Marble Runs as STEAM Activity and Lesson in Waste as Resource

 

One of the most creative and innovative marble runs designed by students.

Teaching a Makespace class this year to 6-8th graders has been a mix of joy and struggle. Makerspace calls for a blend of my old farm handyman/mechanic skills and teaching skills with cutting edge tech. The goal is to design and build a marble run that lasts the longest time with a upper target of sixty seconds. The winning run this year was 50 seconds (pictured below).

Marble runs are a fun way to engage creative thinking that incorporates all of the STEAM points in a fun all encompassing activity. Students are fully engaged and often don't realize that the project will lead them back to the fundamentals they are learning in their core classes. Students use readily available and primarily free materials like cardboard, plastic bottles and containers, and other things from the daily waste stream. I save many of these items from home through the year to bring to recycle in Makerspace class.

In addition to everything incorporating each aspect of STEAM, using waste products raises awareness of how much waste we throw away while reinterpreting  that waste as a resource that can be repurposed. In less than half a dozen years, these kids will be out in the world, so giving them a taste of the possibilities of revisualizing what we throw away every day is essential. Below are several more examples of student creativity.