After nearly a year, Comics Club/Comics & Crafts had run its course, and it was time to try something new. I came up with STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) Time: once a week, kids in kindergarten through fifth grade can come and try out something new and different, from building challenges to puzzles to coding games to art projects.

Our first STEAM Time was a success! Nine kids of various ages showed up, and I presented the options: Robot Turtles (a board game that teaches the basic principles of coding) and Caesar ciphers (I had prepared several of these – from this PDF – with cardstock and brads for kids to create and decipher each other’s codes). As a backup option, I also brought Spot It, a picture-matching game.

Three of the younger kids started with Robot Turtles, and the others began making codes for each other to decipher. I gave a basic explanation about how to use the Caesar cipher (or shift cipher), then helped the kids get Robot Turtles set up, then helped the ones who were having trouble figuring out the ciphers. (I think one thing that tripped them up initially was the letter-letter correspondence, rather than letter-number correspondence; the only number you need with this kind of cipher is the “shift,”; it’s not an A=1, B=2 kind of code.) But eventually, everyone figured it out, and then they could swap ciphered messages to decipher!

Meanwhile, back in Robot Turtle land, each kid got a chance to give instructions (the coder role) and follow instructions (the turtle role). And when the Caesar cipher kids got tired of (de)ciphering, they switched to a rousing game of Spot It!

In the next few weeks, we’ll have a building challenge with blocks (we have both regular and life-size Jenga), a puzzle challenge (a 36-piece jigsaw with the picture showing, then upside down), penny boats, Snap Circuits, primary color painting (think Mix It Up!), and more. What STEAM activities do you like to do with kids?