STEM/STEAM Day Activities

You will need:

• 1 large clear jar

• Shaving cream

• Water

• Dropper

• Blue food coloring

• Small mixing bowl

Step by step:

1. Fill 2/3 of the jar with water

2. Fill the remainder of the jar with shaving cream

3. In a small bowl, combine the food coloring with water

4. Fill the dropper with the food coloring mixture

5. Slowly add a drop of food coloring over the top of the shaving cream. Count how many drops it takes to break through the cloud into the water portion of the jar

The shaving cream represents clouds. The colored water represents rain. Clouds are made of water droplets. Within a cloud, water droplets condense onto one another, causing the droplets to grow. When these water droplets get too heavy to stay suspended in the cloud, they fall to Earth as rain.

You will need:

• Cardboard

• Tissue paper

• Cardstock paper

• Pencil

• Scissors

• 1 Balloon

• Glue stick

Step by step:

1. Cut a square of cardboard

2. Draw a butterfly on your tissue paper with a pencil. Make sure the butterfly isn't bigger than your piece of cardboard. Set your butterfly to the side

3. Cut a butterfly body out of your cardstock paper. Put your butterfly on the cardboard and glue down only the body. Make sure you do not glue down the wings of your butterfly.

4. Blow up your balloon and run your balloon in your hair to give it an electric charge

5. Hold the balloon close to your butterfly without touching it. Raise the balloon up and down to move the wings

When you run the balloon onto your hair, electrons are lost from your hair and gained by the balloon giving it a static charge. When the negatively charged balloon gets close to the positively charged tissue paper, they are attracted to each other and the pull of attraction is so great that the tissue paper moves toward the balloon.

You will need

• Binder clips

• Popsicle sticks

• Tupperware or blocks

• Books

Experiment

1. Set up your tupperware or blocks as supports for each side of the bridge

2. Use your popsicle sticks and binder clips to build a bridge across your supports

3. See how many books you can stack on your bridge before it collapses

4. Try a different bridge design and observe which one holds more weight (books)

Forces, like the weight of cars driving on a bridge, can push (compression) or pull (tension) on things, causing them to collapse if they aren't designed properly.

You will need:

• Flowers/leaves

• A bowl or bucket

• Cardboard

• Hot glue gun & glue

• Hairdryer

Step by Step:

1. Walk around your garden or neighborhood and pick out flowers, leaves, sticks and pinecones that look interesting to you

2. If your plants are wet, blow dry them with a hairdryer

3. Glue your plants on your piece of cardboard and let it dry

4. Optional: hang your masterpiece!

You will need:

• Growing dinosaur (or other growing animal!)

• Tupperware

• Water

• Paper

• Ruler or tape measure

Step by step:

1. Lay your dinosaur on your piece of paper and measure it. Draw a line where your dinosaur starts and ends on your paper

2. Fill your Tupperware with water and put your dinosaur in it. Keep the dinosaur in the water overnight

3. Take your dinosaur out and dry it. Measure the dinosaur again on your piece of paper

4. Observe the size differences of your dinosaur