Nashville, TN – The Tennessee Department of Education and the Tennessee STEM Innovation Network (TSIN) announced the launch of the Spring STE(A)M Resource Hub, which provides weekly challenges and activities for families and students to explore sustainability efforts around a healthy and safe world, food, a clean earth, and industry innovation.
Additionally, each week highlights a different national holiday connected to the week’s challenges and activities.
The Spring STE(A)M Resource Hub builds on the COVID-19 STE(A)M Resource Hub, Summer STE(A)M Resource Hub, and Winter STE(A)M Resource Hub, which engaged students with challenges around design activities, critical thinking, and career exploration. Since the first STE(A)M resource hub launched over a year ago in April 2020, the hubs have had over 64,000 unique visitors.
“Thanks to our partners at the Tennessee STEM Innovation Network and network of teachers, we’ve been able to provide STE(A)M activities to families and students to do right in their own homes, or teachers to facilitate, since the spring of 2020,” said Commissioner Penny Schwinn. “We continue to hear positive feedback on how beneficial these resources are in helping prepare Tennessee students for postsecondary success and highlighting STEM-related career opportunities.”
The Spring STE(A)M Resource Hub includes three weekly challenges that can be done at home and were created using the science standards framework for Tennessee in partnership with TSIN educators from across the state. The challenges are ideal for students grades 3-12, but younger students can also participate with parental assistance.
The spring challenges continue to focus on #MakerMondayTN, #WonderWednesdayTN, and #FutureFridayTN and enable students to learn about science while building their STE(A)M skills in their own homes. Families and educators are encouraged to share their work on social media using the hashtags.
“The Network is dedicated to science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEM/STEAM) learning where we are engaging technology to bridge the gap for continued learning,” said Brandi Stroecker, Director of TSIN.
“The Spring STE(A)M Resource Hub incorporates learning experiences aimed to inspire students to think like scientists and engineers, solve complex problems, and explore STEM focused career pathways. We’ve learned that by creating activities that utilize low-cost, widely available materials, teachers can create and learners can participate in effective hands-on learning, whether in-person or at a distance,” Stroecker stated.
For the month of April, the following highlights various topics and corresponding national holidays that students will explore while completing the weekly challenges, including:
- April 4th-10th: Exploring a Healthy and Safe World
- April 11th-17th: Exploring Food
- April 14th: National Gardening Day
- April 18th-24th: Exploring a Clean Earth
- April 22nd: Earth Day
- April 25th- May 1st: Exploring Our Differences
- April 25th: National DNA Day
Each activity comes with step-by-step directions for the activity, additional resources to continue exploring the topic, and an online portal for parents to ask questions and receive additional support.
For additional information on the department’s COVID-19 coronavirus and school reopening related resources, please visit https://www.tn.gov/education/health-and-safety/update-on-coronavirus/reopening-guidance.html.
For Tennessee Department of Education media inquiries, contact Edu.MediaInquiries@tn.gov.
