STEAM Education
At Ivy Prep, we truly believe that STEAM Education will make a big change in the future...
What is STEAM Education?
STEM education refers to the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
STEAM education incorporates an added discipline of arts – recognizing that to be successful in technical fields, individuals must also be creative and use critical thinking skills which are best developed through exposure to the arts. STEAM initiatives in afterschool and summer programs are meant to encourage, educate, and prepare today’s youth to pursue careers in STEM-related fields.
Why is STEAM Education important?
STEAM education helps all young people to think deeply so that they have a chance to become the innovators, educators, researchers, and leaders who can solve the most pressing challenges facing our nation and our world.
STEAM Education:
- Develops valuable life skills such as logical reasoning, structured problem solving, communication, creativity...
- Builds character traits like Confidence, Imagination, Motivation...
- Inspires kids to pursue STEAM degrees which offer jobs in high demand that enable them to make an impact on society, build communities and transform the world.
How do we teach STEAM?
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Adding More Hands-On Projects.
STEAM incorporates hands-on learning, projects allowing open-ended exploring and investigating, problem solving and solutions to create! Making education hands-on is so critical. The more senses involved in learning, the more it will help the students remember what they are learning. When kids are building, creating, or exploring, the learning matters to them! The experience that comes from the hands-on projects brings the learning to life.
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Including Real World Problem Solving Activities.
A Lego Robotics program with thematics for example. Including activities like this helps kids focus on the important parts of education, how to apply it to real life.
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Integrating and Applying the Learning.
Of course, we teach Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math! But it's also important to apply it by connecting the subjects together. Intertwine art and math. Make engineering and science work together. Bring technology into all of it through apps, programming, wiring, tools, and more!
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Encouraging Questioning and Wondering.
Kids are naturally curious, but educational methods often push that curiosity down. That's why it's crucial to let them question, wonder, experiment and explore. It is through these methods that new discoveries and inventions are made. We help kids understand why things happen the way they do.
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Giving the Kids More Control of Their Learning.
A really important part of education is giving the kids some of the control. When they have control, they care more about it. They will take charge and be more willing to make things happen. At STEAM, we let them make some of the decisions about the projects they do and the way they do them.
