Welcome back, STEM friends!
Today is our sixth installment in the 30 STEM activities in 30 minutes or less series, and it’s all about hard skills.. Don’t worry if you’ve missed the previous posts, you can click that link above to catch up. 🥰
One thing that we often overlook in STEM is taking time to build individual skills that can streamline our bigger projects later. Things like fine motor skills, working with specific tools and more. When we isolate practice with some of our biggest bottle-necks in bigger projects, we can recoup that time tenfold down the line.
My goal remains the same with each post in the series: to provide you with easy STEM activities to implement in a flash — that will still challenge your students — and with at least one free resource each post.
So let’s get started with hard skills!
Easy STEM Activity #26:
Cardboard Connections
There are so many clever ways to connect cardboard. A LOT of teachers make their own 3D anchor charts, and there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s a great place to start. Use the ones above or go a quick Google Image search of cardboard connections. Then post it up and have students practice 2-3 cardboard connections in a center each week.
Another option is to post a picture of an anchor chart and have students team up to create their own 3D anchor chart during a class period. You’ll end up with multiple options of each kind of connection, which will make it easy to share with groups throughout the year as they need it.
Maybe some groups create individual models that can be placed in a bin and pulled out to examine in challenges as needed.
Easy STEM Activity #27:
Fine Motor Skills Practice
Many students (& adults!) can benefit from fine motor skills practice. Why not have students build towers using chopsticks, tongs or tweezers to handle the build materials, as you see in the short video clip above. (This video excerpt is from my STEM CON & Beyond® presentation called, “STEM in 30 Minutes or Less?”. You can view the full presentation free on TPT.)
A few other fine motor skills ideas are:
• Cutting practice (there are many free options on TpT)
• Building brick activities
• Use chopsticks, tongs, or tweezers to perform various tasks
• Origami
• Tying various knots
• Playing with clay
Easy STEM Activity #28:
Sewing / Weaving
Sewing and weaving certainly could have been part of the last section, but I wanted to call them here for special focus. There are so many times simple sewing or weaving can be used during a STEM Challenge, if students have had some experience with it. You’ll see some simple ways to incorporate weaving in the video for idea #27 above.
Easy STEM Activity #29:
Exploration Stations
Sometimes we forget how important play is to learning, but our students are trying to remind us all the time. Just think about when you bring out new building materials how they’re itching to play before using them to build. Every now and again, give in! Place your Keva blocks, Lego, MagnaTiles and more at exploration stations and just let students direct their own time for a bit. Be sure to set expectations for safe, appropriate play before you start and always leave time ample for clean up and to check for any materials that may have “accidentally” walked off during free time!
Easy STEM Activity #30:
Practice Using Tools
Consider teaching students to use hot glue guns, cardboard cutting tools, hammers, screwdrivers or even saws or power tools.
Of course when teaching students how to use tools safely, you’re going to want adult supervision! I describe how you might approach this in the video above. (This video excerpt is from my STEM CON & Beyond® presentation called, “STEM in 30 Minutes or Less?”. You can view the full presentation free on TPT.)
Bonus idea: After student have learned to use a new tool, have them create safety posters to display in class using paper & crayons or an app like Canva! You could even have them create fun stop-motion animation of do’s & don’ts for the tools!
We did it! 🥳 That’s it for the final set of 5 we needed to complete the 30 STEM activities you can do in 30 Minutes or Less series! 🎉 If you missed any, head back to the beginning using that link.
Don’t forget to check out the Ultimate 30 Minute STEM Activities Kit that’s packed with mind-bending, easy prep activities that are easy for you & still challenging for students!
Check Out the Ultimate 30 Minute STEM Activities Bundle:
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