

2. Science Activity Book

Little scientists will love the BIG ideas in this activity book. They’ll discover more about science at home by reading the simple explanations and doing the beautifully illustrated activities on each page.

 

3. My First Coding Book

 

Hands-on introduction to offline coding and programming

 

4. Build It

Explore the science behind construction, from how zip wires move to how marble runs work, with these hands-on experiments.

 

5. Awesome Science Experiments for Kids

100+ experiments to get young children excited about science.

 

 

What to take from this

These activities and books are meant to be an introduction to STEM education.  Giving children the opportunity to engage in hands on learning is important and imperative to the future of science, technology, engineering, and math.

I hope that you have found a few new activities from this post that you can and will be incorporating into your classroom or home school. Have fun, follow the interests of the child, and let them explore!

 

 

 

Do you and your children have any other STEM activities or books that you’d like to add to the list? Let me know about them in the comments!

 

Happy experimenting and learning!

Anitra J.