Fun science revs up kids’ engines at STEAM Fest

Anyone who thinks science isn’t cool, fun or engaging must not have gone to the Indian River STEAM Fest, hosted by Vero Beach Academy, where multitudes of activities related to Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math were going full steam ahead this past Saturday at the Intergenerational Recreation Center.

Last year’s inaugural event was such a success that co-chairs Stephanie Watson, Kelly Brown, Mie Powell and Robyn Hjalmeby expanded this year’s even further. The event, geared toward grades K to 12, spanned the entire facility inside and out, with 62 exhibitors utilizing every spare inch. Roughly 160 volunteers from Vero Beach Academy and First Church of the Nazarene helped ensure everything ran smoothly.

Watson explained that the Vero Beach Academy is a home-school hybrid; each week, students attend class two days, are home-schooled two days, and have one group enrichment day.

Of the event she says, “We saw a need for science, technology, engineering and math specifically to become more hands-on and fun for the kids. If we can spark interest in a child early on, they’ll grow a love for that, and we will train kids up to be excited to become scientists, or to be in engineering. The jobs for the future are showing more and more that they’re going to be STEM-focused. The arts are brought in for the creativity and the process of how they’re all connected.”

As an example of an activity with that incorporation, Amy Brown, who coordinated the multiple arts projects with the help of IRC teachers, pointed to a roomful of youngsters who were learning the anatomy of squid by dissecting them to find the ink sacs. “And then they’re going to create a painting with the ink from that squid,” said Brown. Next door, in an “imagineering” class overseen by Vero Beach Museum of Art volunteers, children were making sculptures using found materials; no glue allowed.

There were also four interactive “Mad Science” shows, a really cool indoor planetarium dome, and interactive STEAM talks. The exhibit hall bustled with well-behaved little ones busily focused on a wide variety of hands-on activities – from making and ‘drilling’ Play-Doh ‘teeth,’ to making real butter from heavy cream.

NASA enlisted the support of young volunteers such as future astronaut John Paul, 11, who explained, “I signed up because I like space.”

Still others had the experience of becoming superheroes flying in their own video, thanks to Jon Pine and Kenneth George of Digital Artist Workshops.

“I’m going to save everybody!” exclaimed Nola, 7. “I’m a superhero and I’m going to kill all the bad guys!” chimed in her brother, Jackson, “almost 9.”

Some of the messier activities took place outside, such as making enormous bubbles and shooting water bottles way up in the air (highly supervised, of course), and a food tent enabled families to take a break before heading back for more activities that were so much fun, children didn’t even realize they were learning.

Photos by: Denise Ritchie
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