Babipur Stem: Story Sacks

#babipurSTEM – Story Sacks

This fortnight we want you to add a STEM element to your story sacks. Reading to your children is always a good thing and a simple or extravagant story sack is a great way to make them more interactive and lots of fun for siblings, if not the whole family! You can read all about story sack  ideas on this blog post.

Setting up scenes is a fab way to engage attention but inviting a little or not so little one to take part in some STEM led shenanigans is a great way to make a story educational and make learning fun!

We’ve gone with the story of the 3 Little Pigs are there is lot to explore in this well known tale.

Can you build a house strong enough that the big bad wolf can’t blow it down?

We’ve set up some toys and some bits and bobs from our junk box to see who can make the strongest house.

With younger children you can work on their fine motor skills, counting whilst stacking simple blocks. Raid your recycling bin for cereal box streets and toilet roll towers. Build your own house for some small world play and spark their imagination. You can bring a simple shoe box to life if you stick a Nin in it!

With older children you can talk through their reasoning and approaches to this and ask what they think will happen. Then get them to test their ideas. Afterwards you can get them to try and improve upon it and repeat. Simple ideas are the best way to get children thinking more creatively.

For fun you can also get children to build the most ridiculous house or set a sibling challenge up for a house that will blow down the quickest. This forces them to change their thinking of stable structures and work on precarious balanced structures.

Keep them thinking with questions and challenge prompts. For example;

• Who can build the biggest but strongest house?
• Who can build the smallest but weakest house?
• Who do you think can save all the pigs?

Best of all let them take turn using a fan or a hair dryer to try and blow down each other’s creations. Even adults could enjoy this after bedtime!

We’ll post ideas throughout the fortnight but a few more simple suggestions are;

Can you build a bridge strong enough for the billy goats to cross it?

Can you build a new bed for Goldilocks to sleep in?

The prize for this challenge is a fabulous set of building blocks, great for open ended play; the Plan Toys 50 Blocks.

To enter all you have to do is post a picture showing us how you’ve had some STEM style fun with a story.

The challenge closes Monday 24th September at 11am and a winner will be chosen shortly afterwards. Multiple entries on both the Facebook Babipur Hangout Group and Instagram are encouraged! Don’t forget to use the #babipurSTEM tag so we can find your pictures!

We look forward to seeing how you’ve made learning fun with story sacks over the next two weeks!