On Saturday, hundreds of teachers, students and parents attended STEMosphere 2014 at the University of Denver.

 

The annual event is a part of the Morgridge Family Foundation’s Share Fair Nation, which is both a teacher inservice opportunity to share STEM best practices, and a public fair to highlight the state’s STEM education efforts.

 

40 Colorado organizations including Denver Museum of Nature and Science, Open World Learning and KidsTek had booths at DU’s Magness Arena.

 

KidsTek’s booth included an activity that we’ve adapted from a classroom lesson: students touched the numbers 1-10 in order on a modified Twister board.  The students could represent their schools either individually or in groups, and their best times were recorded on a spreadsheet.

 

In the classroom, this activity is a fun way to gather data to populate a spreadsheet, then show students how to work with data including averaging and creating graphical representations of their results. 

 

At Saturday’s STEMosphere event, the activity was chance for schools to compete against each other for best times.  When students are able to strategize and test theories, they soon discover that through communication and practice, teams can achieve faster times than individuals.  Students from more than 60 Colorado schools participated, and the top teams were able to complete the challenge in 2-3 seconds!

 

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