Innovation in Action News

Spring Lake Park students enrolled in the Summer of STEM (Science,Technology, Engineering and Math) summer school program recently designed and created knee braces to investigate how to best help an injured leg for the first Summer of STEM theme- When Engineering Meets Medicine: Biomedical Engineering.

This project stemmed from a book they read at the beginning of the program called “Erik’s Unexpected Twist.” In the story, Erik’s friend has an injured leg while in a forest where they had been camping and needs help immobilizing the leg.

After reading the story, students were tasked to think like a biomedical engineer and design a solution of what they needed to do in order to immobilize the leg while it was injured. After brainstorming, they worked in groups and began to design a knee brace to best aid the person with the injured leg. 

Students typically work in groups just as they would in most “real-world” situations. Therefore, cooperation is an important life skill as well as part of the Summer of STEM curriculum. -Jan Burda, Westwood Intermediate Grade 5 teacher

Throughout the summer, the Summer of STEM program explores many different themes including “Liftoff: Mission to Outer Space,” “Stop! Drop! Rescue!: Surviving Extreme Weather,” and “Inquisitive Bakers: The Science of Baking.” Each theme focuses on math, science and reading with many hands-on class projects and activities. 

Within math, students work on many learning targets, including measurements, addition, subtraction and estimation. In the area of reading, students work on reading fluency, comprehension, making inferences and identifying main ideas with supporting details. Science learning targets include the inquiry design process where students ask questions, imagine, make a plan, create designs, improve their plans and then circle around to asking questions again. 

“Students are learning every day and having fun,” Burda said. “This is evident in all the student engagement seen throughout the day and all the happy smiles as they discover how much fun Summer of STEM has been so far, this summer.”

When asked what they thought about Summer of STEM so far, students had all positive things to say.

Angel – “Last week, we had a class in which we got to make knee braces and be a biomedical engineer.  It was awesome!”

Laylah – “I have lots of fun. I like the classes I am in.  I learned that we need to be nice in every class.”

Emely – “It is fun and helps me to grow my brain bigger.  It is creative!”

Xavier – “Summer School is awesome!”