Kids and STEM Programs

I'm in the shop today with Will and Cora, two extraordinary students who are involved with their STEM programs, and we got a chance to do a little bit of woodworking today. I hope you had a chance to see the video of Will and Cora building their very own mobile workbench, right here behind me. We took a couple of hours, I taught them how to use the tools, how to assemble the wood. We talked a little bit about pocket hole joinery. We built one, but what you didn't see is there was a second one that was built and they completed it on their own after learning how to do this one together. They showed great teamwork, but I wanna know more about their experience of building a workbench by themselves with a couple of hours of training. I thought it was pretty easy because you just did it with help and then you know exactly what you're supposed to do, so you just go back and you just redo it. Yeah, it was just super hands-on, super easy to just work through it all and just once you saw it done right in front of you, it was really easy to just be like, all right, well, I just saw it and I can take my shot and do it myself and learn. So it was really interesting and I had a great time doing it. Good, and you guys rocked it. You made me so proud. That validates me, as a teacher, knowing that, okay, I showed them what to do and now they can do it on their own, and you did it flawlessly. I wanna know more about the STEM program. What classes are you guys in? So for the STEM program, it's a couple weeks and it's a unit. And in seventh grade we have a laser engraver and you do a couple projects with the laser engraver, and then you go down to our workshop, which isn't as fancy as this or has as many like tools and stuff, but we go down there and then we make a tiny bridge out of balsa wood. And then if you get done with that in time you can work on another project and I made a foosball table out of cardboard. That is really impressive, a foosball table out of cardboard. So did you cut the cardboard or did you laser cut it? I cut the cardboard with scissors and then little people I did with the laser cutter. That's amazing. Did you use software for the little people? Yeah, and then I also 3D printed two foosballs. 3D printing a foosball. What about you, Will, tell me about your STEM experience. For me, my STEM experience goes all the way back to the start of fifth grade for us. Our middle school is a little different, we start earlier on for our education. So when I first went in there, my first year, I really blew away our STEM teacher. I helped design our egg plant dropper, where you would take an egg and you'd basically build it up like a plant and it would have a parachute, it would be surrounded in a cardboard box, and you drop it from right around here, from hip height, to shoulder height, to head height, then eventually went to a ladder. Then we went to basically the top of our school, dropped it all the way down on the staircase, onto the bottom of our marble floor, and if your egg survived, you were number one. Our group was the only one who survived from that fall so that was really cool back in fifth grade. Wow, in fifth grade. So I could imagine what you're working on now. Yeah, I finished up with our last project we made 3D signs. We took basically just regular old woodworkers wood, put it in the 3D printer, sometimes, and the laser engraver. No, laser engraver. Used that, and we just made tons of shapes, and designs, and images from online. And then we drilled holes in it so we could hang it up on our walls, and then we painted it and it was super cool. That is impressive. When I was growing up, we didn't have the STEM program. What is you guys favorite class so far at school? I really like STEM. STEM was really cool. We got to do virtual reality, too, which was super cool. So I see some careers gravitating towards STEM here. Have you guys given any thought to your futures after high school? Any areas of interest that you think you might be going into based on what you've learned so far? Yeah, our STEM teacher, Mr. Malar, he's really inspired me and I wanna be a STEM teacher 'cause he's just so cool. Or that's something I really would enjoy doing, I think, just working with that every day with a bunch of kids. Good. What about you Will? I really learned that I really liked working with robotics and I really liked working with people, and throughout all of that it taught me how to really use science more and I just wanna become a marine biologist, to help get animals in, take them out, and if they need emergency medical care, I can just grab the 3D printer on the boat and just even craft a fin, or craft a blood clot, a fake made blood clot if they don't stop bleeding and just stick it in there. Wow. That is amazing. Yeah. I have hope for our future because we have people like you who have so much value and so much knowledge and information to add in a good way to help the next generation come up, to help our environment and to help our world. You guys are amazing. I am literally blown away at everything you guys have done, and you're still in middle school. Thanks for joining me in the shop. No problem, any time. Of course, it was awesome. Good.