Category Archives: STEM

Building for Success

Ryves Up! uses a variety of activities to help build crucial skills for the participating elementary students.  Students learn about basic science concepts related to plants, such as photosynthesis and how to water and grow plants.  And best of all, the kids have a great time with these activities!  As second-grader Jackson Schommer exclaimed, “I like learning how to grow plants.  We get to water them and take some home.”

Experiments are also run to reinforce concepts that they learn.  Kids partake in activities such as predicting if celery or a white radish will absorb more water, or writing down in journals what they think will happen to several seedlings that are grown either in the light or in the dark.  These experiments make the students think about what they have learned and apply concepts to real life applications.  This increases critical thinking and hypothesis forming skills of the students.

An article from The Hanen Centre discusses why critical thinking is so important.  Critical thinking and language influence each other as children learn.  Critical thinking makes kids use words such as because, if, then, and different verb tenses to expand their language.  This expanded language also improves the ability to critically think and form well-structured statements.  Increased critical thinking abilities also helps improve literacy by allowing kids to problem solve, read between the lines, and connect multiple concepts and ideas.  The kids even bring seedlings back home to grow to continue their learning outside of school and the Ryves Up! program.

The Future Engineers

Teaching STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) to youth is unbelievably important.  According to the Council of Canadian Academies, elementary school is the best time to start introducing STEM topics, like Ryves Up! does for Franklin Elementary students in Terre Haute.  Children at this age start to form their attitudes toward STEM subjects.  Developing interest and having fun with STEM, such as laughing third grader Carmen McMurray stating the red fluid from a white radish looks like a chopped off finger, makes kids more likely to pursue STEM in the future.

Kids that are taught STEM at an early age are set up for success in their futures.  The U.S. Department of Commerce says STEM occupations are growing almost twice as fast as non-STEM majors, at 17% compared to 9.8%.  An article from Engineering For Kids discusses the benefits of providing kids a STEM education.  This article mentions STEM taught children will be more likely to pursue STEM degrees, and that STEM degree holders have a higher average income even in non-STEM careers.  The STEM education from Ryves Up! helps teach kids problem solving, critical thinking, and sets them up for a more sustainable economic future for themselves and their future families.

STEM teaches kids about topics with real life applications, which keeps the kids interested and engaged, similar to this video. An article from Deseret News discusses the room for growth in the future for STEM.  All careers, especially as time goes on, will require basic STEM competencies whether they are STEM or non-STEM.  The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology reports there will be a deficiency of 1,000,000 STEM graduates from now until 2025.  This means kids that pursue STEM will be in an advantageous position to obtain STEM careers.