STEAM Friday by Hannah

STEAM Friday

STEAM Friday is a time for kids to be creative. Here at Columbine Mr. Solseth puts on a STEAM Friday. On these days kids have an objective they have to complete within a certain amount of time. In this case it was a 20 minute build time. Then it had to stand for 3. Their objective always changes whether they are doing the S in science the T technology the E in engineering the A in art or the M in math they always have to build something with one of these prompts.  

      

        Today I went and sat in on Mr. Solseth’s 1st hour class. They were doing a steam Friday project. Mr.Solseth puts this on every Friday.The class had to make a  tower with a flag on top in 20 minutes. It had to be at least 30 cm high with 5 marshmallows, 1 tooth pick, 1 sticky note, and 10 index cards.They could only manipulate the index cards and the sticky note.Their secondary goal was to have to highest tower. Mr. Solseth was going to drop a heavy book near it to see if it could stand.

       The first thing they did was design their flag then stick it on the toothpick. Next they thought of an outline of their tower, then try their best to recreate it. Then after they knew it could withstand the book drop they should build it taller and sturdier.

     They had to let it stand without falling for 3 minutes. After the book drop they only had 4 standing. The highest was a total of 49cm tall. The school record was 63cm tall but was not beaten until later that day. 

    In all the STEAM  Friday was a success everyone worked together to build  amazing towers. Alana Lasley(6th) said, “Well STEAM Friday’s help us find new ways of doing things and we learn that not everybody can succeed but the ones who do find different ways when their first ones fail.”

To add on Brooke Davidson says, “ I like how we can build stuff.” Finally we interviewed Mr.Solseth and he said that he started doing STEAM Friday so kids will know how to problem solve and so that 5hey could be more creative with their building. In all I do think that everyone is a fan of stem fridays so thank you Mr. Solseth.

Jace (6th grader) working on building his tower and balancing the index cards.