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A Solarific Final Day!

I can’t believe another week of camp has flown by! We really enjoyed the students this week and they really enjoyed being positively engaged in the STEM activities! I saw a lot of weary faces leaving today, so I think we also did a good job of wearing them out this week.

The red and blue groups got to do some 3-Dimensional modeling with origami and 3D pens. They were very creative with their 3D pen creations! I hope you enjoyed what they brought back to show you tonight. They also created polyhedra using origami paper folding. They really enjoyed this as they got to investigate how 2 dimensional figures can fit together to create 3 dimensional ones.

The yellow and green groups got their turn in the chemistry lab today investigating voltage and solar cells! They were amazed at the variations in voltage and current amongst the three different types of fruit. The lemon batteries were definitely a hit as well.


In robotics, they wrapped up the FLL challenge. The students have come so far with their programming! All the groups were able to complete at least one different challenge and there was definitely a feeling of confidence in programming when they left today.

We also had a special visitor today – Interim Commissioner of Education Dr. Wayne Lewis visited camp today. The students were eager to show off their models and talk to him about what they were learning and how it could help them in their classroom learning. We had a great discussion with him about how we could bring more opportunities for engaged STEM learning across the state during the summer and throughout the academic year.

In their words…

  • A lot of random things produce electricity
  • There is a way to make solar cells out of tea and fruit
  • I got to actually make a solar cell!
  • Lemons can produce energy.
  • I learned about solar cells and how to caculate the voltage of the solar cells.
  • 3-D is FUN!
  • I learned about the Euler’s formula.
  • What a tetrahedron is.

Conversation Starters…

Red/Blue Groups

  • What shapes did you use to put together your big origami shape? How did you know how to fit the pieces together?
  • What did you create with your 3d pen?
  • What challenges did you complete in robotics today? What did you do to get your robot to go?
  • What was the most exciting thing about doing STEM Camp this week?

Yellow/Green Groups

  • How can you make a battery? What is voltage?
  • How do you make a solar cell? What different kinds of materials did you investigate today around making a solar cell?
  • What happens when you covered up your homemade solar cell?
  • What challenges did you complete in robotics today? What did you do to get your robot to go?
  • What was the most exciting thing about doing STEM Camp this week?

Photo of the Day…


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Taking Flight and Solar Energy!

Another great day is in the books! The students got a lot of walking today as they were in the beautiful Don & Cathy Jacobs Science Building. The building is our newest academic building on campus and the science labs in there are always a treat for our students to do their investigations.

Today the red and blue groups were with Dr. Graham from the Department of Chemistry. He had them explore solar cells and how different materials used in solar cells compare. They also got to investigate how batteries work and made their own battery!

 

The green and yellow groups took their turn at flight school, looking at the mathematics and physics of airplanes with Dr. Thomas. They made a variety of different types of airplanes to investigate different effects. They had fun flying the planes and making predications about what was going to happen!

In robotics, the students started the FLL challenge today. In the FLL challenge, they take their programming knowledge to the next level by adding more sensors, multiple loops, and sequences to complete a challenge task. The students really enjoy the trial and error and of course the end result when their code works! The yellow and green group had a special treat today; they got to meet a local robot celebratory, Marty!

In their words…

  • we learng that air pockets create drag
  • That the position of weight on an airplane effects how it flies
  • … I find physics and aerodynamics fascinating
  • This is because I solved a problem by building something with my own mind. – This made me feel innovative.
  • I learned that all 4 dimensions of a plane equal out.
  • I learned that planes need drag, pull, and force to be level in the sky.
  • I learned that glliders are designed to go slightly downhill. I was really cool to see how physics has a part in paper airplanes
  • I learned more about how voltage works.
  • That Hibiscus can create the best solar panel out of pomegranite, Hibiscus and blackberry
  • you can use a lemon as a battery.
  • …chemistry is combining things to find something new

Conversation Starters…

Red/Blue Groups

  • How can you make a battery? What is voltage?
  • How do you make a solar cell? What different kinds of materials did you investigate today around making a solar cell?
  • What challenges did you complete in robotics today? What did you do to get your robot to go?

Yellow/Green Groups

  • What makes an airplane go into the air?
  • What did you take into consideration when you created your airplane? How did that work for you? What are some other things you tried?
  • What different types of airplanes did you make? How did they work differently?
  • What challenges did you complete in robotics today? What did you do to get your robot to go?

Picture of the Day…

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Day 1 Week 2 is off to a steamy start!

 

It was another great day 1 at the See Blue STEM Camp! It was a little steamy outside, but we are thankful the rain went north of campus and kept us dry as we walked to the different activities. We are very excited to welcome 228 campers this year! One hundred twenty-four of them started today! Registration went very well this morning and we really appreciate everyone’s patience as we got everyone checked in. You all are awesome!

Just a note about the consent and assent forms that we ask for every year. Our camp is subsidized by an NSF grant that requires research and reporting to the agency.  The purpose of the research is to develop a camp model that promotes STEM careers to adolescents and can be replicated. We also look at students attitudes towards STEM and the impact of our activities. Without this grant and consent and assent to participate the camp simply would not exist. We never report any names or any individual data…it’s always aggregated together! You can read about some of our work here.

We will post a blog post each night this week with some highlights from the day and some conversation starters. The conversation starters are meant to help you get over the “What did you learn today?” “Nothin’” or <shrugging the shoulders> we often see at the adolescent age. We’ll also post a link to the photos we are taking throughout the week. If at any time you want a photo removed that is of your child, please let us know and we’ll be happy to take it down.

Red/Blue Groups

Today the students split their time between Dr. Bruce Walcott and his graduate students today. In Dr. Walcott’s session, students were immersed in the wonderful world of engineering…using their hands to build and explore just as engineers do. The students got to build simple motors and talk about what electrical engineers do. They also tested out their design engineering skills by building a boat out of aluminum foil and seeing how many pennies it held. There was time left for them to explore a different type of robot, the Ozobot. They had a lot of fun exploring the Ozobots and why they worked! The students also got to tour the College of Engineering facilities, including a stop in the anechoic chamber, and ending with an up close and personal look at the solar car and how the college students designed and made it! The students had fantastic questions they asked today.

Green/Yellow Groups

The green and yellow groups got to spend time in our beautiful new science building – the Don and Cathy Jacobs Science Building. They were in one of the labs and got to explore solar energy and how much electricity can be generated. The students got to collect data and make observations about the different panels in different types of light.

All four groups…

In robotics, students started by engineering their robots. They got to build their robot and get to know it. They then start on some basic challenges of getting to move their robots…on a UK football field this year! They had to move their footballs forwards and backwards.

In their words…

Each day we’ll post some excerpts from the students’ reflections of what they learned each day at the STEM Content session. We don’t correct for spelling or grammar in these 🙂 

  • “I learned that STEM can be used for a lot of real world problems”
  • Would like to learn more about this topic (Dr. Graham) “…because t is a way to produce more energy + that is useful.”
  • “I like that we learned about a type of clean energy which we will need more of in the future”
  • “Diffrient boyencys can hold diffrent weights on water.”
  • “I learned the calculas method and the Engineering Design method”
  • “I would (like to learn more about this) becasue for all my life I ahve been interested in aircraft and I want to be a Aeronautical Engineer.”

Conversation Starters… 

We know your child is getting to the age where it might be like pulling teeth to get them to talk about their day beyond “It was fine.” “It was fun.” “I didn’t do anything.” So, each day we’ll post some suggested conversation starters centered on camp activities or STEM-related themes.

Red/Blue Groups:

  • Tell me about how you assembled your robot. Did you follow instructions? Did you just try to figure out what parts went together?
  • Is there a particular field of engineering that you think might interest you?
  • How many pennies did your boat hold? If you could build it again, what would you do differently?
  • How did the Ozobots work?
  • What did the inside of the solar car look like?

Yellow/Green Groups:

  • Tell me about how you assembled your robot. Did you follow instructions? Did you just try to figure out what parts went together?
  • What is solar energy? What can it do for us?
  • What did you measure today using your multimeter? What did you find out?
  • Was there a difference in the panels you looked at today?

Photo of the Day…

Each day we’ll post a camp highlight.  Click the picture and it will take you to the weekly photo album. Please note that we try to capture pictures of all the campers, but we cannot guarantee that we will get every single one. We try our very best to though! Also we are STEM teachers and not full time photographers, so our pictures are not perfect and we leave them unedited, so if you love to edit photos…feel free! 

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Last day excitement!

It seems I forgot to hit post on our last day of fun at STEM Camp on Friday 🙂 Thank you so much for sharing your student(s) with us this past week…we had a blast with them and we hope they came away with positive experiences in the STEM Fields!

Blue/Red Groups

The students actually got to spend the day with me 🙂 It’s been a while since I have been able to do a day of presenting at STEM Camp, so I was really excited! We spent the first half of the session talking about robotics and what makes a robot a robot. We then explored a different kind of robot and the different ways we could program it – the Ozobot. The students love the Ozobots and loved the different games they got to play to help program it. The second half of the session we talked about mathematical modeling and polyhedra. We broke out the 3D pens and used them to make their own polyhedra and then got to get creative and make their own models or use a template for the models. The kids were so creative and had a ton of fun! They brought home their creations to show you 🙂 In robotics, they finished up the Green City Challenge.

Yellow/Green Groups

They spent the day with Dr. Brett Criswell, one of our science (chemistry) educators here at UK. He focused on using different types of energy to power vehicles. The students got to make a car that was water powered and then got a chance to see the UK Solar Car and ask the students who created and race the car lots of questions. They loved making the small cars and then seeing a real solar car! In robotics, they finished up the Space Challenge and started our different racing challenges. Some went back to the football challenge to finish that one.

In their words…

Red/Blue Groups:

  • The world became better that robots can help people.
  • I love 3D printing
  • it was fun and it made me use my brain.
  • 3D pens R hard to use but fun
  • we got to use 3D pens and Ozobots
  • we got to make cool creations with the 3-D pen and make cool paths (with markers for a robot)
  • Ozobots have their own program
  • that not all teachnology is considered as a “robot.”
  • making and building things is fun!
  • It involved working hard ad through frustrations
  • It was epic!
  • it is hands-on
  • about the cheetah robot.
  • 3D printing is fun
  • How to use a 3D pen.
  • It was a hands on project

Yellow/Green Groups:

  • it’s very interesting to think about these new innovations.
  • it will help us in the future.
  • we need energy for the future
  • What did you enjoy? – That we got to make and put together
  • Thing can be powered by the sun.
  • water can move things
  • that hydrogen power cars exist
  • I liked the hands-on learning
  • I learned about different types of energy.
  • we got color changing beads
  • solar power is cool.
  • I want to learn about electricity

Conversation Starters…

Red/Blue Groups:

  • What makes a robot a robot? Is a washing machine a robot? Why?
  • How did the Ozobots work?
  • How did you make your polyhedra with your 3d pen? What else do you think you could create with the 3d pen?
  • What was the most interesting thing you learned about this week at STEM Camp?
  • What do you want to learn more about?
  • How do you think you will use STEM in your career?

Yellow/Green Groups:

  • Why is it important to talk about different kinds of energy?
  • What did you do to make your car move today? How did the water make your car move?
  • What did you observe about the solar car?
  • What was the most interesting thing you learned about this week at STEM Camp?
  • What do you want to learn more about?
  • How do you think you will use STEM in your career?

Picture of the Day…

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Solar Energy, DNA and germs!

Thursday brought another hands-on exciting day at STEM Camp. This group of students is really something special…they are full of extra curiosity and questions. It has been awesome to witness this week!

Blue/Red Groups

They spent the day with Dr. Brett Criswell, one of our science (chemistry) educators here at UK. He focused on using different types of energy to power vehicles. The students got to make a car that was water powered and then got a chance to see the UK Solar Car and ask the students who created and race the car lots of questions. They loved making the small cars and then seeing a real solar car!

In robotics, they continued with the Green City Challenge. Many of the groups made it pretty far today!

Yellow/Green Groups

It was Yellow and Green groups’ turn to be in a biology lab in our beautiful new Don and Cathy Jacobs Science Building with Brittany Rice, a graduate student in the Biomedical Sciences doctorate program in the College of Medicine. They were able to use state of the art lab equipment, wear lab coats, goggles, gloves, etc. as a real laboratory scientist would (this included some lab safety lessons as well 🙂 ). They made models of DNA and then did a simple DNA extraction themselves to look at their own DNA. They were very fascinated! Then they learned about bacteria and germs and how they grow and where they’re located. They did a bacteria activity with their hands…there was some extra handwashing that went on the rest of the day after they realized the germs on their hands 🙂

In robotics, they continued with the Space Challenge. Most groups have made it pretty far and some completed theirs today and so are working on mastering the challenges from earlier in the week. Lots of movement and exciting programs happening!

In their words…

Blue/Red Groups

  • you can make dead muscle and heart tissue move with electricity
  • I realy want to learn more about solar power and hydroelectric
  • It’s fun to use comonly things to use it in a more complex way.
  • we got see it right in front of our eyes, and it was real
  • I got to make a water powered car.

Yellow/Green Groups

  • Its called nucleic acid because DNA’s in the center of the nucleus.
  • I liked the handson activities and being able to physically see my DNA
  • it has so many uses in the future
  • I thought it was really interesting learning about DNA, and how it bonds. We also got to extract some of our DNA.
  • I did not like swishing the gatorade in my mouth
  • Adenine connects to Thymine & Cytosine connects to guanine
  • it was very interesting, both doing it, and learning about DNA.
  • I learned the shapes of DNA and what DNA creates mutations.

Conversation Starters…

Red/Blue Groups

  • Why is it important to talk about different kinds of energy?
  • What did you do to make your car move today? How did the water make your car move?
  • What did you observe about the solar car?
  • What challenges did you complete today in the Green City Challenge? What was your favorite part about programming today? What was the hardest part about programming today?

Yellow/Green Groups

  • How did you extract your own DNA today? What did you observe about your DNA?
  • What did you learn from the handwashing activity?
  • What challenges did you complete today in the Space Challenge? What was your favorite part about programming today? What was the hardest part about programming today?

Picture of the Day… (click the picture to go to all the pictures from this week)