STEAM Learning Lab and Makerspace
The STEAM Learning Lab is designed to research new opportunities for learning through engagement and inquiry-based exploration. Embracing the “maker” way of knowing, this is a place for our students and community partners to play, tinker, design, and create.
Through a partnership with the Kennedy-Longfellow School in Cambridge, MA, with which Lesley did a research project funded through the generosity of Al Merck, we learned that a Makerspace is a remarkably fertile learning ecology, one that naturally ignites creativity, collaboration, and problem-solving. We opened our Lesley Makerspace in early 2015.
This divergent learning environment, brimming with materials of all kinds for making, is a unique vehicle to engage our students in activities that lead to greater learning, particularly related to self-awareness and identity affirmation, perseverance, problem-solving, collaboration, communication, and other skills that are needed to be fully engaged citizens in the 21st century. This environment is also relevant for educators, as the activities and resources fully support science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) content and practice standards.