Superintendent Jeffrey Marsden and Dale Street School Principal Stephen Grenham have shared that the Dale Street School was recently awarded a $4,700 grant from the Mass Cultural Council to bring hands-on science experiences to students.
The grant was awarded as part of the Mass Cultural Council’s STARS Residencies, which aims to fund programs that last three or more days and bring students and teachers together with practicing artists, scientists and scholars to create rich cultural experiences.
The grant awarded to Dale Street School will be used to support its planned residency titled “Making Waves!”, which will give fourth grade students the opportunity to experiment with multiple wave models to gain an understanding of waves as a form of energy in everyday life.
Dr. Elizabeth Bless and Dr. Sandra Pearl, scientists from the nonprofit organization Science & Engineering Education Development (SEED), will visit each fourth grade classroom five times with hands-on activities relating to different waveforms. Students will conduct experiments to investigate multiple wave models and learn about different waveforms and the energy that travels through waves in regular patterns of movement. They will also learn that light and sound are forms of wave energy and that color, brightness, pitch and volume depend on different wave dimensions.
The classes will run between March 24 and April 27.
As a culmination of the sessions, students will work together to either develop a wave model that can help in communicating over a distance, create a performance that uses words and motion to illustrate waves, or create a poster that shows a waveform in detail and provides real-life examples.
“We are thankful to the Mass Cultural Council STARS program for their support in helping our students be able to learn and explore scientific concepts through hands-on activities,” Principal Grenham said. “We hope that through this residency, our fourth-graders will learn that while often invisible, the natural world is filled with energy in the form of waves and that they will develop an appreciation of the science behind everyday things such as music and visual art.”
