Photo: Herbert Morrison Technical High engineering club’s (back row, left to right): Ryan Gooden, Javey Heaven, (front row, left to right) Prudent Salmon, Kevin Coke, mechanical technology teacher, and Kayla Hewan pose for The Gleaner on Day Two yesterday during the Jamaica Teachers’ Association 60th Anniversary Education Conference at Ocean Coral Spring in Trelawny.
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ST JAMES’ Herbert Morrison Technical High School is moving towards fully embracing STEAM education through their industrious engineering club, says mechanical technology teacher Kevin Coke.
Coke, while speaking to The Gleaner at the Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) 60th anniversary Education Conference at the Ocean Coral Spring in Trelawny yesterday, spoke extensively of collaborative teaching practices being explored at the technical institution.
This year’s JTA conference is being hosted under the theme Full STEAM Ahead: Advancing Digital and Future Skills.
STEAM education is an approach to teaching that brings focus to the use of science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics to encourage critical thinking and innovation in the education sector.
Coke told The Gleaner that Herbert Morrison’s engineering club has been making waves with the innovative projects being explored by the youngsters. Members of the club have designed and developed the school’s website, along with a virtual model of their school compound, and are also integral in the design of the yearly graduation paraphernalia.
The club’s creative ideas are also evident in their design of the new Herbert Morrison identification cards, which will be paired with an updated security system, also being developed by the students.
Coke said that there are plans afoot to collaborate with other departments at the school to push this method of “project-based learning”.
“Herbert Morrison has been using a STEAM curriculum prior to STEAM and STEM being publicly announced as the mantra going forward, but we have been doing it through the department in a smaller circle,” said Coke.
“What we need to do now is broaden it across the entire school and other departments so they can participate in the process, and that is what we are doing now. I have already approached the mathematics head of department at the school, Mrs Tracey Smith-Williams, and she is going to use the model to teach the boys the importance of math,” he added.
“I have also approached the science department, and they have decided to look at the different materials in chemistry, so they, too, are on board. The entire school is coming on board little by little, but we are getting there,” Coke explained.
Project-based learning
The mechanical technology teacher further told The Gleaner that with the introduction to STEAM education, his students are exposed to, and are well versed, in different subject areas as they seek additional ways to bring their projects to life.
“My approach is mostly project-based learning, where students find a problem and come up with a project to solve that particular problem. Whenever those projects are completed or the products are developed, they are used as teaching aids or instructional items to further teach students how the other subjects are related, and that is what STEAM is all about,” said Coke.
He said that this approach also stresses the importance of understanding the different disciplines.
“We have students who want to learn auto-mechanics, but they are not seeing how chemistry is related to auto-mechanics. When they go into the building process of these projects, the knowledge in chemistry and physics are required or the product won’t work,” he explained.
Pointing to joint work being done by the engineering club and woodwork students, Coke told The Gleaner that they have been exploring innovative ways to teach in that department.
Their latest project is the building of a queen-sized bed.
“Traditionally, our style of teaching was that if you are doing metalwork, you have to do straight metal and if you are doing woodwork, you just make furniture straight from wood. But we are now having an issue where insects are eating the boards, so we must throw out the furniture. We have decided to integrate materials, so we made the structure from metal, and we use board for the other areas,” said Coke.
“We have also improved the design by making it portable, so it is easy to move. A lot of people think that because it is metal, then the bed must be heavy, but we designed it to be easily collapsible, so transportation is easy. Those are the types of ideas incorporated in the teaching, and I have learned that one of the greatest things we can do is to do common things in an uncommon way,” the Herbert Morrison teacher added.