My group went to the Elementary school today! It was interesting. I feel like the teacher was very patient and helpful, qualities an Elementary school teacher should have. We did a series of activities with the students and talked to them about innovation and the design process.
We started out by telling them today they would be inventors. Emily asked them what an inventor is and if they have ever invented anything before. Garrett explained to them the design process: ask, imagine, plan, create, improve, all oriented around a goal. I told them their first challenge was to pair up and use a bag of supplies to make a robot that moves around and scribbles on paper. We gave them the bags which contained markers, a paperclip, popsicle sticks, a penny, a plastic cup, a motor, a battery, tape, a rubber band, and eraser, and a pencil. The students worked on their robots for about 30 minutes. The were coming up with some great designs and we went around the room observing and asking them questions to get them thinking. Such as, how does a car move? What acts like a wheel for this robot?
After us Jessica and Jeff did an activity about assembly lines. Afterward they did a good job discussing with the students the why of the activity but the logistics before hand could have been explained in greater detail little rocky. The activity was pretty fastpaced and several of the students were confused. But the last activity the students were pretty tired but still working hard. I think we tried to pack in too many activities. The students were a little rushed and I wonder how much more they would have gotten out of the activities if we had taken more time to talk about them. I feel like the students understood the activities on different levels. Their attention spans were shorter than we expected.
Anne suggested afterword that we spend more time on explaining the activities before they engage in them.
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