Sure, anyone can just ring a decorative desk bell by lightly pressing the button on top of said bell – but where is the fun in that?
Wednesday morning, Madison DiFilippo’s fourth-grade Gifted and Talented class broke into groups, charged with the task of taking all sorts of different classroom items and using them to create mechanisms that would ring a desk bell without anyone actually touching the bell.
The students had to use their planning and teamwork skills to accomplish the job – but, DiFilippo asked, what else did they need?
“Our brains!” they said.
This STEAM-infused lesson was inspired by American cartoonist Rube Goldberg. Social media users may already be familiar with the “Rube Goldberg machine” without even realizing it; there are a lot of TikTok and Instagram reels out there that show a series of contraptions going off, all shot in one take, to achieve a basic job in a more complicated way.
A Rube Goldberg machine consists of a series of generally unrelated devices (oftentimes common household items) and the action of each triggers the initiation of the next, eventually resulting in achieving some sort of goal.
In the case of DiFilippo’s class, the goal was ringing a desk bell – a fun way to spend an early release day that happened to fall on National STEM/STEAM Day.
The fields of science, technology, engineering, art and math take the spotlight on National STEM/STEAM Day. It is a chance for children to learn through interactive games and activities that promote critical thinking and problem solving, while considering career paths relevant to those fields.
Making these contraptions required a lot of planning, drawing, discussion and trial and error. It took patience and determination as students gathered items like yardsticks, pipe cleaners, math manipulatives, plastic cups, LEGOs and more to create little “chutes” that they used to carry balls, marbles and toy cars in hopes of landing on top the bell and making it ring. DiFilippo was even open to her students finding other classroom items that might help in accomplishing their task – but encouraged them to limit their group to using three to five supplies.
Rube Goldberg’s life was the focus of Wednesday’s lesson before DiFilippo’s students began to design their own contraptions. DiFilippo read aloud the book “Just Like Rube Goldberg: The Incredible True Story of the Man Behind the Machines.” The book details Goldberg’s life and his love for making complicated contraptions with many parts that performed a simple task in an elaborate and farfetched way.
The book describes Goldberg’s life as being just like one of his machines – “an improbable and inefficient chain reaction that ends up making perfect sense.”
DiFilippo’s students also watched a Rube Goldberg machine in action in a YouTube video, that showed the band OK Go singing the song “This Too Shall Pass.” The video, just under four minutes long, was filmed in a two-story warehouse in Los Angeles, and the “machine” was designed and built by the band, along with members of Syyn Labs over the course of several months. The students loved the video – DiFilippo asked them what stood out to them most, and the children pointed out that if even one device in the video made a mistake, the rest of the mechanisms in the “machine” would also fail.
“In our design process, we want to make sure we spend a lot of time on our thinking, on our planning and working with our group members,” DiFilippo said.
DiFilippo’s STEAM lesson was just one of a couple things going on at Bowen’s Corner Elementary Wednesday morning. The school, which is a STEAM-endorsed school, also had TJ Rostin, a school parent who is North Charleston’s Parks and Recreation Director, speak to second-graders about the new playground at Park Circle.
Park Circle Reimagined is one of the largest inclusive playgrounds in the country; “inclusive” means children – and adults – of all abilities will be able to play on the equipment.
Parks and Recreation department staff spoke to students about the playground equipment – like the three new ziplines and the “American Ninja Warrior”-inspired course – that everyone will get to enjoy, as well as general good practices to keep in mind when sharing the equipment at the playground.
School staff said Rostin’s presentation kicks off the start of the second-graders’ STEAM Unit that will focus on economics and properties of materials. The second-graders also have plans to visit the park during an upcoming field trip.
