School Saver- STEM Projects

Description

The STEM Projects series provides opportunities for pupils to creatively apply skills and knowledge in a wide range of cross-curricular learning contexts. Although science is the subject area upon which most of the projects are based, other curricular areas (geography, mathematics, SPHE and visual arts) along with design and technology skills come into play in a cross-curricular fashion, depending on the project. By their very nature, these projects are group-work driven and they develop skills in communication, cooperation, problem-solving, reasoning, leadership and resilience.

These boxes will ensure that teachers can support and complement their existing science programme of work by incorporating either a short-term or long-term project into their schedule.

Each box is divided into four colour-coded sections:

Living Things;
Energy and Forces;
Materials; and
Earth and the Environment.

The variety of projects contained within each section also allows them to be successfully incorporated into a cross-curricular approach to topic teaching. Each project allows pupils to work creatively in small groups, using effective communication and collaboration skills, to plan, design, create and evaluate a thoughtful and innovative solution to a given task. When satisfied with their solutions, pupils are given a range of ways to showcase and discuss their designs, whilst also explaining how science was used throughout the project. The projects also contain opportunities for effective use of digital technology, including film-making, presentations, scanning QR codes and desktop (Internet) research.