STEAM IT UP
In this project, funded by the Caritro Foundation, we collaborated with Trento 4 Comprehensive Institute and the 'M. Buonarroti' Technical Technological Institute. The project involved various phases: the first phase had middle school students engaged in designing some tools using micro:bit with the support of one of our educators, and they were assisted by students from the 'M. Buonarroti' Technical Technological Institute in Trento who were involved through school-work alternation.
We aimed to create a new type of collaboration between different school levels and local organizations already working in the STEAM field. This aimed to encourage the abandonment of individualistic project work and foster a more conscious and structured collaboration to develop skills that go beyond mastery of disciplinary content, encompassing methodological, teaching, and soft skills in areas such as relationship-building, design, communication, creativity, and digital proficiency. In STEAM studies, there is still a gender gap, which projects like this aim to overcome in terms of perception and challenging stereotypes.
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Students, with support from LEVEL UP experts, guided the second-year classes of the Lower Secondary School in on-the-job orientation activities through a STEAM pathway offered as an optional activity. Students were divided into groups and completed small projects using micro:bits, versatile microcontrollers programmable through a block-based language.
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Furthermore, teachers from the 'M. Buonarroti' Technical Technological Institute attended one of our training courses on the use of headsets for Virtual and Augmented Reality in education.