My students need engineering materials like K'Nex, simple machine parts, alternative energy kits, and bridge building inspiration to become competitive in STEM fields.
Building, creating, trying, failing, designing, inspiring, succeeding, believing--Tinkering. I believe the process of creation is essential to the development of children. Providing time, materials, and an environment to tinker will help create a new generation of engineers and problem solvers.
My students are 97% low income and 30% English language learners.
They live in a world where few engineers look like them, where few engineers grew up like them. Most do not have computers at home, few even have Lego's. Sports and outdoor play are a way of life, but exposure to and encouragement for engineering skills and practices are scarce. However, late in the school year I brought in an old television and my students dissected it with careful exploration. They were planning, sketching, and repurposing; they were trying to identify circuits; they were re-designing pathways; they were beaming. My students love engineering--they just don't know it yet.
My Project
I am requesting a myriad of engineering resources, from K'Nex materials, to toothpicks, to books, to simple machine parts and renewable sources of energy plans. My students will be given the opportunity to explore. In this guided exploration, I hope that they not only learn about scientific and engineering process, but that they also learn about themselves. Most, because of their race and economic status, are in a systemic cycle of failure. I hope engineering practice will help reinforce resiliency and the idea that failure is part of life and part of the process, but with honest effort, creativity, and teamwork there is a solution to reach the end goal.
Our district's public schools are largely failing our students and selective enrollment high schools are one of the few paths to college.
STEM ability is essential to secure a place in these competitive high schools, and early exposure to engineering is critical to my students' success. My principal has been generous enough to donate the valuable resource of time. My students will have 90 minutes a day in my classroom, and I am looking to you for the resources to make those minutes meaningful.
DonorsChoose is the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.
As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Quezada and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.