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G1: STEAM Week — Play with Multi-Disciplines and Build Architecture Skillfully

May 17, 2023

The annual highlight — STEAM Week is coming in the spring breeze! STEAM is an educational activity with the themes of Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math, aiming to cultivate students' comprehensive quality and innovative thinking. This week, let us visit a grand architectural exhibition with the "little architects" of SHSID’s Puxi, Pudong and Lingang first graders!

In this week's STEAM week activities for the first grade, the "little architects" used various self-provided materials to build a one-foot-high building, fully demonstrating their creativity and hands-on ability.

To become an excellent architect, architectural knowledge is the foundation. It teaches us how to make a building so stable that the wind cannot blow it over, and the rain will not ruin it. World-renowned buildings are role models to learn from, teaching us the experience of considering stability and beauty at the same time. On Monday, under the guidance of teachers, the grade one "architects" "visited" the wonders of the world, such as the majestic Taj Mahal, the romantic Eiffel Tower, and the fantastic Leaning Tower of Pisa... While reading these architectural introductions, students explored the structure and principles of the building, accumulating knowledge and inspiration for future building.

Precise measurement is also one of the key abilities that architects need. After drawing blueprints of their buildings on Tuesday, "little architects" made use of what they learned about length and perimeter in math class. They used a ruler to measure the length of the material, calculated the perimeter of the shapes, and tried to build a 12-inch-high building out of their own materials.

With these necessary qualities, "architects" can't wait to show their talents. They built a variety of buildings with materials such as cardboard, wooden sticks, cotton swabs, and straws. Some imitated famous landmarks in the world, such as London Bridge and Oriental Pearl Tower. The box of facial cleanser was used as the body of the tower, and the cardboard was used to make a triangular spire, and small rainbow-colored sticks were inserted into the body of the tower, turning into a rainbow-colored bridge deck. After a while, a "London Bridge" was officially declared open. The "little architects" have learned that a triangle is the most stable, so they used three toothpicks as pillars, rubbed the colored mud into a ball and inserted it into the toothpicks, and then set two toothpicks on top to fix a small ball. The "Bund" stood up. Some "architects" used their imagination to create their own unique buildings, such as rocket towers and windmill houses. "Little Architects" put the clay underneath as a base, plugged with lots of cotton swabs to support the cardboard, and used three straws to form a hollow roof on the cardboard. A delicious cake house was completed. These simple materials have become "ingenious" buildings in the dexterous hands of the "architects", and a little architectural dream has been built in their hearts.

After the construction was completed, the grand architectural exhibition began. "Architects" browsed the works of their peers and accepted comments and suggestions from classmates. They also reflected on their own works, and summed up their strengths and weaknesses, as well as what can be improved in the future.

The activity combined the skills of different subjects, which not only exercised the students' hands-on ability and aesthetic intuition, but also improved their mathematical literacy and communication skills. Let us look forward to the outstanding performance of the Grade 2 next week!

Written by Thea Chen

Pictures by G1 Teachers

Edited by Serene Yang, Elaine Zhu (Intern), Niall Keenan