STEAM: Committee Work, Professional Development, Expo
As a member of the STEAM committee, I've had the unique privilege of working with my colleagues at other sites to understand how we can work to integrate STEAM into our classroom communities in a variety of ways. Below you'll find my work leading professional development opportunities at my site as well as presenting at the very first STEAM Expo.
My work with the STEAM committee (affectionately referred to as the STEAM Dream Team) has had a monumental effect on my work in the classroom. I have particularly been moved by my newfound love of materials— what they are, how we classify them and, more importantly, the infinite ways we can use and reuse them with our students to further our understanding of the world around us. When making theater with students, we prioritize using reusable, recyclable materials in a myriad of ways to create our work (check out the shadow puppet movie Hello, Dude! under the Movie Making tab). Additionally, this work inspired me to create my very own Loose Parts Cart, a mobile resource for myself and my school community. You can read all about it on the Loose Parts Cart page under the Professionalism tab.
STEAM EXPO
In May 2022, our committee hosted our first STEAM Expo in the foyer of 52 Chambers Street, where we had the opportunity to showcase some of the many exciting ways we've worked with STEAM with our students this year.
I presented a booth on Recycled Puppetry, a curriculum that was created in tandem with our Reduce, Reuse, Recycle unit as well as a genuine inquiry from my students as to how we could create our own, individual puppets. Students worked to first design their own puppets, then construct the puppet using recycled materials, taking into consideration mobility and movement, character design, and mathematics, among other STEAM principles.
Professional Development
I've loved leading professional development opportunities on STEAM for my peers. Click below to explore my favorite PD Leading experience, which occurred on April 4th, 2022. In the meeting, I was able to not only lead a discussion and activity focusing on culturally responsive STEAM curriculum, but I also led our community builder activity. In the activity, I merged my passions for STEAM and Theater by asking everyone to respond to a series of Fill-in-the-Blank questions, all related to STEAM in our everyday lives.