100 Easy STEAM Activities: Awesome Hands-On Projects for Aspiring Artists and Engineers

The book also explains the science behind each activity and possible variations of each activity. While the activities do not explicitly define an engineering problem, with the knowledge learned from each activity, users are encouraged to explore new science experiments and activities and apply them to future engineering problems. Most activities can be completed independently, but may require adult assistance to acquire the necessary equipment for some experiments. 

The book is an introductory science book to allow traditional school-science experiments to be conducted at home. This is a great gift for young children to help them learn science and engineering through hands-on activities. The directions for each activity are clear and concise and there are photographs that complement the directions for most of the activities. Because the book appeals to a wide age-range, the user might not complete all the activities in the book as some of them might be a bit too simplistic for an older audience. For younger readers, some activities may initially be a bit too complex for the user to fully understand the science behind the experiment. The book is broken into categories for each of the STEAM components, so while not all the activities promote engineering, they will all promote engaging STEAM-related concepts providing the user the opportunity to build hard skills in all categories. Because most of the activities in the book are science-based experiments, the most consistent skill the reader will exercise throughout the book is the ability to understand processes of design. Completing the activities in this book would be an excellent team-building exercise. The difficulty level of the activities ranges widely, so it is easy for a younger audience to move up to the more complex activities as they gain the skills.  

The book is an excellent resource to integrate existing knowledge into a fun hands-on activity. The book also encourages users to go above and beyond the experiments provided and integrate their knowledge to make the experiments more complex.  With seemingly endless activities to help the reader keep busy, 100 Easy STEAM Activities will bring science class home and will help aspiring young scientists gain insight into the many different aspects of engineering thinking and design in a fun and educational way.

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Framework Categories

Engineering Thinking (EThink)
Processes of Design (POD)
Apply SEM Knowledge (SEM)

Moore, T.J., Glancy, A.W., Tank, K.M., Kersten, J.A., Smith, K.A., & Stohlmann, M.S. (2014). A framework for quality K-12 engineering education: Research and development. Journal of Precollege Engineering Education Research, 4(1), 1-13.