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Grades 4–6. Combined with the PCS Edventures signature BrickLAB Bricks, this program comes with 4 curriculum sets focusing on communication, engineering, math, and physics, each boasting 13 one-hour lessons. With over 6,540 bricks and adaptable learning modules, BrickLAB STEM Foundations inspires critical thinking, creativity, and innovation through engaging, research-based learning experiences. Comes complete with curriculum and materials for 30 students.

Product Details
Pouring the STEM Foundation with Communication, Engineering, Math, and Physics
Grades 4–6. BrickLAB STEM Foundations is your STEM library. Inside, you'll find the 4 books of STEM focusing on communication, engineering, math, and physics. Employing adaptable curriculum, this turn-key STEM enrichment solution successfully engages a wide variety of age levels and learning environments through social-emotional learning, multi-subject integration, and hands-on engineering design exercises. From exploring Newton's Third Law to studying flying buttresses, this grab bag contains over 48 hours of stimulating, reusable, real-world building adventures. With an assessment to check for understanding at the end of each exercise, guide your students as they discover everything the world of STEM has to offer.

Combined with the PCS Edventures signature BrickLAB Bricks, a STEM manipulative designed specifically to provide learners of all ages with a platform for creative and innovative thinking, BrickLAB STEM Foundations comes with 4 curriculum sets, each boasting 13, one-hour lessons. Turn-key and ready to invigorate, this program was developed for any environment looking to explore or expand their STEM options. With over 6,540 bricks and adaptable learning modules, BrickLAB STEM Foundations inspires critical thinking, creativity, and innovation through engaging, research-based learning experiences. Whether you're following the easy-to-implement lessons or integrating the materials into existing semester plans, provide your students with everything they need to expand their STEM skills with BrickLAB STEM Foundations.

Product Features

• Complete program includes materials and curriculum
• Four curriculum sets, each including 13 one-hour activities (52 activities total)
• Designed for up to 30 students
• BrickLAB bricks are 100% reusable; just clean and reuse again and again

Curriculum Topics:
Communication
1. Tactile Symmetry
2. Descriptive Communication
3. Verbal Dependence
4. Hieroglyph Building
5. Learn to Sign
6. Create Your Own Code
7. Semaphore
8. Assembly Line
9. Modeling
10. Charades
11. Inquiry
12. Tall Towers
13. Telephone

Engineering
1. Post and Lintel
2. Cantilever
3. Arches and Corbelled Arches
4. Walls and Dams
5. Buttress and Flying Buttress
6. Pagoda
7. Pyramid Construction
8. Castle Construction
9. Post and Lintel Bridge
10. Aqueducts
11. Greek Architecture
12. Floorplans
13. Urban Planning

Math
1. Volume of Cubes
2. Circles and Circumference
3. Pi
4. Trapezoids and Line Intersections
5. Tessellations
6. Measurement
7. Estimate
8. Bar Graphs
9. Line Plots
10. Frequency
11. Make a Table
12. Mean, Median, and Mode
13. Probability

Physics
1. Falling Bodies
2. Center of Gravity
3. Mass, Volume, and Density
4. Friction
5. Coefficient of Friction
6. Potential and Kinetic Energy
7. Calculating Potential Energy
8. The Work Formula
9. Newton's First Law
10. Newton's Second Law
11. Newton's Third Law
12. Visible Light Spectrum
13. Light and Shadow

Each Activity Includes:

• Introductory discussion
• Step-by-step build instructions
• Engineering challenge
• Real-world extension
• English Language Arts extension
• Assessment

Recommended Settings:

• Classrooms
• Out-of-school time programs

Tech Requirements:

• None

Professional Development:

• Includes a free 1/2-hour webinar orientation when your purchase totals $500+
• Includes a free 1-hour webinar orientation when your purchase totals $1,000+
• Additional training available for purchase by special request

21st-Century Skills:
Helps students develop a set of widely applicable abilities essential for success in the information age.

• Communication and collaboration
• Creativity and innovation
• Critical thinking and problem solving
• Initiative and self-direction
• Social and cross-cultural skills

Standards Alignments:
BrickLAB STEM Foundations was developed and aligned to several systems of science and technology benchmarks, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science's Benchmarks for Science Literacy Project 2061, the Core Knowledge Sequence (taken from the Colorado State Grade Level Expectations), and the International Technology Education Association's Standards for Technological Literacy.

In the foreword of their document Standards for Technological Literacy, the International Technology and Engineering Educators Association (ITEEA) describes the need for up-and-coming generations to have an understanding and appreciation of technology. The ITEEA wrote, "We are a nation increasingly dependent on technology. Yet, in spite of this dependence, U.S. society is largely ignorant of the history and fundamental nature of the technology that sustains it. The result is a public that is disengaged from decisions that are helping share its technological future," (2007).

The ITEEA began with a broad definition of what technology is: "Technology is how people modify the natural world to suit their own purposes." From there, they developed a set of age-appropriate standards, which outline what concepts should be instilled to develop a sense of technological understanding as students progress. Additionally, it is apparent that there is a vast difference between what technology education entails versus educational technology. Many schools utilize technology in education but fail to dive into the origins of technology and how it developed with the human race and continues to evolve with us into the future.

BrickLAB STEM Foundations focuses on recent research, which shows that many students learn best from experiential learning. Bricks are utilized to, "provide opportunities for students to demonstrate their understanding of technology and its value to them and society," (2007, 19). With engaging, hands-on learning activities, BrickLAB STEM Foundations instills a deep understanding of the world of technology.