The first unit of study for the Windham Middle School 8th grade STEM students was the building and flying of Hot Air Balloons. STEM is a hands on, projects based, learning classroom. In STEM, students learn the basics of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math in fun and creative ways to get students thinking outside the box.
With Hot Air Balloons, students construct their balloons from tissue paper, They choose the colors, cut the patterns and glue them together. Once the balloons are tested indoors to make sure there are no holes, they are then taken outside and launched. The students love this project because they like to compete to see whose balloon will fly the highest.