STEM Challenge Day

Each year we host a Year 5 STEM Challenge Day. We invite local primary schools to enter a team of four students and they each compete against each other to become the Westholme School STEM Challenge Champions. Students take part in tasks relating to each of the STEM disciplines.

 

Aims

The aim of this project is to raise awareness and promote the STEM subjects amongst younger students. 

In order to make the event a success, we need extenral schools to take part.

The immediate beneficiares relating to this event are the students who take part. Their schools will also benefit from taking part in this event as they will be able to share ideas that they learn about during the day spent with us.

Background

We wanted to host an academic event for external students and when we discussed our ideas with the staff team, our Head of Science suggested promoting the STEM subjects. He realised that not many primary schools are able to run activities relating to these subjects outside the classroom and we wanted to be able to share our resources and facilities with external schools so that other children were able to benefit.

Resources

Most of the resources are already in school within the Science and Maths departments. We use our Learning Resource Centre, Theatre, Science Labatories and Dining Hall to host this event. 

We buy prizes (books relating to the subjects) for the winners in each category and also a prize for the overall winners. Each students receives a certificate of participation. 

Given that most resources are in school already, this event does not cost a lot to host. An appoximate budget would be £120.

Pupil Involvement

Students from our own school and external schools in Year 5 (boys and girls) are able to take part in this event. 

Frequency

This event has taken place for four years and will continue to run annually in the future.