Harrison Park Elementary School conducts monthly STEAM projects called “Junk Box Wars.”
STEAM activities incorporate science, technology, engineering, art, and math into one lesson. The Junk Box Wars projects encourage students to use their scientific knowledge to create and design a device. Students in kindergarten through fifth-grade work with a partner and are given a design challenge and a bag of “junk” to create a device that solves a specified task.
November’s Junkbox War was called ‘Turkey Table,’ and was spearheaded by Student Learning Assistant Michael Barnes. The students were tasked with building the strongest table that had four legs. The students were given only newspapers (generously donated by Penn Franklin News) and tape in order to complete the challenge.
Winners were named from each grade level, and the students enjoyed the educational and interactive project.
2nd-graders Kassidy Savering and Juna Rodgers tackled the challenge as a team
2nd-graders Miles Hoffman and Keaton Washburn
Amelia Smith and Alyona Krowchak, grade 2
3rd-graders Natalie Shannon and Ella Breeger
4th-grader Mackenzie Orendt tests her table as her classmates Charlotte Thomas, Sylas Storer, Danny Frey, Beckett Burmeister, Jason Bick, and Delilah Montenary observe
4th-graders Maleah Felton, Delilah Montenary, and Danny Frey watch as Sierra Mason stacks books on their table
4th-grader Andrew Bittner achieved quite a tower of books on his table