stem research project middle school

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50 Best STEM Projects for Middle School Kids

Science Activities for Middle Schoolers

Technology activities for middle schoolers, engineering activities for middle schoolers, math activities for middle schoolers.

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STEM projects for middle school are an excellent way to engage young minds and spark their curiosity in science, technology, engineering, and math. Research supports that STEM activities positively impact the scientific creativity of middle school students. These exercises give students an enjoyable learning experience and promote critical thinking and problem-solving abilities .

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Additionally, middle school STEM programs help foster interest in these subjects, develop skills, improve future job prospects, encourage creativity and innovation, and promote diversity and inclusivity. However, before delving into the exciting projects, it’s essential to understand why STEM programs in middle school are crucial for a student’s academic journey.

5 Essentials Of Middle School STEM Programs

In the modern work market, STEM education has increased. Students in middle school are at a pivotal point in their development, and exposure to STEM education can greatly impact how they grow academically and professionally. The following justifies the necessity of STEM programs in middle schools.

1. Fostering Interest in STEM

Middle school STEM programs offer an interactive and immersive approach to STEM education by providing hands-on opportunities for students to engage in projects and experiments, which can lead to deeper comprehension and enthusiasm for these subjects. The Journal of Pedagogical Research suggests that a STEM-focused learning environment can positively influence academic achievement in science. Moreover, STEM education provides students with practical applications of these topics in the real world, which fosters a heightened curiosity and drive for learning. 

2. Developing Critical Thinking Skills

Problem-solving and critical thinking abilities are emphasized in STEM education. Students’ minds are still developing throughout middle school. Thus, STEM education can aid in the development of the abilities necessary for success in the real world. 

3. Improving Future Job Prospects

Middle school STEM education can provide students with the essential abilities and skills necessary to pursue high-paying professions in the rapidly-growing STEM sectors of the contemporary economy. 

4. Encouraging Creativity and Innovation

Middle school STEM programs have been known to be a catalyst for fostering creativity and innovation among students. This is because these programs equip students with the necessary skills to design, build, and test their projects, which can be quite perplexing. By undertaking middle school STEM programs, children can develop the courage and aptitude to take risks, think outside the box, and solve problems in novel and unexpected ways.

5. Promoting Diversity and Inclusivity

The benefits of STEM education extend beyond just individual development, as it can also promote diversity and inclusivity among students. Regardless of background, all students have equal opportunities to learn and succeed in STEM. By introducing students to a wide range of STEM occupations and showcasing the achievements of underrepresented groups in these industries, middle school STEM programs can inspire kids from diverse backgrounds to pursue their interests in these disciplines.

What Does STEM Education for Middle Schoolers Look Like?

Middle school STEM education is a way of teaching that focuses on science, technology, engineering, and math. It’s exciting and interactive, aiming to help students become skilled in these subjects. The main goal is to give students the knowledge and abilities they need to handle the many challenges of our ever-changing technology-driven world.

“STEM education is not just about learning scientific concepts and principles; it’s about developing critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration skills that will benefit students throughout their lives.” – Arne Duncan, former U.S. Secretary of Education.

Students are introduced to the fundamentals of STEM disciplines in middle school through practical, project-based learning . They investigate the scientific method, study the fundamentals of engineering and design, and become aware of the wonders of math and technology.

Middle schoolers can develop critical thinking skills, problem-solving abilities, and creativity through STEM education. Research suggest that STEM activities effectively develop positive views toward interdisciplinary education and 21st-century skills such as creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, and problem-solving. By engaging in STEM activities , students can also improve their science process skills, STEM career interests, motivation, and views about STEM education. 

50 Best STEM Activities for Middle School Kids

Engaging in STEM activities for middle school kids, students can gain valuable skills and knowledge that will assist them in success in high school, college, and beyond. So, without further ado, let’s explore these best STEM activities for kids!

“STEM learning is vital for the future success of our students and our country. By engaging students in hands-on projects and encouraging their curiosity, we can inspire the next generation of innovators.” – Mae Jemison, former NASA astronaut and founder of the Jemison Group.

Science is essential to STEM education and can be incredibly engaging and exciting for middle schoolers. Here are some science-related STEM activities for middle school kids that can inspire young minds to discover the world around them.

• Chemical Reactions: Mix baking soda and vinegar to observe the fizzy reaction. Try other combinations like lemon juice and baking soda.
• Solar Oven: Cut a flap in a cardboard box and line it with foil. Place food inside and keep it in the sun to cook.
• Egg Drop Challenge: Gather materials like straws, paper, and tape. Create a protective structure around an egg and drop it from a height.
• Rock Candy Experiment: Dissolve sugar in hot water and grow crystals on a string suspended in the solution.
• Volcano Eruption:  Build a clay volcano around a small bottle. Mix baking soda and vinegar inside the bottle for an eruption.

• Hovercraft: Glue a balloon to a CD, then inflate the balloon and place the CD on a smooth surface to create a hovercraft.
• Slime Making: Mix glue, water, and borax solution to create slime. Explore different ratios for varying consistencies.
• Bottle Rocket Launch: Fill a plastic bottle partially with water, then quickly attach a cork and pump air inside to launch the rocket.
• Sundial Crafting: Place a stick vertically in the ground, and mark the shadow cast by the sun at different times of the day.
• Plant Growth Study:  Plant seeds in pots with varying amounts of sunlight, water, and soil to observe their growth over time.

• Static Electricity: Rub balloons against clothing to create static charge. Test its effect on objects like paper and hair.
• Dissecting Owl Pellets: Purchase owl pellets and use tweezers to carefully dissect them, identifying the bones of small animals.
• Microscope Adventures:  Collect samples from ponds or leaves, place them on slides, and observe under a microscope to discover tiny organisms.

Now that we’ve explored some exciting science-related STEM ideas for middle school kids, let’s look at engaging technology activities to help students develop important coding, programing and digital literacy skills.

Technology activities for middle schoolers are designed to introduce students to coding, programing, and digital design basics. These hands-on activities are a great way to build technical skills while fostering creativity and innovation. Here are a few technology-related STEM activities for middle school kids.

• Coding Basics: Use online platforms like Scratch or Code.org to start learning coding concepts through interactive tutorials and projects.
• Robotics Challenge:  Provide robot kits with instructions and coding software. Students follow the instructions to assemble the robot and write code to make it perform tasks.

• App Design: Utilize app development tools or platforms like MIT App Inventor to design and prototype mobile apps. Students can create simple apps and explore different features.
• 3D Printing: Teach students how to use 3D modeling software to design objects. Then, print the designs using a 3D printer.
• Website Creation: Introduce HTML and CSS coding languages to build a basic website. Students can experiment with customizing their site.
• Video Game Design: Use game development software like GameMaker or Unity to design and create simple video games with characters, levels, and gameplay.
• Augmented Reality (AR) Exploration:  Explore AR technology using AR apps or platforms. Students can create interactive experiences by overlaying virtual objects on the real world.

• Green Screen Projects: Provide a green screen and video editing software. Students can record themselves against the green screen and use the software to replace the background with any image or video.
• Electronic Circuits: Use a circuit kit with components like LEDs, resistors, and wires. Students follow diagrams to build circuits and learn about electronics.
• Digital Storytelling: Use digital tools like PowerPoint or video editing software to create multimedia stories with text, images, and audio narration.
• Internet Research Challenge: Assign specific research topics, and guide students on using search engines and reputable websites to find relevant information.
• Cybersecurity Awareness: Conduct discussions and workshops on online safety, creating strong passwords, and protecting personal information from online threats.
• Virtual Field Trips: Utilize virtual reality headsets or online platforms with virtual tours to take students on immersive journeys to museums, historical sites, or outer space.

Now that we’ve explored some exciting technology-related STEM projects for middle school kids, let’s shift our focus to engineering. These activities are designed to introduce students to engineering and design principles and provide hands-on opportunities to create and build.

Engineering activities are a great way for middle schoolers to explore design principles, problem-solving, and creativity. These activities help develop important skills that benefit students in all aspects of life. Here are a few engineering-related STEM projects for middle school kids that are both fun and educational.

• Popsicle Stick Bridges: Provide popsicle sticks and glue. Instruct students to design and build bridges using the sticks, aiming to make them sturdy enough to hold weight.
• Hydraulic Lifts: Provide syringes, plastic tubes, and water. Students build a hydraulic lift system using syringes and water to lift objects.
• Spaghetti Towers: Offer uncooked spaghetti and marshmallows as building materials. Challenge students to construct tall and stable towers using the two items.
• Water Filtration:  Teach students about water filtration concepts. Provide various materials like sand, gravel, and cotton balls for them to build their filtration systems and test their effectiveness.

• Egg Parachute Drop: Provide materials like plastic bags, strings, and cushioning materials. Have students construct a parachute to safely drop an egg from a height.
• Catapult Challenge: Gather materials like popsicle sticks, rubber bands, and plastic spoons. Instruct students to build a working catapult and launch small objects towards targets.
• Mini Wind Turbines: Provide students with materials like cardboard, straws, and small motors. Guide them in creating miniature wind turbines to generate electricity from wind energy.
• Simple Machines Exploration: Set up stations with different simple machines like pulleys, levers, and inclined planes. Allow students to experiment and learn how these machines work.
• Sustainable Building Designs: Introduce sustainable building practices to students. Let them design and sketch eco-friendly and energy-efficient buildings or houses on paper.
• Bristlebot Robots: Provide toothbrush heads, small vibrating motors, and batteries. Show students how to assemble these components into tiny robots called Bristlebots that move around.
• DIY Waterwheel: Provide materials like popsicle sticks, cups, and a small water source. Students design and build a waterwheel to harness water energy.

While engineering activities focus on design and problem-solving, math activities for middle schoolers aim to build a strong foundation in mathematical concepts and practical applications. Let’s look at some engaging and hands-on math activities that middle schoolers can enjoy and learn from.

Middle school math activities are made to help kids develop a solid mathematical foundation while also exposing them to real-world applications of mathematics. Through these exercises, students can improve their ability to think logically, solve problems, and appreciate the beauty of mathematics. A few math projects and activities are listed below for middle school students to try out.

• Math Scavenger Hunt: Create a list of math-related items or problems for students to find and solve around the school or outdoors.
• Fraction Pizza: Use construction paper to create “pizza slices,” and have students color in fractions to represent different toppings.
• Math Board Games:  Introduce math-based board games like “Math Bingo” or “Math Jeopardy” to reinforce skills in a fun way.

• Math Art: Have students create geometric art using shapes, angles, and symmetry.
• Math Puzzles: Provide various math puzzles like Sudoku, logic puzzles, or tangrams to challenge problem-solving abilities.
• Real-World Budgeting: Assign students a hypothetical budgeting project to plan for expenses like groceries, entertainment, and savings.
• Data Analysis with Graphs: Present students with real data sets and guide them in creating different types of graphs to analyze the information.
• Math Escape Room: Design a math-themed escape room with puzzles and problems that students must solve to “escape.”
• Geometry Construction: Teach students how to use a compass and straightedge to construct geometric shapes and angles.
• Math Relay Race:  Divide students into teams and create a relay race with math problems they must solve to pass the baton.

• Mathematical Storytelling: Have students write stories or scenarios that involve math concepts and solve problems within the narrative.
• Measurement Olympics: Set up a measurement-based competition, like seeing who can estimate and measure the length of various objects most accurately.
• Math in Nature: Take students outside to explore the environment and find examples of math concepts like patterns , symmetry, and angles in nature.

Engaging in hands-on learning through math activities and projects can help middle school students develop a deep understanding and appreciation for mathematics. Having explored a variety of fun STEM activities for middle school, it’s worth considering how we can integrate STEM learning into other aspects of a student’s daily experience, including during recess or on the playground.

4 Ways To Integrate STEM Activities Into Middle School Playgrounds

Middle school is a pivotal developmental period for students, marked by a strong desire for knowledge acquisition and exploration. In this phase, students indulge in both physical activity and cognitive stimulation, and incorporating STEM projects for middle school can substantially enhance their educational experience. Thus, it is imperative to investigate why STEM activities should be included in the middle school playground, and one promising answer is through interactive learning stations.

1. Interactive Learning Stations

These learning stations offer a unique opportunity for students to learn while simultaneously enjoying themselves via experiential education. Specifically, students can engage in hands-on activities such as building miniature wind turbines or constructing solar-powered vehicles, which can enhance their problem-solving skills and deepen their understanding of STEM concepts.

2. Outdoor Laboratories

Students may conduct experiments and gather data in outdoor laboratories because they are situated in a natural setting. Weather stations, gardens, and animal habitats can all be included as part of these laboratories. Kids can develop a passion for science and receive real-world experience by participating in these events.

3. Technology Enhanced Playgrounds

The utilization of technology-enhanced playgrounds represents a novel opportunity to combine fitness and STEM activities, thereby improving student engagement in the form of augmented reality activities, interactive displays, and sensory tools. The resultant learning experience is distinctive and enriching. By integrating technology into gardening , students can augment their digital literacy in a enjoyable and educationally valuable manner.

4. Innovative Equipment

Innovative tools can be utilized to design fun STEM projects for middle school that pushes kids to think creatively. Programable robots, 3D printers, and virtual reality headsets are a few examples of this equipment. With the use of this equipment, kids can enhance their creativity and problem-solving abilities while learning more about STEM principles.

The academic achievement, physical health, and general well-being of children can all be dramatically impacted by including STEM activities in middle school playgrounds. By giving children the chance to participate in practical STEM activities, we can help them acquire crucial abilities that will set them up for future success.

Middle school completion is an indispensable prerequisite for reinforcing students’ aptitude and mastery in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). STEM challenges for middle school students are boundless and varied. We must encourage them to face challenges and in order to ensure that students are equipped for future prosperity, we must proffer them with diverting, interactive, and engaging STEM-related activities. Integration of STEM education within the middle school curricula can be accomplished through various methods such as interactive learning stations, avant-garde tools, and outdoor laboratories.

By providing middle schoolers with the best STEM activities, we can encourage and kindle their passion, empowering them to create a better future. Let us, therefore, take the initiative and encourage our schools to allocate sufficient funding toward STEM education. This will help our children realize their full potential and have a transformative impact on the world.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Can middle school stem instruction aid pupils with learning disabilities.

STEM instruction can be modified to meet the needs of children with varying learning preferences and aptitudes. All pupils can benefit from the promotion of problem-solving and critical-thinking abilities.

At what age can you start STEM?

STEM education can start as early as preschool and continues through elementary, middle, and high school. Introducing STEM concepts early helps foster curiosity and lays the foundation for future learning and exploration in science, technology, engineering, and math.

Does incorporating STEM activities into middle school playgrounds come with any risks?

When incorporating STEM activities into playgrounds, safety should always come first. It’s critical to correctly identify risks, train staff members and teachers, and maintain equipment.

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50 STEM Projects For Middle School: Structures, Experiments, Discussions, Challenges, DIYs, And Games

April 4, 2024 //  by  Stephanie Ledford

STEM: Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math! This exciting topic puts your students at the center of learning by encouraging exploration and innovation to solve problems. By doing so, we are creating tomorrow’s cutting-edge leaders, ready to make new discoveries and advances that we couldn’t even dream up! Check out these awesome STEM projects that are perfect for middle school to cultivate the next generation of scientific, technological, engineering, and mathematical innovators!

1. Scaling Up Candy Wrappers

Teach your kids about increasing the scale of an image by using grids. This activity works well with candy wrappers or cartoon characters, as these are things every middle schooler is interested in! You can also use this idea to teach them how to use grids to decrease the size of their drawings.

Learn More: Fast Times Of A Middle School Math Teacher

2. Leaning Tower of Pasta

Have your students practice their engineering skills with this fun activity using pasta and marshmallows! They’ll learn about concepts like compression and tension as they try to build the tallest and strongest structures! Dial up the competitive spirit with a prize for the winning team!

Learn More: Teach Engineering

3. Toothpick Bridge

Another creative engineering project for your middle schoolers is this toothpick bridge project. Your kiddos will only need glue and toothpicks to design and build some awesome bridges. They’ll earn extra points if their bridges are strong and can hold a lot of weight!

Learn More: Instructables

4. I Breathe What?

If you are looking for an activity that combines engineering and science then look no further! Your kids will build pollution detectors out of card, string, and sticky tape, to put in different areas. They’ll then collect these and use a magnifying glass to examine all of the different particles that have been caught. The results may be surprising!

Learn More: YouTube

5. Backyard Weather Station

Teach your students about how we’re able to measure and predict weather patterns using weather stations. After making their own predictions about what the weather will do, your budding meteorologists will build their own weather stations complete with a weather vane, barometer, rain gauge, and thermometer!!

Learn More: eGFI

6. One Million Dollar Project

Show your middle school students the value of the dollar with this fun math assignment! They’ll delight in planning how they’d spend one million dollars, but it won’t be all about fun and games! They’ll need to take real-life expenses into consideration, such as paying for college and buying a house. They’re sure to appreciate their weekly allowance that much more!

Learn More: 4mula Fun!

7. Protect Your Body, Filter Your Water!

Having access to clean water is a huge concern for many people around the world, so being able to filter dirty water to make it drinkable is invaluable! Put your kiddies’ engineering skills to the test as they work out the best way to create their own water filters using a sieve and some activated charcoal.

8. Paper Roller Coasters

Who doesn’t love a roller coaster? This fun STEM challenge will have your little engineers use paper, card stock, and tape to build their own roller coasters. Next, they’ll roll a marble along the track and see if it makes its way to the end! They’ll be amazed at what kind of thought goes into their local fun park!

9. Fire Snake

This is one of those science experiments your students will remember for many years to come! Set up this experiment by lining a bowl with sand, then add sugar and baking soda on top. Next, saturate the mixture with some lighter fluid, then have your kiddies stand back as you light it up! They’ll be amazed by the interactions of the different elements and love the final product!

Learn More: Surviving a Teacher’s Salary

10. Alka Seltzer Lava Lamp

Add this one to your simple STEM projects folder straight away! Have your kiddos combine food coloring, vegetable oil, and water in a clear jar or bottle, then start the show by adding an Alka Seltzer tablet! The way the different elements interact in this fun, simple experiment will be awe-inspiring for your class.

Learn More: Fun Learning for Kids

11. Ice Cream in a Bag

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream! Who knew there was science involved in making ice cream? Get your learners to combine and seal half and half, sugar, and vanilla in a zip lock bag, then place this into a bigger bag filled with ice and salt. After a good shake, their ice cream is ready for a taste test!

Learn More: The Best Ideas for Kids

12. Paper Airplane Challenge

There are tons of STEM challenges you can do with your students involving paper airplanes. They’re probably bored of seeing whose airplane will fly the furthest, so why not shake things up by seeing whose can carry the most cargo? They’ll be having so much fun that they won’t even realize they’ve become engineers!

Learn More: Kids Activities

13. Fidget Spinner Challenge

While fidget spinners may have momentarily driven teachers crazy, they can actually be a great learning opportunity!! Use them to teach your class about the engineering design process; from having your kids create their own design to using math concepts for budgeting the cost of building one, they’re sure to have fun with this one!

Learn More: Momgineer

14. Comparing Slime And Other Polymers STEM Activity

A great STEM activity that’s sure to excite your little scientists is one that involves slime! In this project you can make slime and other polymers and non-Newtonian fluids then compare the properties of each! What a perfect way to get your class talking about and practicing scientific investigative processes!

Learn More: STEAM-Powered Family

15. No Valve in Vain

Your kids will be inspired to learn that biomedical engineers design things that not only assist people but also keep them alive! In this STEM activity, you’ll teach your class how to create a one-way valve like the ones found in our hearts. They’ll see how this simple concept ensures that our blood continues to pump around our bodies.

16. Balloon Powered Car

Look no further for your next STEM project than the balloon-powered car! Using various crafting or recycled materials, your kiddies will build their cars and learn how an axle allows the wheels to turn as the balloon propels their cars across the room! There are so many different concepts you can cover in this one STEM challenge!

Learn More: Teaching Science

17. Elephant Toothpaste

Let your kiddos discover how some hydrogen peroxide can turn some everyday materials into elephant toothpaste! They’ll combine dish soap and food coloring with the peroxide, then add yeast to kick things off! This exciting chemical reaction isn’t one they’ll forget in a hurry!

Learn More: Fractus Learning

18. Bath Bombs

In this fun experiment, your kiddos will form hypotheses about how water temperatures will affect the eruptions of bath bombs. After they’ve made their predictions, they can fill up a tub with some water and get to testing! If you have time, you could have them create their own bath bombs for this project!?

Learn More: Argo Food Service

19. Candy Crystals

Creating these gorgeous lollies with your learners is sure to delight! Who knew that growing your own rock candy was so easy? Have your them create a mixture of sugar, water, and food dye, then submerge their prepared sticks and wait for the magic to happen! They’ll be amazed as they watch their candy crystals grow before their eyes!

Learn More: Better Life Blog

20. Marble Speed Trap

Toys + science = FUN! Use LEGOs and marbles to review and reinforce the concept of velocity with your kiddies. They’ll build their very own speed trap in this engaging activity using some light sensors which will measure the speed that the marble travels down the track! There’ll be no slowing these scientists’ learning down, that’s for sure!

Learn More: Blog She Wrote

21. Cell Phone Stand

One thing we all have in our pockets these days is a cell phone. And why not make it the main attraction in this fun STEM activity? Have your kids use the design process to reimagine a common cell phone stand and then have them bring their visions into reality by using various crafting materials from around the classroom.

Learn More: Scientific American

22. Cloud in a Bottle

Inspire your future meteorologists with this unbelievable experiment! Using just a clear bottle, a few drops of water, and a match they’ll get to see firsthand how water condenses to form a cloud!

Learn More: The Water Project.org

23. Snickers Rock Models

Did you know that a simple Snickers bar can be used to represent three kinds of rock? Have your kiddos explore the layers of this delicious candy bar and experiment with applying pressure and heat to discover the effects these have on sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic rock. 

Learn More: Organized Homeschooler

24. Windmill STEM Challenge

Engage your kids’ engineering mindsets with this windmill construction challenge, based on the story of The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. They’ll use recyclables to explore, design, test, and refine models of windmills. This is an awesome way for them to explore future careers in STEM.

Learn More: Carly & Adam

25. Layers of The Ocean And Density

STEM activities are a great way to bring abstract scientific concepts, such as the layers of the ocean, to life for your students! This activity uses sand, salt, and water to make a mini-ocean in a glass. Your class will measure the different densities of these materials and discover how this relates to the ocean’s layers. 

Learn More: Homeschool Momgineer

26. Bouncy Naked Eggs

Shell-less eggs are sure to fascinate your students, whatever their age!  Give your learners an unboiled egg to put in some vinegar for about 24 hours; the result is a shell-less bouncy egg! Take this classic experiment a step further by predicting and testing which egg is the bounciest.

Learn More: Science Sparks

27. Glowing Eggs

Let your kiddies take the “naked egg” experiment to the next level with just one more ingredient–the ink from a highlighter! Add the ink pad from a highlighter to vinegar, then add the egg Once the shell has dissolved, take the egg to a dark room and shine a light on it! Talk about a glow-up! 

Learn More: Frugal Coupon Living

28. The Science of Sound Waves

Visualizing scientific concepts like sound waves can be tricky! However, with just a spoon, some string, and a ruler, your students will start to get the idea. First, have them tie a spoon to the end of two lengths of yarn and hold the yarn to their ears. Next, tap the spoon and watch the “Ah ha!” moment in real-time!

Learn More: KC Edventures

29. How Does a Leaf Breathe?

No lungs? No problem! Have your kids put a leaf in a bowl of water, set it in the sun, and watch as the magic of photosynthesis happens. Seeing the oxygen bubbles form on the surface of the leaf will show them this process in real-time! 

30. Ping-Pong Ball Launcher

Get your kiddos outside with this fun rocket ball launcher experiment! Using a recycled plastic bottle and some rubber bands, your kiddos will learn about a ton of important STEM concepts such as the transfer of energy, inertia, and velocity. Create your basic prototype then let them tinker with the design to make improvements!

Learn More: Frugal Fun 4 Boys

31. Marble Energy Transfer

Build your kiddos’ understanding of how energy is transferred between objects in this intriguing marble experiment! Using their prior knowledge of potential and kinetic energy, they’ll make predictions about what will happen to the marbles when they collide and how far they will travel.

32. LEGO Wrecking Ball

What’s better than building a LEGO tower? Using it to knock things down! For all your future engineers, it’ll be a hit to build some functional machines during a STEM design challenge! Using just a golf ball, some string, and a few LEGOs, task them with constructing a wrecking ball that’ll knock over anything standing in its way!

Learn More: LEGO Librarian

33. DIY Phone Amplifier

Check, one, two, three! Your music lovers will love this one. They’ll get to have a dance party in class, but must first they’ve got figure out how to amplify the music from a phone. Using only recyclable materials, have them build a device that’ll turn up the tunes!

Learn More: Mum In The Madhouse

34. Catapult Circuit Challenge

Ready, aim, fire! Have your kiddos engineer catapults from simple materials in this classic STEM activity. You can extend this activity by challenging them to complete several tests and get the perfect collapse! They’ll need to truly follow the engineering design process, revisiting and tweaking their machines in the pursuit of efficiency!

Learn More: Vivify STEM

35. Space Lander Challenge

In this incredible activity for your middle school kids, they’ll integrate physical science concepts and their problem-solving skills. They’ll be tasked with the real-world problem of developing a stable spacecraft that protects the “astronauts” inside upon landing. It’ll only take a few simple materials and some marshmallows to prepare!

36. Index Card Challenge

This simple activity is the perfect icebreaker for your middle school kids and also incorporates STEM. First, split your learners into groups and give them a couple of minutes to write things they have in common on index cards. Next, they must race against each other to build the tallest card tower possible!

Learn More: Beakers And Ink

37. Saving Sam

Saving Sam is a STEM challenge for your table groups with a team-building element! Your kiddos have got to work together to save poor Sam, the gummy worm but they’ll only be allowed to use paperclips to flip his capsized boat and get his lifesaver on! This activity highlights the importance of sharing ideas respectfully, as they would in future STEM fields.

38. DIY Smartphone Projector

Your middle school students will explore concepts of projection and magnification as they work to create a functioning movie projector. After creating the projector from just a magnifying lens and box, your students can vote on which movie to watch as they test out their creation!

Learn More: The STEM Laboratory

39. Pinball Machine Challenge

Are there any pinball wizards in the room? Take your kiddies back to the days of arcades with this super fun pinball machine engineering activity. Have them design a functional pinball machine, complete with flippers, a plunger, and score holes, and prompt them to consider STEM concepts like the laws of motion, force, and velocity!

Learn More: Teach Student Savvy

40. Simple Machine Bird

Strengthen your learners’ engineering mindset as they build a mechanical bird complete with levers and gears! All you’ll need is some cardboard, popsicle sticks, and some plastic gear sets to challenge them to construct a bird that is able to flap its wings! This cool STEM activity will build an understanding of how simple machines are built.

41. Water Pipelines

Connect your classroom STEM lessons with future career pathways through this introduction to water pipelines! Your kiddies will use their problem-solving abilities to move water from a reservoir through straw pipelines! Can they get the water from A to B without any leaks?

Learn More: Teachers Are Terrific

42. Earthquake Structures

Can your students build an earthquake-proof structure? Guide them as they investigate the properties of stable structures and then use simple materials to create multi-level buildings that can withstand a Jello earthquake! This fun STEM activity is a super hands-on way to shake things up for your middle schoolers!

43. Thaumatrope

During this STEM lesson, you’ll teach your students the scientific magic behind a classic toy from the old days; the thaumatrope!  First, your kiddos will trace or draw designs on the two sides of a cardstock circle. Then, after learning about “persistence of vision,” they’ll add rubber bands and spin their creations to see them in action as the two images blend together.

Learn More: What We Do All Day

44. Pringles Ring

Amaze your kiddos with this feat of friction and gravity as they work to construct rings of only Pringles chips. By carefully placing the chips in the correct pattern, they’ll be able to form a solid ring that stands without support! Amazing, right? The best part is that their creation becomes an edible reward in the end!

45. Light Painting

Light painting may seem like just a fun social media trend, but on a deeper level, it is an exploration of camera exposure and light! Turn out the lights, set your camera on a long exposure mode, and show your kiddos what types of images they can create with just a torch or glow stick! 

Learn More: Pink Stripey Socks

46. Video Game Coding

Before delving into your classroom unit on video game engineering,  challenge your kids to complete the same type of tasks in a hands-on way. Encourage them to think through their overall layout, familiarize themselves with commands, and figure out what they’ll need to incorporate into a purposeful game design.

Learn More: Teachers Pay Teachers

47. Design a Video Game

Introduce your learners to basic game coding concepts with this super offering! The software is right at their fingertips with Google CS First for them to learn how to create simple racing games. and as it meets ISTE standards! What a fun and practical resource to help your middle schoolers meet the STEM curriculum. 

Learn More: Google CS First

48. Lightbot Coding

Lightbot is another fantastic online resource for building your students’ understanding of coding. They will get to practice their skills in relaying commands, making loops, and utilizing their critical thinking skills on this interactive platform. This a great choice for a STEM block or as an activity for your early finishers! 

Learn More: Light Bot

49. Printable Debugging Game

Debugging is an important principle of coding that your kiddos should learn early on. Grab this quick and easy debugging practice printable to tap into their critical thinking skills. It’s sure to show your kids the importance of thorough, error-free coding, which is critical for a future career in computer science!

Learn More: iGame Mom

50. Digital Artist

Looking for an awesome online resource that combines art and technology? Code has numerous coding games and activities to teach your students the basics of code and Artist is no exception!! Your class will be totally engaged as they follow the on-screen coding instructions to create increasingly difficult shapes. They’ll be coding pixels to create masterpieces in no time!

Learn More: Code  

20 STEM Projects That Are Great for Middle School

Krystal DeVille

February 15, 2024

Middle schoolers experience a great time of exploration and learning during these formative years. Explore these middle school STEM projects, designed to enhance STEM education by engaging students in hands-on learning. Pick which ones you want to try first.

Simply click the title of each lesson in the list to get the full lesson plan for these great STEM challenges that align with lessons for middle school science, technology, engineering, and math objectives. Alongside these projects, we also offer a variety of easy STEM challenges that can serve as introductory activities for beginners.

I’ve gone through all the educational subscription boxes for teenagers and put together the best ones in this resource, teenagers’ top STEM subscription boxes.

Table of Contents

STEM Activities for Middle School Students

1.  i breathe what.

Students enhance their problem-solving skills and understanding of the scientific method by exploring air quality through pollen, dust, and particulates using their homemade ‘pollution detectors.’ They will hypothesize what causes the differences and explain why engineers look at the particulate matter when they observe air quality.

2. Design a Bridge

This is a fun way of using simple machines and various materials, students design bridges that can hold 100 pennies for 30 seconds without collapsing, teaching them fundamental principles of physics. Review engineering concepts such as load and force with your classes before they get started. Consider using craft sticks as one of the materials, which are great for learning about weight distribution and structural integrity.

3. Spaghetti Soapbox Derby

In this science experiment, pairs of students design, build, and test model vehicles made from dry pasta and hot glue, with the goal of rolling along a ramp and coasting as far as possible. This STEM activity focuses on using somewhat challenging materials in the best ways possible.

For an added challenge, students can use rubber bands to enhance the propulsion of their pasta vehicles.

4. Trail Planning Using Topographic Quadrangle Maps

This earth science activity first calls for familiarity with US Geological Survey quadrangle maps. Working within set guideline requirements, students then use these maps to design a good route for a new recreational trail.

5. Bikini Bottom Genetics

Students apply an understanding of genetics in an analysis of sea creature genotypes that live in SpongeBob SquarePants’ neighborhood. They predict traits of offspring with the use of Punnett squares.

6. Design a Wristwatch for the Visually Impaired

Help your students review the engineering design process. They will then research, model, test and evaluate wristwatches for individuals with visual impairments as an exercise in applying engineering skills in the areas of bioengineering and biomedical engineering.

Take a look at our review of Groovy Lab in a Box . It’s hard to convey, but after reviewing about a dozen educational STEM subscription services, Groovy Lab Box has the most well-thought-out lesson plans!

7. Use Your Shoe!

Teachers collect shoe size data from the class. As a group, they use the data to determine the mean, median, and mode. Students then use that information to make inferences about average shoe size and broader populations. This activity provides a review of how to calculate mean, median, and mode, along with methods to make inferences based on the sample.

While this article focuses on middle schoolers, we also recommend fun and educational STEM projects suitable for elementary students .

8. Mission to Mars

Following a storyline, task your students with completing various STEM challenges, including understanding chemical reactions through a Coke and Mentos experiment as part of a Mars emergency. Teamwork, engineering design, and the use of science topics in real life are all addressed.

9. Snack Time!

Using nutritional information labels from various packaged foods, students will organize and describe that info to show the data in a box-and-whisker plot, bar graph, and pie chart. This activity touches on both math and science standards.

10. No Valve in Vain

Teams of students employ the engineering design process to use tape and plastic tubing to create heart valve models. For this activity, the class reviews the engineering design process and the workings of a one-way valve.

For older kids, particularly high school students looking for more advanced challenges, please check out our article, The Best Science Sets for Teens .

11. Marble Speed Traps with Lego Mindstorms

Students review the formula for velocity . Using drag and drop programming, they code the speed traps to measure the distance between the sensors and time it takes the marble to travel between them. They design the course, write the code, convert units, evaluate, and make changes as needed.

12. The Million Dollar Project

Students imagine inheriting and spending 1 million dollars with specific guidelines of how they may use that money. They research on the internet, record all purchases, learn to write checks, and track all their spending, which reinforces various mathematical concepts.

13. Explore the Law of Inertia using a Fidget Spinner

Review the equations for torque and inertia with students. By removing lights (weight) from spinners, they can explore how the amount of time the device will continue spinning is affected by the mass.

14. Backyard Weather Stations

Working in groups, students describe the current weather and predict future conditions by observing cloud formations. They design backyard weather stations that could gather data for actual forecasting. Technologies for forecasting would be explored, along with weather basics.

15. Leaning Tower of Pasta

Review compression and tension in structure stability with your class. Students use math and engineering concepts to design and build structures with long, dry spaghetti and marshmallows, to find which ones can withstand the largest amount of load.

16. Cleaning the Great Lakes

What better way to understand environmental science than by having students use limited materials to discover how to filter pollutants from dirty water? Teachers may use this challenge activity along with earth science units about water pollution or those concerning local lakes.

17. Soil Biosolarization: Sustainable Weed Killer

Serving as agricultural engineers, students explore the effectiveness of this sustainable weed control technique that uses organic waste instead of poisons. By using seed starter pots, they plant “weeds” and test the use of organic matter, like oatmeal, to see if it kills the weeds, assessing the impact of products and systems.

18. Renewable Energy: Power Your School

In pairs, students use real data to assess the possible use of solar or wind power generation at their school. Using science, math, and engineering concepts, they explore the differences between these two methods, use maps for an analysis of potential, and look at factors related to the feasibility of renewable energy at their location.

19. Generate Your Own Ocean Currents!

Encourage critical thinking and understanding of real-world applications as students design and construct ocean models to study wind-driven currents. Through this challenge project, they will explore circulation patterns, the Coriolis effect, and the transfer of heat from the global ocean convection cycle.

20. Scaling Up Candy Wrappers

Students bring in their favorite candy bar wrappers, choose a scale factor (larger than 5), and enlarge their wrappers to that scale in a drawing on grid paper. Scaling up candy wrappers is not just educational, but also a lot of fun, teaching kids about the math concept of scale factor. They can then color and display their finished projects!

21. Rube Goldberg Machines

What is a rube goldberg machine.

A Rube Goldberg machine is a deliberately complex contraption in which a series of devices perform simple tasks linked together to produce a domino effect, ultimately accomplishing a simple goal in a highly complex manner. Named after the American cartoonist Rube Goldberg, these machines are fantastic tools for teaching students about physics, engineering, and critical thinking.

Why Include Rube Goldberg Machines in Middle School STEM?

• Encourages Creative Thinking : Building these machines requires students to think outside the box and use their imagination to solve problems.
• Teaches Basic Physics Principles : Concepts like energy transfer, motion, and simple machines come to life in a Rube Goldberg project.
• Enhances Teamwork and Collaboration : Students often work in teams, learning to communicate and collaborate to design and build their machines.
• Develops Problem-Solving Skills : Students learn to troubleshoot and iterate, key skills in any STEM field.

Implementing Rube Goldberg Machine Projects

• Introduce the Concept : Start with a brief history of Rube Goldberg and show examples of Rube Goldberg machines, either through videos or illustrations.
• Define the Project Scope : Set clear goals and parameters. For example, each machine must have a minimum number of steps or complete a specific task.
• Materials : Encourage creativity by allowing a wide range of materials, from household items to recycled materials.
• Documentation : Have students document their design process, challenges, and solutions. This can be in the form of a journal, video, or presentation.
• Presentation and Reflection : Allow students to present their machines to the class. Encourage them to discuss what they learned and how they overcame obstacles.

22. Egg Drop Challenge

What is the Egg Drop Challenge? An engaging physics experiment for middle schoolers, the Egg Drop Challenge involves designing a device to protect a raw egg from breaking when dropped from a height. It’s an excellent way for students to apply concepts of gravity, impact force, and material properties.

Why It’s Beneficial:

• Encourages creative problem-solving.
• Demonstrates physics principles like momentum and shock absorption.
• Promotes teamwork and collaborative skills.

Implementing the Challenge:

• Materials: Offer materials like straws, balloons, and craft sticks.
• Design and Build: Students design and construct their egg-protecting devices.
• The Drop: Test the devices by dropping eggs from a set height.
• Analysis: Discuss the outcomes, focusing on physics concepts and design strategies.

Curriculum Alignment: This challenge complements the middle school physics curriculum, applying theoretical concepts practically.

23. The Index Card Tower Challenge

What is the Index Card Tower Challenge? The Index Card Tower Challenge is a straightforward yet engaging activity that introduces students to basic principles of physical science and engineering. Using only index cards, students are challenged to build the tallest possible tower. This activity is the best way to demonstrate concepts like balance, gravity, and kinetic energy, making it perfect for kids of all ages, including younger kids.

Why It’s Essential in STEM Curriculum:

• Introduces Physical Science Concepts: Focuses on basic principles like stability and kinetic energy.
• Encourages Creative Problem-Solving: Challenges students to think innovatively using simple materials.
• Accessible to All Ages: Easily adaptable for different age groups, making it suitable for both younger kids and older students.
• Prepares for Future Careers: Develops foundational skills useful in various STEM fields.
• Materials: Provide students with a stack of index cards.
• Build the Tower: Students experiment with different construction techniques to build their towers.
• Discussion on Physical Science: After the activity, discuss how forces like gravity and kinetic energy influenced their designs.
• Real-World Connection: Relate the activity to real-world structures and engineering challenges.

How It Fits Into STEM Courses: The Index Card Tower Challenge is a versatile activity that can be integrated into various STEM courses. It encourages students to apply scientific principles and think critically about engineering challenges, making it a valuable addition to any STEM curriculum.

How To Make The Most Of These Fun STEM Activities for Middle School Students

Whether in STEM labs, at home, or in the classroom, engaging students with discussion questions throughout these hands-on activities is vital.

To connect with students’ interests, some of these STEM activities offer different ways, including the design or analysis of simple video games, blending technology with creativity.

We rounded up these projects specifically because they align with learning objectives and lessons for 6th to 8th-grade students. Ask how this applies to what they’re currently learning in class? What did the project demonstrate?

Let us know in the comments what your favorite Middle School STEM projects! We’d love to hear them.

2 thoughts on “20 STEM Projects That Are Great for Middle School”

I taught bridge building to sixth grade students. The only thing I taught them was information and diagrams about trusses. They had to take notes for their own use during construction. Gave them the materials, formed groups and gave them them help without interfering with their own ideas. The amount of enthusiasm I have seldom seen in middle school. They were so excited they told their other teachers about the project. The bridges were beautiful and so strong. It was great to see the application of the trusses! I am all for STEM activities!

These are some great activities thanks for sharing and I’ll use them at my school.

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10 Structured STEM Projects For Middle School

Do you want to do STEM projects for middle school but you’re not sure how to structure them or grade them? 

Karen Sinai

Updated October 22, 2023

I’ve got you! It took me years to iron out the kinks but now I LOVE STEM activities! When I first started doing STEM projects, I loved the initial excitement in the room!  I just let students keep working from day to day. Slowly, the students would start to get frustrated, and even bored, and they kept doing restarts. The projects ended up dragging on FOREVER with no good way to wrap them up.

Once I started adding strict structure with brainstorming sessions, check-ins and rubrics, the accountability went way up and the students stayed much more focused. This allowed them to let their creativity kick in and, as a result, the projects have been so much better!

There are 10 major STEM projects that I do in middle school and I have broken them down into three categories: physical science, life science and environmental science. All of the projects involve very little extra materials and I promote using recyclable objects. The only exception to this rule may be the electrical circuit games. Each one of these is a product on Teachers Pay Teachers so you could go grab the directions, check ins, rubrics and follow up questions for each.

What Students Should Know Leaving Middle School Science

Besides all of the concepts that we need to cover, what do students need to know leaving middle school science?

Updated May, 2024

Of course, we want our students to be good citizens and independent workers, but what else? Here is a list of skills that I think we will agree are critical to cover besides our extensive content.

Critical Thinking Is First!

In my opinion, critical, thinking should be the top of the list. Being able to look at data in a rational, organized way, and draw correct conclusions is important. So many “sources” are thrown at us from social media and other places. Teaching students to weed out “the real science” is critical. Many students may not understand the concept of “fake science”. Future voting decisions, homeownership, career choices, and so on will all need to be researched the correct way, with analytical thinking.

Learning critical thinking should be taught as many different ways as possible. I start my classes with CER image writing prompt bell ringers or I weave it into other assignments, such as analyzing a chemical reaction.(Using CER Image Prompts as Bellringers)

I find that praising the students for thinking hard is effective as long as it’s not overdone. Let’s be honest, most students look for quick, easy answers, so they should be rewarded for the extra brain work.

Organizational Skills

One of the hardest things to teach another person is how to organize themselves. So much of it is a personal preference and style. That being said, most middle school students haven’t really “found their groove” yet in terms of being self-sufficient and mindful of their time and materials.

That’s where we come in as teachers to model, model, model.

In sixth grade, I write up most lab result sections with data charts and questions that need to be addressed. Students need to see how it’s done, over and over. This means that by the time they are in eighth grade I can say “create your own data charts” for the lab that we are doing. 

As for student notebooks, I have gone digital, which was the best organizational change I ever made. I let the students design their own pages, and at the end of each unit I have a rubric which includes a table of contents, all homework, assignments, video, notes, book notes, lab reports, activities, project brainstorming, etc.   No more loose papers all over the place. 

If you are using paper notebooks I recommend one composition book per unit. Include a table of contents and a rubric to grade them at the end of the unit. I tried doing whole semester, or yearly, notebooks and it was a mess.

I have mentioned before that my ADHD students, or even those on the spectrum,  thrive with digital organization. I have a student whose handwriting is basically incomprehensible on a written test. I often have to ask him to translate. His digital notebook on Google Slides? Perfect score, every unit.

Teach Them to Be A Good Person

I will always pause my class if I hear someone not treating another correctly. My expectations are high and I never waver when it comes to bullying, insulting or excluding someone else, etc. Respect to themselves, teachers and others ranks high with what students should know when they leave middle school.   As they head for high school, there will be less forgiveness.

 I find boosting a child’s self-esteem goes miles with their behavior towards others. If your classroom is set up for “little wins”, then everyone gets a chance to feel good about themselves. I also use praise. Genuine praise. A little goes a long way!

Study Skills Are Essential

Let’s face it. Many students arrive in middle school without a strong set of study skills. A large part of teaching any subject is teaching students how to learn. Simply telling them to “study for the test” won’t cut it. 

They don’t even know where to start! 

Show them how to use flashcards, quiz websites, paired learning, games, etc. This will help get them motivated to study and to see the benefits. That said, I strongly believe in using many different types of assessments to hit all learning styles.               

How to Take Notes

Everyone should know how to take notes from someone who is speaking or from a text source. Again, we can’t assume students have this skill, and we must model it repeatedly. Give students templates to help organize their thoughts. I especially like Cornell notes and teach it as soon as they get into middle school. After they have completed any notes, I grade them carefully with suggestions.

 Since I have digital notebooks, I can watch the students on their iPads from my iPad. I often realize that I need to slow down and model more. Sometimes several students have barely any words written!

 Many students can’t process notes quickly, so they miss important points. It’s always good to have visuals and to wait for everyone to catch up.

Reading Comprehension and Pulling Information From Text

This is a very important skill.  I have been frustrated seeing even eighth graders read text and choose some of the least important information as they take notes! Guided notes and comprehension questions really work well to teach students how to glean the main ideas out of a text. 

Look for interesting reading passages that have students practicing over and over. Don’t shy away from textbook passages as students will need to use them in high school.

Compare Contrast Using A Venn Diagram

The idea of comparing and contrasting sometimes confuses students as they listen to a lecture, watch a video or read text. Being visual with a diagram helps. However, you will need to model a lot.

Look for situations for students to practice in all of your units. For example, have them compare and contrast the wings of birds and bats, a desert ecosystem to a grassland, or characteristics of a metal versus a nonmetal.

Construct and Read A Graph

When I start teaching graphing to my sixth graders, I start with students using graph paper to draw bar and line graphs. This way, students really understand how and why each plot point is located on the graph. 

We then move onto creating graphs with Google Sheets, Numbers, or Excel. Without doing it on paper first, these apps almost seem to create “magic” as they generate graphs from a spreadsheet. I’ve also noticed that if the app is incorrect at interpreting the spreadsheet, students will pick it up faster if they have done it on paper previously.

Before I did the paper activity, they had the wonkiest, meaningless, computer generated graphs but always with lots of pretty colors!

Search for graphs for students to read and interpret from real data. What trends do they see? How would the graph look differently if the increments of y-axis were changed?  Why would someone presenting the graph change the increments to make the data look more dramatic? Again, the importance of learning to distinguish “real science”. 

Research Skills

I love to bring up a picture of someone using the Dewey decimal system, in a library, and tell students how I did research at their age! We had to go through the filing system, which was difficult in itself, and then pray that the book that we needed was on the right place in the shelf, or even in the library at all! 

Yes, I’m dating myself, but it really gets the point across to the students as they sit there in shock listening to me.

Now the students have the problem that there is TOO MUCH information to weed through and a lot of it is unreliable. Start with explaining the reason why most teachers don’t allow Wikipedia for research and then how anyone can create a website.

OCTUPOD 

When doing research projects always ask the students to use citations and make sure you spot check them. Students must learn the laws of copyright and the consequences for plagiarism. They need to understand that just because an image is on the internet, that they can right click and save, doesn’t give them free rein to use it anywhere. Honestly, many adults still don’t understand that! Google images seems like an endless source of free pictures.

Students also need to understand the methodology for doing a research paper. Model how to outline their thoughts and how to structure the paper so that they don’t ramble randomly.

Work Ethic and Pride in Their Work

This isn’t so easy to teach, but if you set up the classroom with many little wins, it will become easier. Try not to focus on “getting it done for the sake of the grade”. This may encourage overwhelmed students to take shortcuts, or to shut down completely.

Breaks down work into little bites. Brainstorm with them and then do daily check-in so students feel accomplished. Reward the work that is done for those that struggle.

If an assignment is ripped out of a notebook and it tears, don’t accept it. Keep your standards high, and students will rise to them . Model at the beginning of the year what is acceptable and talk about having pride in their hard work.

Learning How to Communicate

This covers many aspects of being a good student and citizen. How should students ask for help in class? What should an email to you look like? Should it look like you’re texting your teacher?  Model this on the first day of school.  

Discuss how to work in a group where others may have different opinions than yours. Constantly remind them how they would prefer to be treated themselves.

Organizing a Project

Some teachers may shy away from long-term projects, such as Rube Goldberg machines, or other STEM activities. This could simply be because the lack of structure and chaos is just too much.

Try structuring the projects in doable sections with stop points. Implement daily rubrics to keep up accountability. When students learn how to work against reasonable deadlines, they are calmer and more organized with less “false starts”.

If possible, I try to keep the majority of the project work in school rather than at home. This means each student learns time management equally without having home distractions.

Learn Enough Basic Science Concepts to Make Intelligent Decisions

Of course, we have course content that needs to be taught. However, I believe that every concept should be brought into the student’s every day lives. Work hard to tie the topics into their world. Anticipate the “why do we have to learn this?” and START with the importance first. This helps the students be engaged and own the material.

For example, if you’re studying weather and clouds you can ask the students “how did you know, before you started this unit, that it might rain by looking at the sky?” Build on their existing knowledge, and they will see how knowing more simply enriches their lives. 

Yeah yeah, not every concept works out so well. However, the more you try to make it relatable, the better.

There are teachers who feel rushed to get concepts into students before end of year testing. If you choose even the shortest activities, that are relevant to their lives, you will find much more concept retention.

There are a lot of concepts that we need to get into middle school students, in terms of the actual science content. However, making them into good citizens, self-reliant learners, and organized workers, is critical as well. Please check out my other blog post on how to structure projects, keep students organized, set up digital notebooks, teach relevant topics, etc. 

Physical Science: Create Rube Goldberg Machines

Rube Goldberg machines( How to Create Exciting But Structured Rube Goldberg Machines ) are so incredibly fun and there is so much learning going on while students are working on them. Just the trial and error alone is super important. As I mentioned in my blog on Rube Goldberg machines, I tell the students upfront that they WILL be frustrated and they WILL want to throw the materials down on the floor and stamp on them. Ha Ha . But….. they will be absolutely beyond happy when the machine does what it’s supposed to do!

 I have the students figure out an end goal such as popping a balloon, pouring a cup of water or dropping a tea bag into a cup. I encourage them to work backwards using simple machines to create the Rube Goldberg machine. We take videos, do a presentation and we invite other students to come in to see their machines.

Physical Science: Food Chains and Rube Goldberg Machines Transfer of Energy Projects

A variation that stresses the transfer of energy in a Rube Goldberg machine and compares it to a food chain which also has the transfer of energy.( STEM Energy Project Using Rube Goldberg Machines and Food Chains! ) I give the students a four level food chain from different ecosystems. Students design a four stepped Rube Goldberg machine to reflect the transfer of energy from producers, to first consumers, to second consumers, to the top predator. I have this in many different ecosystems such as the deciduous forest, savanna, rainforest, tundra, desert and ocean. 

Physical Science: Creating Magnet Mazes

Learning about magnets and magnetic fields is much more fun when you have your students create magnet mazes.( How to Create STEM Magnet Mazes ). They create obstacles such as bridges or holes to jump across to test the range of the magnetic field. Again, the trial and error process is very rewarding to watch. I have had students make themed mazes such as a race track, a city, an airport or one group did a walk-through Disneyland!

Physical Science: Designing Electrical Circuit Arcade Games

A very exciting project that my eighth graders do is designing electrical circuit arcade games.( How to Create STEM Electrical Circuit Games ). I do a bare minimum of introducing series and parallel circuits, conductors, insulators and switches. I have them get into groups and design arcade games using recyclable materials. The highlight of the end of the activity is inviting the lower school to play the games. Students have done quiz boards, race tracks, pinball like machines and games that involve throwing a ball into cups that light up. As an alternative to these games, I give the option to build a tiny house and show the electric wiring of the rooms.Those were also super creative!

Life Science: Designing Organisms in a Symbiotic Relationship

When learning about the relationships between organisms and ecosystems, we learn about symbiosis. ( How to Create a Symbiosis STEM Project ). This STEM project has students focusing on symbiotic mutualism which is when both organisms involved benefit from the relationship. The goal of the project is for students to design two organisms that need each other for survival. The organisms must live in an existing ecosystem, such as a rainforest, and have adaptations to survive there. I have students usually working in pairs and they build the two creatures using recyclable materials with daily check-ins and rubrics. I also require a video describing each organism and the story of how they benefit from the relationship.

Life Science: Creating Aliens with Adaptive Traits and Using Punnett Squares to Cross Them

While working with genetics, we do some basic Punnett square activities and then we launch into the STEM project.( How to Teach Punnett Squares and Genetics Using Aliens ) Students design a male and female alien with at least five traits that help them survive in their made up environment. They decide which traits are dominant and recessive, and then create the alleles for their male and female, with some being homozygous and some being heterozygous.  Using the extensive directions I give them, they randomly cross the two aliens using Punnett squares for the five traits. They design the baby aliens based on that cross.

My students get so excited and want to create more babies and generations! I have recently had them use a choice board as to how they would like to present them to the class. They can make a stop motion video or animation, a detailed poster, news article, or they could use clay or other materials to create their creatures. I’ve done this at the end of the school year and it is a super way to keep them creative and interested.

Life Science: Invent a New Method of Seed Dispersal

While learning about plants, we talk about seed dispersal using either wind, water, animals or “explosive” devices. ( Design a Seed DispersaL Method Structured STEM Project with Rubrics ). I show some YouTube example videos as an introduction and then the students design their own plant with a seed dispersal method.

The first time I did this was while we were all remote, during the pandemic, and the results were unbelievable! Students were involving their families and creating these seed or seed pods. One boy used a Nerf gun foam projectile and drilled a hole in a bath bomb with his father. He put the foam projectile into the hole of the bath bomb. The idea was that the bath bomb was the seed pod and they dropped it into the bathtub. They videoed a time lapse until the bath bomb dissolved and the foam projectile popped up to the surface of the water to “germinate”! 

Another student had a balloon full of seeds that he hung from a branch of a tree and, when the balloon popped, lots of seeds scattered everywhere. Other students made sticky items and attached it to their pets for the animal dispersal. I now do this in my classroom and they still come up with very clever ideas such as seeds that have miniature parachutes attached, pods that unfold when placed on water, pods that stick to socks and so on. 

Environmental Science: Designing Water Filters

Students in my school know that every year my sixth graders will be designing filters  to clean water. The older students, who have already done it, can’t wait to give advice and peek in to see how the contest is going!( Design Water Filters With This Exciting STEM Project! ) 

The basic directions involve simply cutting an empty water bottle in half and then inverting one half to make a funnel. Using my brainstorming page, students go home and use any materials that they want to create the water filter in the funnel half. Meanwhile, I take a gallon jug and create the most disgusting, dirty water solution that I can! 

On the day of the contest we all sit around one table and students are given exactly 100 mL of my dirty water.  Their goal is to be the one that has the cleanest water come out of the bottom of the filter. 

Most of the time, the results of the first day are not that clean looking. Definitely lighter but not clear. So what do we do? They go home and REDESIGN their filters and we have a second contest. We always see a huge improvement and sometimes I’m amazed that the students produce water that looks so clean that it looks drinkable. The idea that they shouldn’t be happy with the first design that they make is important and that redesigning and redesigning is what engineers do.

Environmental Science: Tracking Car Air Pollution

While we are learning about air pollution and preparing for Earth Day, the students do a project where they track the family car to talk about how much they contribute to air pollution with just their family.( Teaching Students About Their Individual Affect on Air Pollution ). I put a lot of privacy parameters on this project, for obvious reasons, as they track their car for a week. If that’s a problem for any parent, I provide realistic data for them to use. Once students have written down where their car has gone, we classify those trips as necessary trips, luxury trips or semi luxury trips.

We take that data and create numerous bar and pie graphs. I have them do it on paper, and either Google sheets, Excel or Numbers.  Students understand that the raw data, the private data, stays in their notebook but we are still able to see the results represented graphically. We can then discuss  how they could reduce the luxury trips that their family takes.

Environmental Science: Analyzing and Redesigning Excess Product Packaging

A very eye-opening STEM project has to do with municipal waste, particularly plastic, and how much is produced unneeded packaging. ( Inspiring Middle School Students to Minimize Their Impact on Municipal Waste ). Students bring in an unopened package and we determine what percent of that product is actually trash. What percentage of that product is actually headed to the landfill? They bring in anything from food products to new toys and they are always shocked that many of the products are between 40 to 60% trash! 

We use the balances to find the mass of the package and product and then they use some math skills to find the percentage. I have these all laid out in my product on Teachers Pay Teachers. Depending on which age group you’re working with, you may need to teach percentages, which is an extra bonus!

After the students have worked on finding the percentage, we analyze the package carefully and decide what was extra and unneeded.  Now they redesign the package for that product! They base this on their knowledge of recyclable materials, keeping the product relatively lightweight, safe and theft proof with the least amount of packaging possible. I have a blog post on this and honestly it’s something the students have never thought about before!

STEM projects that tie into your present unit are the best! Plus, using structured pieces helps keep the students accountable and focused plus gives you lots of material to put in your gradebook. all of the above products are on my Teachers Pay Teachers store at Science by Sinai.

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10 Awesome STEM Projects Perfect for Middle School

Stem learning is so important.

Students need real-world applications with experimenting, prototyping, inventing, and creating; using their imaginations to spark creative solutions! They need to be challenged to use their engineering skills to brainstorm, plan, draw, and test their creations using the engineering design process . STEM Activities encourage kids to think outside the box , with skills like problem-solving, critical thinking, communication and the ability to deal with complex problems to succeed in the real-world, beyond the classroom. Teamwork and collaboration are also part of successful STEM activities. Working in groups is not always easy, but it builds skills that kids will need for the rest of their lives.

Introducing kids in middle school to STEM subjects doesn’t have to be complicated!

Using simple and inexpensive supplies, you can provide fun and relevant activities where students take charge and stay interested and engaged. Here are some inexpensive, hand-on Middle School STEM Activities for kids in 6h grade, 7th grade, and 8th grade. These are STEM projects that will really bring out kids’ creativity. These STEM labs challenge your students to design, construct, and revise their projects as they collaborate in groups with other students. Teamwork is an important real-world skill that will benefit students far beyond the classroom. Being low-prep, these STEM Challenges are super-easy to set up.

Teacher Video Demonstration.

A video demonstration is included with each activity and clearly explains step-by-step how to run the STEM lab, along with the materials you will need. It also explains the concepts you are teaching, giving an added level of confidence while you are giving instructions and guiding your students through the project.

These are great resources for using in middle school STEM and Science Classrooms along with Summer Camps and after-School STEM Clubs. It’s especially great for Homeschool Groups, for co-op STEM classes, and also parents who love hands-on learning at home!

Each Activity includes: • Teacher Instructions • Video Demo for the Teacher • Materials List • Student instructions (worksheet) • Real-World Research Question, Video, or Activity • Advanced Level Extension (Middle School Level) • Grading Rubric • Aligned NGSS standards

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge Pop Can Races

Students will work in groups to explore electrostatic forces between a balloon that they charge and a pop/soda can on the floor. After experimenting with different balloons and different methods, teams will race their pop can a distance of ten meters. Students will not be able to touch, push or blow on their pop can. It must be pulled with the static electricity they create.

>>> Click here to find out more!

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge – Aluminum Foil Boat

In this activity, students will work in groups to design and build a small boat from aluminum foil. They will then see how many pennies it can hold before it sinks. The goal is for each student to work with their group to build and modify their boat to hold as many pennies as possible.

STEM Activity Challenge Levitating ping pong ball 6th – 8th grade

Students will work in groups to discover the phenomenon that occurs when a ping pong ball is placed above a straw and air is blown through the straw. Most people would expect the ping-pong ball to fly up and off to the side—but it doesn’t. Due to Bernoulli’s Principle, the ball will hover in the air above the straw. This project can end with a demonstration using a shop-vac or hairdryer with a ping-pong ball that will produce the same interesting results.

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge Marshmallow Catapult (6th, 7th, 8th grade)

In this activity, students will work in groups to create a catapult from popsicle sticks. They will modify their catapult in order to produce the best launch possible. Kids will have a great time launching mini marshmallows across the room while learning about potential and kinetic energy.

>>> Click here to find out more

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge Balloon Powered Car

In this activity, students will work in groups to harness the power of a balloon to power their car (pop bottle with wheels). Students will modify the design of their vehicle to produce the best travel distance possible.

>>> Click here to find out more.

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge Marble (Noodle) Roller Coaster 6th 7th 8th

In this activity, students will work in groups to create a rollercoaster from foam pool noodles. They will include twists, turns, hills, and loops. The goal is to create an exciting “ride” (for the marble) while getting it safely to the ground.

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge – Marble Run (6th, 7th, 8th grade)

Working in groups students will design and build towers, ramps, and loops. They will then start marbles on the top and watch them roll, spin and drop to the bottom. Their goal will be to create a track that (safely) transports the ball to the bottom—in the most creative and unique way possible.

Middle School STEM Activity Challenge Hoop Glider Competition 6th, 7th, 8th

This activity challenges students to build a glider that will glide as far as possible. Working in groups, students will cut and tape various hoops to their straw. They will experiment with hoops of different sizes, positioning, and throwing styles.

Middle School STEM Engineering Project: Popsicle Bridge (6th, 7th, 8th grade)

In this S.T.E.M. lab, students will work in groups to create a bridge from popsicle sticks (craft sticks) that will hold as much weight as possible. The student’s favorite part is when their very own bridge gets to be tested to see how much it can hold.

Middle School STEM Engineering Project: Index Card Tower

In this S.T.E.M. lab, students will work in groups to create a tower from index cards and masking tape. Through teamwork and problem solving, groups will raise their tower to exciting heights!

Want more activities? Click here to visit my teachers pay teachers store!

35 Fun Stem Projects for Middle School

Stem projects for middle school are a fantastic way to engage students in hands-on, interdisciplinary learning experiences that promote critical thinking, problem-solving, and creativity.

Whether it’s building a working model, conducting experiments, or designing solutions to real-world challenges, STEM projects provide middle school students with opportunities to explore and apply their knowledge in fun and meaningful ways.

We will explore a variety of engaging STEM project ideas suitable for middle school students , encouraging them to embrace the exciting world of science and technology.

Paper Bridge Engineering:

Challenge students to design and build paper bridges that can support a specified weight using only a limited number of materials like paper, tape, and glue. This project encourages students to apply principles of engineering, physics, and mathematics as they experiment with different bridge designs, considering factors like load distribution, structural stability, and material strength. It’s a hands-on way to introduce them to the world of structural engineering.

Solar-Powered Mini Cars:

Have students construct small, solar-powered vehicles using inexpensive materials like cardboard, small electric motors, and solar panels. This project combines elements of physics, electronics, and renewable energy. Students can learn about solar energy conversion, electrical circuits, and vehicle design as they build and race their solar-powered cars. It’s a great way to introduce them to sustainable energy concepts.

Biome Ecosystems:

Task students with creating mini-ecosystems in glass containers to simulate different biomes like rainforests, deserts, or wetlands. This project integrates biology and environmental science as students research, design, and care for their ecosystems. They can observe how living organisms interact with their environment and understand concepts like food webs, nutrient cycles, and the importance of biodiversity. Related: 20 Fun No Prep Stem Activities & Games

Coding and Game Development:

Introduce students to the world of computer programming by guiding them through the process of creating their own video games or interactive simulations. This project covers aspects of computer science, mathematics, and logic. Students can use platforms like Scratch or Python to code their games, fostering creativity and problem-solving skills while learning the fundamentals of coding.

Water Filtration Challenge:

Engage students in a real-world problem-solving activity by challenging them to design and build water filtration systems. Provide them with contaminated water samples and various materials such as sand, gravel, and activated charcoal. This project combines elements of chemistry, environmental science, and engineering as students work to purify the water. It’s a great opportunity to discuss water quality issues and sustainable solutions.

Rocket Science and Aerodynamics:

Allow students to delve into the world of aerospace engineering by having them design and launch their own model rockets. This project combines physics and engineering principles as students learn about thrust, drag, and stability. They can experiment with different rocket designs and propulsion methods while gaining an appreciation for the science behind space exploration.

Robotics Challenge:

Introduce students to robotics by providing them with robot kits or access to robotics programming platforms like LEGO Mindstorms or VEX. Challenge them to build and program robots to complete specific tasks or navigate obstacle courses. This project integrates technology, engineering, and computer programming, fostering teamwork and problem-solving skills.

3D Printing and Design:

Equip students with 3D printers and guide them through the process of designing and creating 3D-printed objects. This project involves elements of technology, engineering, and creativity as students learn about computer-aided design (CAD) software and the principles of additive manufacturing. They can bring their ideas to life by designing and printing functional objects or artistic creations.

Renewable Energy Showcase:

Task students with researching and presenting on different renewable energy sources such as solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal power. This project combines science, technology, and environmental awareness as students explore the benefits and challenges of each energy source. They can also design and build small-scale models or prototypes to demonstrate how these technologies work.

Math Mystery Investigations:

Engage students in mathematical problem-solving by presenting them with real-world mysteries that require mathematical analysis to solve. These mysteries could involve topics like cryptography, logic puzzles, or mathematical patterns. This project enhances critical thinking and mathematical skills while making math more intriguing and relevant. Related: 25 Best Outer Space Activities for Preschoolers

Weather Station Construction:

Have students build their own weather stations using sensors and simple equipment. This project combines elements of meteorology, data collection, and technology. Students can monitor and record weather conditions such as temperature, humidity, and wind speed, and then analyze the data to make weather predictions and gain insights into climate patterns.

Microbiology Investigation:

Introduce students to the world of microbiology by conducting experiments with microorganisms. They can grow bacteria cultures, observe microscopic organisms under microscopes, and investigate topics like antibiotic resistance. This project encompasses biology and chemistry while promoting scientific inquiry and laboratory skills.

Hydroponic Garden Design:

Challenge students to design and create their own hydroponic gardens. This project combines elements of biology, chemistry, and engineering as students explore plant growth without soil, nutrient solutions, and the optimization of growing conditions. They can experiment with different hydroponic systems and plant varieties, fostering an understanding of sustainable agriculture.

Environmental Cleanup Challenge:

Engage students in environmental science by organizing a cleanup challenge in a local park, beach, or community area. This project involves researching environmental issues, organizing a cleanup event, and analyzing the impact of pollution on ecosystems. It promotes environmental awareness and civic responsibility while integrating science and community engagement.

Innovative Energy-Efficient Home Design:

Task students with designing energy-efficient homes using CAD software or physical models. They can explore concepts like insulation, renewable energy sources, and smart home technology to reduce energy consumption. This project combines architecture, engineering, and sustainability principles, encouraging students to think about environmentally friendly housing solutions.

Astronomy and Star Mapping:

Explore the wonders of the night sky by having students study astronomy and create their own star maps. This project combines science and mathematics as students learn about celestial objects, constellations, and the use of telescopes. They can then document their observations and create their own star charts for different seasons.

Electricity and Circuit Challenges:

Teach students the fundamentals of electrical circuits by challenging them to design and build various electrical devices or gadgets. This project involves hands-on experimentation with circuit components, such as resistors, capacitors, and LEDs. Students can learn about Ohm’s law and circuit design principles while creating functional projects.

Environmental Impact Assessment:

Have students investigate the environmental impact of a local development project or policy change. This project combines environmental science, data analysis, and advocacy skills as students research, collect data, and present findings to assess the potential consequences of the project on the ecosystem and community.

Earthquake Resistant Building Design:

Task students with designing and building model structures to withstand simulated earthquakes. This project combines principles of structural engineering, physics, and mathematics as students experiment with different construction materials and techniques to create earthquake-resistant buildings.

Biomedical Engineering:

Challenge students to explore the field of biomedical engineering by designing and building medical devices or prosthetics. They can create models of prosthetic limbs, artificial organs, or assistive devices for individuals with disabilities. This project combines biology, engineering, and healthcare technology.

Mars Colony Design:

Challenge students to design a hypothetical colony on Mars. This interdisciplinary project integrates space science, engineering, and sustainability concepts. Students can consider aspects like life support systems, habitat design, and resource utilization while exploring the challenges of space colonization.

Wildlife Tracking and Conservation:

Engage students in ecology and conservation by introducing them to wildlife tracking methods. They can design and build tracking devices or use GPS technology to monitor animal movements in their local environment. This project promotes a deeper understanding of ecology and the importance of wildlife conservation.

Alternative Energy Experiments:

Have students conduct experiments to explore alternative energy sources such as wind, solar, or biomass energy. They can build simple renewable energy systems, measure energy output, and analyze the efficiency of each source. This project combines science, engineering, and environmental awareness.

Greenhouse and Plant Growth Study:

Create a greenhouse on the school premises and have students conduct experiments related to plant growth. They can explore factors like light, temperature, humidity, and nutrient levels on plant development. This project combines biology, environmental science, and agriculture.

STEM Inventions and Innovation Fair:

Organize a STEM invention fair where students develop and showcase their own innovative creations. This project encourages creativity, problem-solving, and entrepreneurship. Students can invent solutions to everyday problems or come up with new gadgets, apps, or technologies, presenting their ideas to peers and judges.

Aquaponics System Design:

Challenge students to design and build their own aquaponics systems, combining elements of aquaculture and hydroponics. This project integrates biology, chemistry, and engineering as students create a self-sustaining ecosystem where fish and plants support each other. They can explore nutrient cycles, water quality, and sustainable food production.

Renewable Energy Art Installation:

Encourage students to combine art and technology by creating renewable energy-powered art installations. This interdisciplinary project involves designing aesthetically pleasing pieces that incorporate elements like solar panels, wind turbines, or kinetic energy generators. Students can explore the intersection of art, science, and sustainability.

Virtual Reality (VR) Exploration:

Introduce students to the world of virtual reality by allowing them to create VR experiences or educational simulations. This project combines technology, programming, and creativity as students learn to design and program virtual environments or educational games using VR software and hardware.

Math in Nature Scavenger Hunt:

Take students on a math-focused scavenger hunt in a natural setting like a park or botanical garden. They can identify and measure geometric shapes, collect data on plant growth, and solve math problems related to their observations. This project fosters an appreciation for the mathematical patterns found in the natural world.

Medical Mystery Investigation:

Engage students in medical science by presenting them with fictional medical mysteries to solve. They can research symptoms, conduct experiments, and use deductive reasoning to diagnose the “patients.” This project combines biology, anatomy, and critical thinking while sparking an interest in medical careers. Related: 100 Helpful Science Fair Project Questions

Recommended:

• 25 Teeth Brushing Activities for Preschoolers
• 24 Fun Literacy Activities for Preschoolers
• 23 Fun Shark Activities for Preschoolers

Sohaib Hasan Shah

Sohaib's journey includes 10+ years of teaching and counseling experience at BCSS School in elementary and middle schools, coupled with a BBA (Hons) with a minor in Educational Psychology from Curtin University (Australia) . In his free time, he cherishes quality moments with his family, reveling in the joys and challenges of parenthood. His three daughters have not only enriched his personal life but also deepened his understanding of the importance of effective education and communication, spurring him to make a meaningful impact in the world of education.

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15 Best STEM Project Ideas for Middle School

• Lauren Chiangpradit
• September 13, 2022
• Reviewed by Sean Barton
• Reviewed by Haley MacLean

Table of Contents

Backyard Weather Station

Egg drop experiment, see the effects of an oil spill, create a water filter, grow a plant by watering it with different liquids, determine the best way to melt ice, make a fire snake, create an alka seltzer powered lava lamp, make your own harmonica, build bath bombs, lemon powered electricity, do it yourself marble runs, stem football, learn more about middle school stem with stem sports®.

Science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) subjects are essential to a child’s education. These subjects help students prepare for the workforce, where STEM professions are growing faster than any other field. Oftentimes, classroom lesson plans only include math and science. This leaves students with a knowledge gap in technology and engineering. As educators, our goal should be to touch on these four core subjects, leading students to passions and confidence in these areas. 

25 Best STEM Projects for Middle School Students

One way to get students excited about STEM is by incorporating engaging STEM activities into curricula. This creates a positive association with STEM and gives them the confidence they need to continue taking STEM courses throughout their education. In this article, STEM Sports® provides 15 of the best STEM projects to incorporate with middle school students.

Explanation: Students will gain a deeper understanding of the weather system by acting as a meteorologist. After building their own backyard weather station, students will predict weather patterns and fill out their worksheet/tracker to compare with classmates and their teacher. 

Materials Needed: 

Weather Tool #1: Wind Vane

• Wind Vane Worksheet
• Pencil with eraser
• Pencils and markers
• Straight pen
• A small piece of modeling clay
• Plastic straw
• A piece of cardboard

Weather Tool #2: Barometer

• Barometer Worksheet
• 2-liter plastic bottle
• Food coloring
• Clear plastic cup

Weather Tool #3: Thermometer

• Thermometer Worksheet
• Maximum/minimum thermometer
• Climatology data for your area

Weather Tool #4: Rain Gauge

• Rain Gauge Worksheet
• Masking tape
• Straight, thin jar (a graduated cylinder works best)

Learning Objectives: 

• Students will describe weather patterns in wind, rain, and temperature.
• Students will create predictions of the weather based on cloud patterns and previously collected data.

To implement this lesson with your students, click here . 

Explanation: Students act as engineers when creating a casing to protect their egg. This introduces the Engineering Design Process (EDP): ask, imagine, plan, prototype, test, and improve. This method is commonly used by engineering professionals when working through complex problems.  

Materials Needed:

• Egg (Pro tip: For less mess, use a hard-boiled egg)
• Container (e.g. cardboard box, plastic container, etc)
• Rubber bands
• Wooden sticks 
• Bubble Wrap 
• Students will better understand gravity, force, and mass.
• Using the EDP, students will compare their casings and determine which was the most effective and why. 

To implement this lesson with your students, click here .

Explanation: The oil spill experiment teaches students why oil and water do not mix and what impact oil has on the environment. As an extension, students can work to clean up the oil spill, teaching them about real-world problems. 

• Clear plastic container
• Vegetable Oil 
• Cotton Wool and Buds
• Paper Towels 
• Students will learn about density and why certain materials do not mix.
• Students will learn about global warming and the effect that pollution has on the environment. 

Build a Toothpick Bridge

Explanation: Using glue and toothpicks, students work independently to create a bridge. After everyone is finished, they look at other students’ bridges and see how they could have made their own sturdier and more usable. 

• Toothpicks 

Learning Objective: 

• Students learn that it is okay to fail and it is important to try again.

Explanation: Students build their own water filtration system to learn more about the water cycle. By the end of the lesson, students have a firmer understanding of what is done to the water they drink every day.

• Plastic soda or juice bottle
• Vase or tall drinking glass
• Gravel or small stones
• Activated Charcoal
• Cotton balls, small cloth or coffee filter
• Gardening dirt
• Scissors or knife
• Students will learn about the water cycle and how the earth naturally filters water vs filtering done by humans. 

Explanation: As a group, the class will water four plants (all the same type) with different liquids to see how it affects growth over time.

• Four (4) plants – teacher’s choice!
• Sprite or another soda type
• Gatorade or Powerade 
• Students will learn about molecules of different liquids and how it impacts plant growth.

Explanation: Using different elements, students will see what makes ice melt the fastest. 

• 4 ice cubes (per student or class depending on lesson approach)
• Water boiler or kettle 
• Students will learn to write a hypothesis before starting the experiment. 
• Students will learn how different elements impact the melting speed of ice. This introduces them to chemical reactions. 

Explanation: Using three simple materials, students see a chemical reaction that turns into a “fire snake”. Since this lesson involves fire, educators should help facilitate and make sure students are taking proper safety precautions. 

• Lighter fluid 
• Lighter or matches 
• Fire extinguisher
• Students will explore chemical reactions to understand the impact this reaction can have on an element’s original form. 

Explanation: Students learn about density and chemical reactions while making their own at home lava lamp. The reaction and material separation mixed with the Alka Seltzer tablet creates a visually stimulating and exciting end result for students. 

• Alka Seltzer Tablets 
• Food Coloring 
• Students will learn about the density of liquids and why some materials will not mix.
• Students will see the impact of chemical reactions using the Alka Seltzer tablets. 

Explanation: This fun STEAM activity turns students into engineers who can modify their harmonica to create different sounds and pitches. 

• Two large craft sticks (at least six inches long)
• One wide rubber band (#64 size works well)
• One plastic drinking straw
• Two small rubber bands
• A piece of paper
• A pen or pencil
• Students will engage in the EDP to repeat these steps until they create a functioning catapult. 

Create a Model of Our Solar System

Explanation: Students learn about our solar system through this hands-on science project that they can take home and show to family and friends. 

Materials Needed (per student):

• Nine styrofoam balls of varying sizes 
• One pipe cleaner
• Wooden sticks
• Black marker
• Paint and paintbrushes
• Floral foam block
• Students will draw conclusions about the planet’s placement, size, and orbit based on their model solar system. 
• Students will be introduced to astronomy and the real life application of studying this subject. 

Explanation: This is a great project to do during Mother’s Day and can be used for kids to give a gift to a mother or mother figure in their life! Students use their science skills and imagination to create a bath bomb that will fizz once it is dropped in water. 

• 1 cup baking soda 
• 1/2 cup citric acid 
• 1/2 cup Epsom salt
• 1/2 cup cornstarch
• 3/4 tbsp. water
• 2 tsp. essential oil (lavender, eucalyptus, rose, orange, and lemongrass are popular for the bath)
• 2 tbsp. oil (jojoba, sweet almond , coconut , olive, or even baby oil )
• A few drops of food coloring.
• A mold of your choice, such as regular or mini-muffin tins, candy pans, or round plastic molds specifically for bath bombs
• Students will learn how combining certain ingredients can change their form (solid, liquid, gas) and create a chemical reaction when added to water. 

Explanation: Students create an electrical circuit using wires and a lemon. They will experiment to see how many lemons are needed to light up the bulbs. 

• Copper plates
• Zinc plates
• Alligator clips with wires (2 per cell, so minimum 8 if you are creating a 4 cell battery)
• LED light bulbs
• Students will learn about electrical currency and the need for a complete, closed circuit.
• Students will better understand conductors and what can and cannot be used. 

Explanation: Students work together to create a track that will allow marbles to move across the classroom, the more curves and turns, the better. This allows them to exercise their engineering, problem solving, and collaboration skills.

• Wooden craft sticks 
• Students will learn about motion and gravity. 
• Students will practice using the EDP to create a usable track through trial and error.  

Explanation: Students work through eight (8) lessons that use real-world football examples to facilitate STEM learning. 

• None! All STEM Sports® kits are turnkey and easy to implement in the classroom, during after school programs, at summer camps, or at home. 

Learn More About STEM Football 

If you are interested in learning more about how to implement STEM at the middle school level, read the following blogs:

• Tips for Teaching STEM to Middle School Students
• How to Integrate STEM into Classroom Curriculum  
• How to Create a Sports Lesson Plan 
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A STEM Project That Connects to Students’ Interest in Social Movements

A personally and socially relevant project ties what middle school students study in science class to developments in the world around them.

Black, Latino, and Indigenous people are underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, in part because STEM in school is often treated as bias-free or objective, removed from everyday life. This colorblind approach contributes to the alienation of students of color from science because it does not recognize many of the ways in which they see themselves. A crucial question for STEM teachers, therefore, is how we can create compelling learning activities in our classrooms that recognize students as whole people.

We’d like to describe one example of a personally and socially relevant STEM project—or STEAM, really, as it incorporates art—that has the potential to do just that. A few years ago, prior to the pandemic, one of us (Donna), an eighth-grade science teacher, noticed that her students would come into her classroom talking animatedly about the issues they had been discussing in their social studies class: justice, inequality, and personhood. She decided to use social movements as a metaphor and have students apply it to one of the topics in the science curriculum, Newton’s laws of motion, by asking them to build kinetic sculptures that would represent both a social movement and the laws of motion.

Eli contributed to the project by co-designing a space for teacher professional learning where Donna developed the idea. (This was part of a project funded by the National Science Foundation (#2021180) to research how teachers learn to integrate computational making projects into STEM classrooms, and we’re grateful for the support; teachers can do this project without outside funding.)

How to Set Up This Project

Donna introduced the kinetic sculpture project by describing the overarching task, the criteria for success, and the timeline (about seven days, or the equivalent of nine class periods). Students had already been introduced to paper mechanics and practiced building a kinetic sculpture of choice with inspiration and templates from Karakuri: How to Make Mechanical Paper Models That Move by Keisuke Saka.

Donna presented the task as follows: “You will apply your knowledge of forces and motion and your “making” skills from the karakuri projects to design and build a kinetic sculpture that moves and addresses a social movement.”

Students brainstormed a list of “hashtag movements” and then chose one that they wanted to represent. The movements they brainstormed included #ClimateChange, #MeToo, #BlackLivesMatter, #NoBanNoWall, #LGBTQIArights, #TakeaKnee, and #StopWar. They joined together in small groups based on the social movement they selected, and began with a day of research on that movement in order to build background knowledge as well as to generate ideas for symbols and types of motion they might incorporate in their sculpture.

The groups then chose a mechanism (cam, gear, lever) they would use to add motion to their sculpture. Some groups built their own cams or gears; a great resource for paper-based mechanisms is PaperMech .

Next, each group submitted a design proposal with sketches, a brief description of what they wanted to build and necessary materials, the connection to physics, and the connection to their social movement. Project proposals needed to be approved before groups could gather materials and begin building their sculpture. After that, they were left mostly on their own to figure out how the work would get done.

About four class periods were allotted for building sculptures, with multiple checkpoints scheduled for peer feedback as well as individual and team reflection . On the fifth day, students made final preparations for presenting their sculptures “gallery style” in a project exhibition, creating signs and planning what they would present to an external audience. They used an artist-scientist statement to help them.

The project exhibition happened during the school day with school administrators and staff and other classes invited to attend, but this could also be a wonderful opportunity for an evening event that would be more conducive to inviting families.

Metaphors are not perfect, but they do help to expand static ideas about what counts as science and how science can be related to the world adolescents inhabit. Three years after the first implementation of the project, one of the students from the class said, “I feel like with the project, I was learning science but I was also learning about social justice and skills I need to know for the future. And I feel like in things we’re learning now [in high school], we don’t get that. That two lessons in one. We only get one [now]—science heavy, not future related.”

Culture is often thought of as linked to particular ethnic or religious groups, but we understand culture to be the daily practices, values, and beliefs of any group of people. For instance, there can be a workplace culture, or a culture of activism in a neighborhood. This project honored and built on students’ cultural identities as legitimate subjects of study because it attended to what they cared about and who they believed themselves to be. It also built on their intellectual identities by providing them an opportunity to make decisions about how they were going to complete their projects and in doing so explicitly valued their ability to know, do, and learn.

Students are often asked to acclimate to STEM and other subjects rather than the other way around. Donna paid attention to what her students were talking about among themselves for weeks and months before the project began and asked her students what was important to them.

By expanding the connections we educators make between STEM and the rest of the world, we can also expand students’ ideas about what is possible in learning STEM and how STEM can be a tool for more just futures.

10 Educational And Fun STEM Projects For Middle School

Categories Education/School

Getting middle school kids into STEM can seem like a challenge; however, if you can make their learning fun, you’ll find you have a lot more success. Kids at this age love hands-on learning that gets them out of their seats and learning by doing instead of listening.

None of these projects take a lot of preparation in order to set up, and they can all be done at home or in the classroom.

We’ve broken our projects down into the different subjects that make up STEM; however, before we get into it, let’s take a quick look at what STEM is and why it matters.

What Is STEM?

STEM is an acronym that stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. If you want to incorporate some more creativity into your classroom, then you can practice “STEAM” activities, which simply add the Arts.

STEM is an educational policy that helps to address subjects and concepts that can often be overlooked in the classroom. Whilst it’s easy to incorporate science and math, technology and engineering are vital components to a kid’s learning that they might only be able to access through extra-curricular activities.

By developing a strategy to include STEM and STEAM activities in your classroom or home, you can ensure that your students or children have a more solid understanding of how scientific concepts can be applied in real-world situations.

Using STEM is also a great chance for your kids to work on their problem-solving skills and critical thinking for students, from kindergarten all the way up to high school.

Now that we’ve covered exactly what STEM is and why it’s important, let’s look at ten educational and fun STEM projects that your middle school students will love.

Using different materials and engaging with some key scientific concepts, your students can get involved with their science lessons in a more engaging way than just sitting at their desks and listening for an hour.

1. Solar Oven

Teaching your students how to create a solar oven is not only a practical survival skill but is also a super fun way for kids to learn about how solar heat and solar power work whilst you make something tasty to eat.

Using a small, reflective surface, you can use the power of the sun to heat up a cooking pot enough to cook food!

• Use a dark-colored cooking pot to maximize heat absorption.
• Cover the cooking pot tightly so that no heat escapes.
• Use your solar oven in an area that gets direct sunlight for most of the day.

2. Sedimentary Rocks Model

If you’ve been teaching your kids about different kinds of rock, then you should give these simple sedimentary rock models a try in your classroom.

By smashing together graham crackers, hard-shelled candy, and mini marshmallows, you can demonstrate how sedimentary rocks are formed.

Use pressure to smash the “rocks” together, which forces the candy and cookie pieces into the marshmallows whilst also melting the marshmallows so that everything sticks together.

This is an interesting (and tasty) way to demonstrate how sedimentary rocks are formed and should help your students retain the information more.

3. Coding With Scratch

Coding and computer fluency is such an important aspect of our lives now that teaching kids how to program whilst they’re still in school is not only really important but is also something that they’re likely to be interested in. Most kids play some kind of video game or engage with content online, so there’s going to be something that they want to create.

Using a site like Scratch introduces them to the idea of programming in an easily digestible format and allows them to play around with different coding concepts and see projects that other people or students have made, inspiring them and giving them ideas for their own projects.

4. Smartphone Projector

If you’re trying to figure out what to do with the cardboard overflowing from your recycling bin, then why not give this super easy and super interesting project a try?

Projectors are surprisingly simple bits of technology and one that you can easily recreate in the classroom without much preparation. In fact, all you need is a small cardboard box (a shoe box is perfect, along with some spare scraps for a phone stand), a magnifying glass, scissors, tape, and, of course, a smartphone.

Putting the pieces together isn’t super complicated and should be a totally age-appropriate challenge for your middle school students.

Engineering

5. optimized paper airplane.

Anyone and their grandma can make a paper airplane, but can they make the most optimized and aerodynamic airplane?

There are some really interesting and intricate designs that your students can copy and try to create. Challenge your kids to make the best paper airplane and test them out during class. See which plane can fly the furthest, the quickest, and whether any are able to do loops.

This gets your students practicing their critical thinking, ability to follow instructions, and their dexterity to actually make the folds.

6. Egg Drop Challenge

This one is a classic. Who hasn’t gone to school and performed an egg drop challenge? The concept is simple: your students are going to drop an egg from a predetermined height, and their challenge is to create a system that will prevent the egg from breaking.

Some children might try to pad the egg enough to break its fall, whilst others might attempt to slow the egg with a parachute.

Provide your students with some simple materials like paper, tape, and cotton balls for them to make their egg protectors, and let them figure out how they want to save their eggs.

7. Paper Rollercoaster

A lot of classes will get their students to create the best paper bridge. However, we prefer to do something a little different. This paper rollercoaster challenge gets your kids constructing a rollercoaster out of paper.

Admittedly, this project does require a lot more preparation and materials, so it’s best to get your students to work in groups so that you don’t have to bring so many different sets of material to class with you.

There’s a lot of cutting and folding involved, so you might have to lend a hand in some places; however, at the end of the project, your students will be engaged with key scientific concepts like kinetic energy and potential energy.

8. Geometric Heart

To bring holidays like Valentine’s Day into your math classes, you could try introducing your students to these geometric shape challenges. This particular set of instructions has you creating a heart. However, you can easily have your kids come up with some new designs that they can create using the same method.

With just string and pipe cleaners, you can create these adorable geometric hearts. Grab straws and pipe cleaners in as many fun colors as you can find to make the craft more interesting.

If your kids want to make their own design, you can make sure that they measure it carefully and calculate how many straws and pipe cleaners they’re going to need.

9. Surface Area Castles

This next craft might run over a couple of days, but it’s so fun and creative that you won’t mind. For this activity, your students will create, measure, and calculate both the surface area and volume of a 3-D model castle that they can then design however they like.

You can pick up the templates for free and encourage your kids to build the best castles they can by making it a competition.

10. 100-Cup Tower

The final activity on our list is another classic. The 100-cup tower challenge is set up to get your kids building the tallest (and steadiest) tower possible using 100-cups.

If that’s a lot of materials that you can’t provide, then why not make it a 10-cup challenge instead>?

You can add complexity by getting your students to measure, record, and compare the heights of each tower. Whose tower was the tallest? Whose tower was the most structurally sound? Were they the same tower, or was there some difference?

Final Thoughts

Introducing STEM activities to your classroom can be a great way to get your students engaged in activities that are teaching and demonstrating key mathematical and scientific concepts without them even realizing all the time.

Before each craft or project, you should discuss the activity with your kids and get their predictions on what they think will happen. Talk them through the project, explaining the different concepts that they’ll be exploring, and, most importantly, give them a time limit.

It can be difficult to keep excitable middle school kids on task during open-ended activities, so make sure they have a set deadline that they have to be finished by.

Which of these activities will you try? Happy teaching!

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• Open access
• Published: 24 December 2022

What do integrated STEM projects look like in middle school and high school classrooms? A systematic literature review of empirical studies of iSTEM projects

• Felicity I. McLure   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-3664-9146 1 ,
• Kok-Sing Tang 2 &
• P. John Williams 2  

International Journal of STEM Education volume  9 , Article number:  73 ( 2022 ) Cite this article

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The past 20 years has seen a growing focus on the integration of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (iSTEM) disciplines in schools to provide students with authentic experiences in solving real-world problems. A frequently stated aim for iSTEM projects has been increasing engagement and interest in pursuing STEM subjects in senior high school and tertiary studies. In order to better understand the iSTEM projects’ landscape in school classes, this systematic literature review analysed empirical studies of integrated STEM projects carried out in secondary schools to answer the following questions: What are the characteristics of the projects described and to what extent do these projects reflect characteristics of effective STEM projects; and to what extent does research into iSTEM projects in classrooms investigate specific methods of integration of STEM domains? Thirty-five peer-reviewed publications were identified from database searches that met the following inclusion criteria: (a) integrating two or more of the STEM areas, (b) middle/high school education and (c) explicitly describing the research intervention. The review revealed a diversity of iSTEM approaches in the literature, with Engineering and Science, particularly Physics, the most commonly integrated fields. Concerns are raised about the degree to which projects are relevant to students and their context and address the diversity found within student cohorts. A gap was found in the literature in detailing how teachers and students enact integration of STEM skills in these projects.

Introduction

Integration of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields in projects from K-12 has been proposed as a means of improving engagement with these fields and increasing the selection of related courses at senior high school and university level (Honey et al., 2014 ). However, despite these efforts, enrolments in STEM fields such as Physics, Engineering, Computing and Mathematics at tertiary level continue to be of concern (Office of the Chief Scientist, 2020 ).

However, despite the focus over the past 20 years on engaging student interest in STEM fields through providing students opportunities to use skills and knowledge from different STEM domains to solve problems, little is known about the types of projects that are being characterised as integrated STEM projects in the classroom and the ways in which the domains are integrated. When teachers or researchers talk about projects that integrate STEM, are certain STEM domains, such as engineering and science, more likely to be addressed than others? In addition, to what extent and in what ways are data being collected and analysed to explain how STEM domains are being integrated by teachers and students while carrying out projects characterised as integrated STEM projects? As a snapshot of the types of projects that integrate STEM, this systematic literature review aims to investigate these questions by analysing empirical studies of projects that claimed to integrate STEM domains, within classroom settings, from 2000 until the end of 2021.

Definitions of integrated STEM

There has been much debate about what constitutes integrated STEM education and hence there has also been disagreement about the most effective ways to approach instruction when integrating STEM domains (Moore et al., 2020 ; Nadelson & Seifert, 2017 ; Sgro et al., 2020 ). STEM integration is frequently defined as the attempt to support students in making connections between two or more of the STEM disciplines within an authentic context (Kelley & Knowles, 2016 ; Moore et al., 2014 ). This models real-world experiences where teams of professionals from differing disciplines work together to solve real-world problems. For the purposes of this systematic literature review, we examined STEM projects that involved interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary integration of at least two domains (Honey et al., 2014 ; Kelley & Knowles, 2016 ; Li, 2018 ). Interdisciplinary integration involves relating closely linked concepts and skills from two or more disciplines with the aim of deepening knowledge and skills (Vasquez et al., 2013 ). Transdisciplinary integration applies knowledge and skills from two or more disciplines to real-world problems and projects to shape the learning experience (Vasquez et al., 2013 ).

There are differences in the interpretation of the T and the E in STEM at the school level. Some curricula interpret Technology as digital technology, while in other countries, Technology is design and technology. For the purposes of this research, we adopt the Australian conception in which Technology represents both digital technology and design and technology (ACARA, 2022 ). Few jurisdictions include Engineering as a school subject (apart from the USA), so in the STEM context, this element of the acronym is increasingly considered as a reference to the Engineering design process, as promoted by the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS, 2022 ).

Prior reviews of integrated STEM literature

Even though the acronym “STEM” was only coined in 2001, there has been a large amount of literature published on the topic. Trends in STEM literature over the preceding period were analysed by Li et al. ( 2020 ) who found that research in STEM education has increased in importance over the two decades since the term was first used, but that there was a lack of consensus about what constitutes STEM and particularly, integrated STEM. The diversity of opinions and definitions of STEM has contributed to difficulties in carrying out general literature reviews to describe the field (Li et al., 2020 ). As a consequence, many of the literature reviews available focus on narrow areas of integrated STEM education.

For instance, a review of commonly used teaching strategies in integrated STEM education (Mustafa et al., 2016 ) indicated that project-based learning approaches were most prominent. Likewise, a systematic literature review by Thibaut et al. ( 2018 ) investigating the instructional practices employed when implementing integrated STEM projects found that integration of STEM content, problem-centred or problem-based learning, inquiry-based learning, design-based learning and cooperative learning were the most common frameworks used. However, neither of these reviews analysed the ways in which STEM domains were explicitly or implicitly integrated within each of these instructional approaches.

A systematic review looking at the major challenges in implementing integrated STEM projects identified limited teacher confidence, lack of guidance to teachers in planning projects, and knowing how to effectively integrate STEM areas, as the major reasons why teachers avoided carrying out such projects (Arshad et al., 2021 ). Teachers themselves confirmed that, while they think that carrying out integrated STEM projects is beneficial to students, they frequently encounter challenges in fitting STEM projects into a busy curriculum, have not been provided with pedagogical tools for implementing such projects, lack support through professional development and collaboration opportunities, and hold concerns about whether students will learn the required curriculum content (Margot & Kettler, 2019 ). However, the characteristics of projects being presented to students as integrating STEM, have not been analysed. Considering the lack of clarity and consensus surrounding definitions of integrated STEM projects amongst researchers, it is not surprising that teachers are unclear and are lacking in confidence about how to proceed.

Consequently, without a clearly defined theoretical framework for integrated STEM education, there has been a lot of debate about what constitutes best practice in the integration of STEM fields. Based on a detailed analysis of literature published about integrated STEM, Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) developed a comprehensive framework to conceptualise good practice when developing integrated STEM projects. They identified seven characteristics of effective STEM projects:

Making an engineering design process central to the project, during which students participate in at least one cycle of designing, evaluating and re-designing;

Choice of authentic problems which are relevant to the students’ contexts, which take into account the diversity of students, and address social, political or ethical aspects of the problem or socio-scientific issues (SSI);

The context of the problem needs to allow for explicit connections with developmentally appropriate subject content, skills and learning goals;

In addition, explicit connections should be made between the content in targeted disciplines which could involve multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary approaches;

Development of STEM practices are necessary in order to produce solutions, such as active social construction of understanding, collection, analysis, manipulation and visualisation of data, argumentation supported by evidence-based reasoning and consideration of multiple aspects of the problem (e.g., social benefits or costs);

Employment of twenty-first century skills such as creativity and collaboration;

Explicit links are made with possible future STEM careers.

In particular, in order to cater for diversity within the classroom, rather than taking a deficit view of what is keeping certain students from engaging with STEM, researchers and teachers are encouraged to think about what can be changed about STEM projects in order to address the interests, skills and experience of all students (Zeidler, 2016 ). Brotman and Moore ( 2008 ) identified important ways in which curricula can become more inclusive, including more gender-inclusive, by: including students’ interests and experiences; using real-world problems; engaging with societal problems that are burning issues for students; and encouraging active participation, agency, collaboration and communication. Zeidler ( 2016 ) highlights the importance of addressing socio-scientific issues as a sociocultural response to designing inclusive STEM projects. In this review, we adopt Roehrig et al.’s ( 2021 ) view of what constitutes effective integrated STEM projects.

Although reviews clarify some of the methodologies and teaching approaches used or recommended for integrating STEM in schools, what is less clear is what types of projects are being put forward as integrated STEM projects, the STEM domains that are most commonly integrated, and an understanding of how integration is achieved. While some jurisdictions provide guidelines for integrating STEM domains (e.g., NGSS Lead States, 2013 ) the focus of this paper is the enacted curriculum, that is, how guidelines and recommendations for integrated STEM are translated in practice within classrooms (Cal & Thompson, 2014 ). This systematic literature review seeks to understand these aspects by focusing on empirical studies that describe the integrated STEM projects (the enacted curriculum) being implemented with enough detail to answer the following research questions.

Research questions

Considering middle/high school projects that are identified by the authors as integrated STEM projects:

What are the characteristics of the projects described?

What disciplines are explicitly (or implicitly) integrated in these projects?

To what extent do these projects reflect characteristics of effective STEM projects identified by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 )?

What are the foci of research in empirical studies of integrated STEM projects? To what extent does research into iSTEM projects in classrooms investigate specific methods of integration of STEM domains?

In order to systematically review the literature to answer the research questions the following Preferred Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) (Moher et al., 2009 ) steps were addressed: establishing relevant inclusion/exclusion criteria; determining a search strategy; searching and screening potential studies; evaluating included studies; analysis and synthesis of themes. The inclusion and exclusion criteria utilised were:

Inclusion criteria

Empirical studies reporting the implementation of an iSTEM project.

The authors identify two or more disciplines of STE or M addressed. The project may also include STEAM (with the Arts) or STEMM (with Medicine) dimensions.

The iSTEM project is explicitly described; summarised in the methodology and/or illustrated with excerpts/examples in the results.

The projects involved middle school (Grades 5–8) or high school students (Grades 9–12) or appropriate equivalents.

Data may be qualitative and/or quantitative.

The intervention can take place outside of the school setting—informal settings.

Exclusion criteria

Study is published earlier than 2000.

Study describes STEM projects with elementary and university age students.

Limited description of the project/s being implemented.

Theoretical papers.

Review papers.

Papers not written in English.

Search strategy

Title, abstract and keywords were searched in ProQuest, ERIC, Scopus, Sage Journals and Web of Science databases using a search for terms agreed between the authors, these being: “integrated STEM” OR “integrated STEAM” OR “integrated STEMM” OR “interdisciplinary STEM (STEAM/STEMM)” OR “Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics” AND “project*” AND “secondary school” OR “high school” OR “middle school”. It was decided to limit the scope of the study to publications from January 2000 onwards, since the term STEM was coined in 2001.

Data screening and extraction

The data screening process is described in Fig.  1 . The search results ( N  = 221) were imported into an Excel spreadsheet and duplicates and conference proceedings were removed ( n  = 106). Each author then independently checked the titles and abstracts of the remaining articles ( n  = 115), excluding those studies that did not meet the inclusion criteria ( n  = 71). Where conflicts arose, the authors consulted and discussed whether to include or exclude the study.

PRISMA flowchart

In the second phase of screening, the authors individually examined the full text of studies ( n  = 44) and made decisions to include or exclude the studies based on the inclusion criteria. Where conflicts relating to decisions about exclusion/inclusion occurred, the authors met to resolve them.

Finally, authors extracted data from the remaining 35 studies, including publication date, country of the author and setting of the study, study design, data type collected, type of class (unidisciplinary or multidisciplinary) data was collected in, STEM fields integrated, whether integration is elaborated, a description of the scope of the project(s), instructional approach, cohort and research focus. One other author then checked the extracted data for accuracy. The extracted data were then summarised, and further thematic analysis was carried out where appropriate.

Data analysis

For most of the data extracted, analysis involved aggregating numbers of papers within each category. However, in the areas of domains of STEM integrated, instructional approaches, whether student context/interests are addressed, student autonomy and research foci, themes were identified within each area. For instance, within the research foci, the theme ‘development of students’ content knowledge’ arose as an important focus of research within these articles. In order to determine which domains were integrated within the project, the authors first searched for statements by the authors of the study that specifically identified domains such as Physics or Engineering. In some cases, when domains were not explicitly identified, the authors identified domains from the description of the project and the activities carried out which implied that certain domains were addressed. Data from each paper were placed under each of these themes as appropriate. When new themes arose during this initial analysis, these were added. Once saturation of themes was achieved and no more major themes arose (Bryman, 2012 ), the authors cross checked each other’s analysis of themes.

Research question 1: characteristics of studies

The 35 articles which met the inclusion criteria were published in 25 different journals (see Additional file 1 for a complete list). The majority of these journals had either a Science focus (e.g., Journal of Research in Science Teaching ) or at least two STEM areas (e.g ., Journal of Science Education & Technology ) (Fig.  2 ). No articles were found in journals which focused solely on Mathematics.

Subject area focus of publishing journals

There were no articles found before 2010, although the number of articles for each year has increased steadily since then (Fig.  3 ). The research described in the included articles was carried out in 8 different countries, 60% in the USA (Fig.  4 ). The majority of studies had a case study design or were quasi-experimental using pre/post tests (Fig.  5 ). In one article, the methodology was unclear. Thirteen studies focused on qualitative data, seven on quantitative data, while 14 collected both qualitative and quantitative data. Data types collected from the studies are described in Table 1 (as many studies utilised multiple data sources, the total number in Table 1 exceeds the sample size of 35). The cohorts who participated in iSTEM projects and who were the focus of the papers ranged from Grade 5 to Grade 12 students and included mixed age groups (Fig.  6 ). Some of the articles described participation in a range of different STEM projects for several grade levels.

Publication date of included articles

Countries where research was carried out

Reviewed articles study design

Cohort described in the reviewed studies

We also examined the types of classes in which the iSTEM projects were carried out. About half of the projects were implemented in unidisciplinary classes (i.e. classes that normally focus on one of the STEM subject areas). Of these, 14 were projects implemented as part of Science classes, two as part of Engineering classes and one as part of a Technology class. Eighteen of the studies implemented iSTEM projects in a multidisciplinary class where the focus was specifically on integrating several STEM areas.

In response to research question 1a, we firstly examined the STEM areas that were integrated within the project. Twenty-four of the studies elaborated which areas were integrated, while five gave limited descriptions of integration, and integration was not the focus for six studies. Areas of integration are listed in Table 2 . Science skills and content knowledge featured in all but two of the studies, while 31 studies included an Engineering focus. Twenty studies explicitly discussed integration of technology (e.g., through robotics, electronics, 3D printing, computer programming). Likewise, 20 of the studies indicated that mathematics was integrated into the project. Although all the studies claimed to be integrating a number of STEM areas, two studies only focused on one area (Table 2 ).

Within the Science domain, content knowledge from Physics, Chemistry, Biology and/or Earth Science (including Astronomy) was identified as a focus of the project (Table 3 ). Physics topics were the most commonly included Science topics in STEM projects. Note that some projects included more than one Science learning area.

To what extent do these projects reflect characteristics of effective STEM projects identified by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) ?

Firstly, we examined whether the engineering design process was central to projects. A wide variety of projects were described. These could be organised under four broad themes described in Table 4 : (i) design challenges which involved constructing prototypes (23 studies); (ii) hands-on learning activities (11 studies), such as making DNA models to understand genetically modified organisms (Wanoho et al., 2021 ); (iii) student-designed inquiry projects (3 studies), such as experiments aimed at explaining metal purification methods (Daman Huri & Karpudewan, 2019 ); and (iv) abstract problem solving (2 studies), such as brainstorming to solve problems related to space travel (Moreno et al., 2016 ). There were several articles that described more than one project, such as a study which looked at the integration of mathematics into a number of different STEM projects, including designing and making ballistic devices and understanding the properties of circles and theorems (Nathan et al., 2017 ). The 23 design challenges met the criteria for an engineering design process as they included at least one cycle of designing, evaluation and re-designing. However, the hands-on learning activities, where the teachers guided students through activities, gave limited opportunities for them to engage with an engineering design process.

In addition to examining the types of projects described, the instructional approaches identified by the authors in each paper could be categorised according to five key principles identified by Thibaut et al. ( 2018 ): integration of STEM content, problem-centred learning, inquiry-based learning, engineering design-based learning and cooperative learning. Instructional approaches are summarised in Table 5 . Some articles identified more than one instructional approach. The most common approach was an engineering design approach followed by problem-based/oriented learning. Both of these approaches were often combined with inquiry approaches and included cooperative learning. Engineering design was also incorporated into some of the problem-based learning approaches. However, two of the studies focused on presenting learning through a series of guided tasks, such as a NASA unit, “Thinking Like an Astronaut” (Moreno et al., 2016 ) rather than utilising an engineering design process. Additionally, the focus of one study was on preparing students for assessment. Five studies also specifically referenced a focus on Social Scientific Issues (SSI) (e.g., Wanoho et al., 2021 ). All of the studies claimed to integrate STEM content. However, six of the articles examined did not identify the instructional approach that they used.

Secondly, we examined each of the articles to understand whether the authors explicitly took into account the students’ context or interests in order to produce authentic problems. Of the design challenges, 12 consisted of a design brief which considered the students’ context, although student context or authenticity of the projects was not the main focus of these papers, and was often only mentioned in passing. The example which most clearly addressed the students’ context was one in which they designed an amphitheatre, within a budget, to meet the needs of the local community (Newman et al., 2015 ). The other design briefs focused on designing “things” without any explicit relationship to the students’ context (c.f., Gunckel & Tolbert, 2018 ) (e.g., a CO 2 powered model drag racer (Chien, 2017 ) or designing and building a balsa wood house to survive in a wind tunnel (Barrett et al., 2014 )).

Of the projects that focused on teaching a concept or concepts through hands-on activities, none of these considered the context of the students explicitly, although two projects addressed SSIs. Of the projects which focused on inquiry learning, two were context specific. However, students were given agency in designing experiments. Neither of the abstract problem-solving projects specifically engaged with student context.

One way of ensuring that projects are relevant to students is allowing for student design or choice of project topic. Fifteen of the 35 studies implemented projects that were externally designed, either by the researchers or by other experts such as NASA or Curriculum developers (e.g., Petrosino et al., 2016 ; Wilhelm et al., 2013 ). A further seven studies described teacher/researcher collaborative efforts to design the STEM project/s (e.g., De Meester et al., 2020 ). Teachers were instrumental in designing 11 of the projects (e.g., Wieselmann et al., 2021 ). Only two of the 35 studies gave students agency in choosing the problem to be studied (Kapon et al., 2021 ; Newman et al., 2015 ).

Of the 35 studies examined, only three mentioned that they made explicit links for students with possible future STEM careers as part of the project design. For instance, in the project described by Burrows et al. ( 2014 ), career connections were explicitly discussed in class and included in assessment questions. However, 18 studies did mention that one of the goals for introducing integrated STEM projects to students is that participation in these may increase engagement with future STEM careers and two of these studies examined whether students had changed their perspective about STEM careers as a result of doing these projects. However, neither of these papers mentioned whether this was an aspect that was explicitly addressed in lessons. In one study, including a “STEM Career Connections” component was considered, but the project designers chose not to because they did not think this was critical to the success of the project (Gale et al., 2020 ). The rest of the articles did not mention STEM careers at all.

Research question 2: foci of research

In response to research question 2 (What are the foci of research in empirical studies of integrated STEM projects? To what extent does research into iSTEM projects in classrooms investigate specific methods of integration of STEM domains?), the research questions for each study and the outcomes reported were examined. The research themes that were identified are displayed in Table 6 . It should be noted that some studies had multiple research foci.

It can be seen from the research foci presented in Table 6 that there is a very limited focus in the literature on describing the ways in which the STEM domains are practically integrated as iSTEM projects are enacted. The largest group of studies focused on the degree to which students had developed STEM-related content knowledge or skills as a result of participating in an iSTEM project. Many of these utilised a pre/post-test design, and in some cases compared results with a control/comparison group (e.g., Chen & Chang, 2018 ). Of the 12 studies which focused on the degree of content knowledge acquisition, 10 indicated that students had improved content knowledge, while two studies showed no significant learning had taken place. Four studies observed students actively applying STEM knowledge and skills to solve problems. Likewise, most studies noted that STEM skills, including twenty-first century skills, such as creativity and collaboration, improved as a result of participation in these projects. However, one study showed no noticeable improvement in skills.

Students’ experience of the lessons in terms of their motivation, self-efficacy and engagement was also a prominent theme, mostly evaluated through questionnaires, interviews, journals and video recordings (e.g., Chu et al., 2020 ). Seven studies observed high levels of engagement and motivation amongst students as they carried out STEM projects. Likewise, students’ attitudes towards STEM subjects and intentions to continue in the STEM pipeline were determined through questionnaires (e.g., Lou et al., 2011 ). Most of the studies examining changes in attitudes towards STEM indicated an improvement as a result of the STEM projects, although one study indicated no improvement had taken place.

The degree and types of participation of students while completing iSTEM projects, including gender differences, were analysed through classroom observations, videos and journal entries (e.g., Gardner & Tillotson, 2020 ; Wieselmann et al., 2020 ). For instance, Wieselmann et al. ( 2020 ) showed that boys and girls participate differently in STEM activities within small groups—the boys tending to be controlling and competitive and ignoring the girls’ contributions.

Teachers’ perceptions of the efficacy of the iSTEM intervention based on questionnaire and interview responses was the focus of five studies (e.g., Gardner & Tillotson, 2019 ). A number of challenges for implementing STEM projects were described by teachers, such as scheduling difficulties, difficulties using technology, and in making links to the curriculum (Stohlmann et al., 2011 ). Fidelity of implementation of specific iSTEM approaches by teachers was also analysed in two studies (e.g., Petrosino et al., 2016 ), and three studies considered the challenges that arise when integrating STEM domains (e.g., Stohlmann et al., 2011 ).

Surprisingly, the research questions in only five studies specifically targeted the enactment of STEM integration within an iSTEM project. For the most part, these studies carried out detailed analyses of audio/video recordings (e.g., multimodal discourse analysis (Nathan et al., 2017 )) of groups participating in STEM projects to understand teacher and student choices/actions/discussions. Mathis et al. ( 2018 ) presented a case narrative using quantitative content analysis to describe how students chose to use science and mathematics content through different engineering design phases while solving an engineering problem. Burrows et al. ( 2018 ) focused on engineering skills and identified numerous ways in which science, and to a lesser extent mathematics, was integrated while enacting these skills in an informal, community-based project. On the other hand, Dare et al. ( 2018 ) focused on iSTEM projects within the Science classroom. Teachers identified the time spent addressing the domains of STEM in each lesson. Teachers were then categorised as having low, moderate or high levels of STEM integration within their classes. They found that teachers are not always aware of how to meaningfully make explicit connections between domains, struggling to integrate mathematics and engineering into science instruction. In particular, engineering appeared to be an add-on, especially for those who had low levels of integration. Wieselmann et al. ( 2020 ), on the other hand, found that girls and boys, working in small groups, engaged with science or engineering focused lessons in different ways and may need practice and support in moving between these two discipline areas. In order to promote STEM integration, Nathan et al. ( 2017 ) found that cohesion between fields is best achieved when students themselves find their own ways to integrate fields as they apply ideas to more abstract principles.

This systematic literature review focuses on two areas that have not previously been investigated: what are the characteristics of projects being classified by researchers/teachers as integrated STEM projects; and to what extent are the specific ways in which integration of STEM domains investigated in the classrooms where they are enacted? In order to take a snapshot of the integrated STEM project landscape, we limited the review to empirical studies of iSTEM projects carried out with middle/high school students.

The authors of the 35 articles which met the inclusion criteria for this literature review identified a wide variety of projects that they considered exemplified integrated STEM. Making the engineering design process central to effective iSTEM projects is one of the recommendations made by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ). Although engineering design was prominent amongst the instructional approaches identified by authors, other instructional approaches were also prominent, such as project based/oriented learning (Table 5 ). This is consistent with the findings of Mustafa et al. ( 2016 ) and Thibaut et al. ( 2018 ). However, several projects made no mention of engineering design, focusing on inquiry approaches or hands-on learning. In particular, the projects which presented hands-on learning activities left little or no room for design/re-design by students.

In terms of the types of projects students were engaging with, the authors identified four types (Table 4 ). Consistent with the engineering design approach used in many of the projects, 23 of the 35 studies gave students a design brief which allowed students to design some kind of physical model or prototype in order to solve a specific problem. These clearly fit the recommendations of Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ). However, although 23 of the projects identified by the authors as iSTEM did have an engineering design focus, surprisingly, 16 of the projects described did not specifically use the engineering design cycle. For instance, there were 11 projects which focused on teacher directed, hands-on activities to communicate content knowledge and skills to support students’ learning (Table 4 ) rather than employing the engineering design cycle to address a specific problem. Although these projects allowed students to construct models, for instance 2D and 3D models to explain lunar periodicity and phases (Wilhelm et al., 2013 ) or DNA models to understand genetically modified organisms (Wanoho et al., 2021 ), the engineering design process was not followed as students were given limited agency in the design process. This raises the question of whether these fit into the category of integrated STEM projects, especially if the characteristics of effective STEM projects identified by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) are considered. These findings indicate that researchers (and teachers) may not be operating under coherent definitions of what constitutes an integrated STEM project. We would argue, together with Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ), that projects that do not allow students to design their own solutions to problems, evaluate those designs and then re-design do not meet criteria for best practice in integrating STEM domains.

Another feature of effective iSTEM projects is that they enable students to engage with authentic problems which are relevant to their context. On the whole, the engineering design challenges (Table 4 ) gave students agency in the design/re-design process and the inquiry tasks also allowed students to design experiments. However, considering the recommendations of Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) that effective iSTEM projects should be relevant to the students’ context, relate to their interests, and take into account diversity amongst students, it is concerning that only 11 of the studies specifically mentioned that problems relevant to the students’ contexts or interests were considered when designing the iSTEM project. For instance, one of the projects, that included a service-learning component, asked students to design an amphitheatre for a local park that the community and school could share (Newman et al., 2015 ). In addition, five projects explicitly consider socio-scientific issues, such as producing genetically modified organisms, in the project design (Wanoho et al., 2021 ). These projects may meet the criteria for projects that are authentic and relevant to students of Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ). However, it was unclear whether the SSIs addressed were of particular importance to the students carrying out the tasks. This begs the question about the extent to which students’ interests and concerns are being considered as iSTEM projects are designed.

In addition, 19 of the projects asked students to design and build artefacts that did not explicitly consider the student context, although these studies stressed the importance of providing real-world problems, that professionals may engage with, to increase student engagement. For instance, a competition to build a robotic arm was thought to be motivating for students, but no mention was made about how this device was relevant to students’ lives (Chu et al., 2020 ). It may not be sufficient to simply provide design problems that represent the types of problem-solving experiences that occur in industry but, as indicated by Brotman and Moore ( 2008 ), projects should address issues and concerns that are important to students in order to engage their interest.

This problem is compounded by the fact that, in almost all the studies, students were not given choice about the project that they would investigate. This limits the ability for the iSTEM experience to address diversity of interests and life experiences within the student cohort.

The two exceptions, where students were given choice, were a study in which the students developed the problem that they would investigate: understanding the difference in efficiency between a stationary and tracking solar panel (Kapon et al., 2021 ); and a service project where students identified problems within their communities to be solved (Newman et al., 2015 ).

In addition to our concerns over some of the instructional designs of projects being put forward as integrated STEM projects, the degree of integration within projects was not always evident. All of the studies claimed that STEM fields were being integrated within these projects (c.f., Thibaut et al., 2018 ). However, for some of these studies, integration of STEM was either not the focus or the ways in which these fields were integrated was not evident. When considering the degree of integration of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics within each of the iSTEM projects in this study, it was evident that the Science and Engineering fields dominate within these projects (Table 2 ). This is consistent with Bybee’s ( 2010 ) description of the variety of definitions of STEM integration, ranging from Science and Engineering to all four domains. Thirteen of the 35 studies included at least all four domains. In addition, two studies included Social Science and English together with STEM. While 31 studies included the Engineering domain, the majority of these utilised an Engineering Design process rather than the development of engineering content knowledge. All but two of the studies included Science skills or knowledge, and technology was less likely to be identified as a domain that was integrated into the project (20 studies). This is consistent with studies which show that, even though digital technologies are frequently used in projects, the use of these technologies is often assumed rather than explicitly examined (Ellis et al., 2020 ). Mathematics was also not explicitly included in 15 of the 35 studies. It is possible that in other studies, even though connections with mathematics and technology are not explicitly addressed, they may be seen as tools of science or engineering (Baldinger et al., 2021 ).

The predominance of physics (21 studies) and astronomy (4 studies) as the Science content area addressed (Table 3 ) may be related to the number of design briefs that asked students to build prototypes. When limited connections are made between STEM projects and the students’ context and interests, and the value to students and the communities that they live in are not made explicit, and when many of these projects have a physics and engineering focus, stereotypes of these subjects may be further consolidated in students’ perceptions. Chemistry topics (8 studies), while less common, tended to be associated with inquiry tasks, such as designing experiments to understand the processes involved in mineral purification (Daman Huri & Karpudewan, 2019 ) or problem solving, for instance to stop corrosion on a metal bridge (Yüceler et al., 2020 ).

The inclusion of biology topics (11 studies) was also less common than for physics and were sometimes associated with teaching activities to understand biological concepts, such as body systems (Ntemngwa & Oliver, 2018 ) or design challenges based on biological examples (Gale et al., 2020 ). However, several of the projects that included biology identified SSIs in the local community, for which students designed solutions through an engineering design process (e.g., Newman et al., 2015 ). These projects met many of the characteristics of effective STEM projects identified by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ). It may be that incorporating a biology topic into an engineering design cycle appropriate for middle and high school is more challenging to designers than inclusion of physics concepts.

Considering that one of the rationales for introducing iSTEM projects in middle/high school has been to increase students’ understanding of what careers in STEM entail, and hence increase students’ willingness to consider STEM careers in the future (Honey et al., 2014 ) our finding that almost no studies explicitly made connections between the iSTEM projects and possible careers, as suggested by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ), is surprising. This may have been due to the research focus of the paper being unrelated to career choice. However, even in the cases where one of the research questions was to understand the influence of participation in iSTEM projects on students’ future choice of careers, no mention was made of how students’ were informed about connections between their learning in the project and possible careers.

Finally, in response to research question two, the main focus of research involving integrated STEM projects has been on learning outcomes, the degree to which students are learning specific STEM skills and content knowledge as a result of these projects (Table 6 ). In addition, affective aspects including change in attitudes to STEM, motivation and engagement throughout the STEM project were major foci of research. On the other hand, there were only five studies of exactly how students and teachers enact the integration of STEM domains throughout the project. The focus on learning outcomes related to iSTEM projects may be in an attempt to address the concerns raised by teachers about whether participation in STEM projects is in fact resulting in students learning the required curriculum content (Margot & Kettler, 2019 ). Likewise, iSTEM projects have been promoted as a way forward for increasing students engagement with and interest in pursuing STEM subjects later in school and at university (Honey et al., 2014 ), which may explain the number of studies which focus on increasing these affective aspects of learning.

The small number of studies which analyse the enactment of integrated STEM projects, however, is more surprising, particularly when teachers have indicated that they need more direction and support on how to effectively integrate learning areas (Arshad et al., 2021 ; Margot & Kettler, 2019 ). In addition, Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) identify that making explicit connections between the content of the targeted disciplines is one of the essential factors for effective iSTEM projects. Of the five studies that investigated the enactment of integration, Burrows et al. ( 2018 ), Mathis et al. ( 2018 ) and Nathan et al. ( 2017 ) were the only studies which specifically addressed the ways in which domains were integrated. Burrows et al. ( 2018 ) briefly described how science content was integrated within engineering skills. Nathan et al. ( 2017 ), on the other hand, did not focus on integration of all domains but analysed the ways in which the teacher guided engagement with mathematics as students completed mechanical and electrical engineering design projects. Mathis et al. ( 2018 ) took the approach of focusing on each of the engineering design phases within an iSTEM project and analysing how students chose to use science and mathematics in each phase while solving the engineering challenge.

On the other hand, Dare et al. ( 2018 ) developed an innovative method for measuring the degree of integration within a series of lessons within a Science classroom by using a digital teaching log to identify the length of time spent addressing each domain in each lesson. This allowed the authors to identify teachers who had low, medium and high levels of integration. However, the study did not analyse how individual domains were integrated. Likewise, the study of Wieselmann et al. ( 2020 ) looked at frequency of certain performances, such as reasoning, encouraging and suggesting, within lessons that they identified as focusing on either Science or Engineering, rather than on how Science and Engineering were integrated. What is clear is that it is challenging to find ways in which to measure the degree of integration of domains and describe ways in which they are integrated. This finding suggests that there is much scope for classroom-based studies to probe effective strategies for integrating STEM domains.

Limitations and recommendations

It is possible that by including some of the search terms, such as projects, into the search engine criteria some integrated STEM studies may have been missed. The search also only included studies in English, which, perforce, limits the number of studies.

However, we offer the following recommendations for further research based on the scope of the studies that have been included. Firstly, further research is needed into the types of projects that would engage a greater diversity of students. For instance, a focus on designing “things” (Gunckel & Tolbert, 2018 ), untethered to students’ interests or concerns, may be one of the reasons why girls, in particular, are less motivated than boys to participate in integrated STEM projects (Brotman & Moore, 2008 ; Koul et al., 2021 ). Students’ beliefs that STEM careers do not address their diverse interests and concerns, including gendered interests, has been identified as one of the reasons that females are not choosing to continue to study subjects such as engineering, physics and computer science (Su et al., 2009 ). The higher enrolment of females in biology and, to a lesser extent, chemistry in preparation for caring careers, such as in the health sector, is indicative of gendered interests that are, on the whole, not being addressed within the context of iSTEM projects (Eccles & Wang, 2016 ). This is highlighted by the preponderance of physics-based projects presented in these studies (Table 3 ). Projects which only set one type of problem, such as building a ballistic device (Nathan et al., 2017 ) or CO2-powered model drag racers (Chien, 2017 ) may be of interest to some students, but do not take into account the diversity of students (Roehrig et al., 2021 ), and may, in fact, perpetuate stereotypical perceptions of engineering as the preserve of males (Master et al., 2016 ). We would suggest that, in order to address diverse interests within the student cohort, further research is needed into whether targeting biology within the Science domain of iSTEM projects increases the engagement and interest of girls in STEM.

Secondly, further research is needed regarding the effects of giving students more agency in choosing the problem that will be addressed through the STEM project.

Thirdly, the effects on attitudes towards STEM careers of making explicit links with possible careers as students carry out STEM projects is another area of research suggested by the results of this literature review.

Finally, the limited number of studies which investigate specific ways in which STEM domains are integrated suggests that further research is needed into methodologies for measuring the degree of integration and understanding best practice to effectively integrate STEM domains.

This systematic literature review addresses two main research questions: What are the characteristics of the projects described and to what extent do these projects reflect characteristics of effective STEM projects identified by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ); and to what extent does research into iSTEM projects in classrooms investigate specific methods of integration of STEM domains?

It was evident that there were a wide variety of ways in which researchers and teachers understand STEM integration. While a majority of studies claimed to integrate, at least, Engineering and/or Science, only half of the studies presented students with an engineering design challenge which asked students to apply the engineering design cycle, as recommended by Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ). Mathematics and technology were less likely to be explicitly addressed within these projects. The specific ways in which integration of STEM domains occurred was only discussed in a small number of papers. The majority of studies focused on the effects of iSTEM projects on content and skill acquisition or on attitudes towards STEM. Only five studies examined the enactment of STEM integration within the classroom, and of these, only three explicitly examined processes for integrating domains, leaving much scope for further investigations in this area. This suggests that there is an extensive gap in our understanding of the practical ways in which STEM integration occurs and is made explicit to students (Roehrig et al., 2021 ). Another recommendation of Roehrig et al. ( 2021 ) was that projects should be relevant to students interests and context. Only 11 studies explicitly took into account the context of the students or their interests, and of these, some made assumptions about what the students may be interested in. Additionally, only two studies gave students choice in determining the engineering design question. This lack of student agency and relevance may provide a further barrier for engaging with iSTEM for some students. Further research is required to understand the importance of student agency in designing iSTEM projects and in finding ways to more authentically address student context and interest. In addition, a major rationale for introducing iSTEM projects into schools has been to raise student awareness of careers in STEM. The limited number of studies that explicitly made connections between the projects described and possible STEM careers, suggests that this is another area for further study.

Availability of data and materials

All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article and its supplementary information files.

Abbreviations

Integrated Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics

Project based learning

Project centred learning

Problem oriented project based learning

Socio-scientific issues

Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine

Science, Technology Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics

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Wieselmann, J. R., Dare, E. A., Ring-Whalen, E. A., & Roehrig, G. H. (2020). “I just do what the boys tell me": Exploring small group student interactions in an integrated STEM unit. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 57 (1), 112–144. https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21587

Wieselmann, J. R., Dare, E. A., Roehrig, G. H., & Ring-Whalen, E. A. (2021). “There are other ways to help besides using the stuff”: Using activity theory to understand dynamic student participation in small group science, technology, engineering, and mathematics activities. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 58 (9), 1281–1319. https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21710

Wilhelm, J., Jackson, C., Sullivan, A., & Wilhelm, R. (2013). Examining differences between preteen groups spatial-scientific understandings: A quasi-experimental study. Journal of Educational Research, 106 (5), 337–351. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220671.2012.753858

Yüceler, R., Aydın-Günbatar, S., & Demirdöğen, B. (2020). Stop bridge collapse: a STEM activity about preventing corrosion of metals. Science Activities, 57 (4), 154–164. https://doi.org/10.1080/00368121.2020.1850408

Zeidler, D. L. (2016). STEM education: A deficit framework for the twenty first century? A sociocultural socioscientific response. Cultural Studies of Science Education, 11 (1), 11–26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-014-9578-z

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McLure, F.I., Tang, KS. & Williams, P.J. What do integrated STEM projects look like in middle school and high school classrooms? A systematic literature review of empirical studies of iSTEM projects. IJ STEM Ed 9 , 73 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40594-022-00390-8

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STEM Career Research Project for Middle School

• December 18, 2022
• Engineering , STEM
• Career Exploration , Engaging Lessons , Real World Connections

How do you inspire future scientists and engineers? Do your students know what careers are STEM careers and what it means to have a career in STEM? You can answer these questions and more with this multi-day STEM career project !

STEM Career Research Project

In this project, students will choose an engineering career to research. They will discover the job roles and responsibilities, possible work environments, education requirements, average salaries, helpful skills and traits, and projected job growth in that field. Then students will imagine a company that is looking to hire a person in that career field. They’ll examine real-world job postings and then design and create a “help wanted” poster for their chosen career. Next, students will present their work and learn about other careers in a gallery walk activity. Finally, they’ll complete an independent reflection activity.

This STEM career research project is independent and low-prep. Grab this resource today! You will save your prep time, and know your students will be engaged and inspired while learning about STEM careers.

What’s included in the STEM Careers Research Project?

This no-prep project includes everything you need for 3-5 days of engaging STEM activities, including: 

• Printable PDF, Google, and Easel versions of the student activities and worksheets
• A webquest that guides students to choose and research a STEM career
• Detailed guidelines and  templates for the “Help Wanted” job advertisement project
• A graphic organizer for capturing student learning during the Gallery Walk activity
• An independent reflection worksheet to be completed at the end of the project
• Embedded links to quality background research websites
• Detailed teacher notes for easy facilitation
• An easy-to-use grading rubric

What materials do you need?

You only need to provide printed or digital copies of the student worksheets and devices with internet access for research. 

How can you use the STEM career project in your classroom?

You can use the research project as a week-long study of STEM careers. You will open your students’ eyes to career options that they may have never before considered. This is a great introductory activity for your STEM class, and it can be used to celebrate National Engineering Week in February.

This STEM career project is also perfect for giving yourself a bit of a break when you are feeling burnt out or feeling frustrated with challenging student behaviors. For example, you could use the project to keep students engaged before a school holiday. You can also use the project to keep students learning when you have unusual schedules or low attendance due to field trips, testing, assemblies, or other interruptions. Or, you can leave the low-prep project as a multi-day STEM sub plan.

Looking for other STEM Career activities?

If you’d like more ideas for inspiring your students and teaching them about STEM careers, check out this blog post on exploring STEM careers !

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10 STEM Summer Camps for Middle School Students

Middle school students can greatly benefit from engaging in STEM summer camps. These camps provide an enriching environment where participants can explore various STEM fields, cultivate their interests, and develop essential skills. These hands-on experiments, interactive projects and team activities not only prepare students for advanced placement (AP) courses but also enrich your college applications and boost your shot at getting into future research programs!

Below, we've curated a selection of 10 STEM summer camps tailored specifically for middle school students, offering them an exciting pathway to discovery and growth in the world of STEM.

1. MSM Steam Academy (Morehouse School of Medicine)

Throughout this comprehensive four-week program, you will immerse themselves in a diverse range of engaging activities spanning engineering/technology and exploratory studies.  In addition to these focal areas, you will delve into the realm of mobile application development with a specific emphasis on health science.

Incorporating both fundamental academic content and thematic programming, the curriculum encompasses subjects ranging from engineering/technology to health and wellness, satisfying extracurricular educational needs. You will also actively engage in inquiry-based activities designed to reinforce the program's curriculum and establish connections to real-world applications.

Note : All materials (application and supplemental) must be received by the application closing date by 5 pm. 

Location : Atlanta, GA (Morehouse University)

Dates : June 3-28

Cost : $800

Eligibility : Rising 5-8th graders

Deadline : Rolling

2. The University of Texas at Dallas Coding Camps

At the University of Texas at Dallas Coding Camps, you'll discover the dynamic fusion of mathematical principles and computer programming. With platforms like Scratch and JavaScript, you'll witness how abstract math concepts come alive in the digital realm.  From exploring angles and 3D space to working with random numbers and recursion, students will immerse themselves in a diverse array of mathematical ideas.

A standout offering is the "Bring Math to Life!" camp, where participants embark on a journey to leverage programming for grasping geometry, object manipulation, sequence patterns, and recursive structures in an enjoyable week-long experience. Moreover, the "Modding with Minecraft" camp transports students into the beloved Minecraft universe, empowering them to craft mods using programming fundamentals.

For beginners, the camp provides an accessible entry point with the "Enjoyable Coding with Alice" segment. Through the Alice programming environment's intuitive drag-and-drop interface, participants delve into 3D animation and game development, bypassing the complexities of syntax errors. This segment caters especially to newcomers, furnishing a robust groundwork in programming principles in a user-friendly manner.

Location : Virtual

Dates : Weekly camps from June 3, 2024 - August 2, 2024

Cost : $150

Eligibility : Students aged 11-14 are eligible

Deadline : Enrollment is open until the Wednesday prior to the start date of the week’s camps.

3. Oregon State University - Stem Academy

The program aims to boost college attendance rates and foster enthusiasm for STEM disciplines. Although the specific topics for the upcoming summer of 2024 are pending confirmation, the offerings from the previous year in 2023 provide a glimpse into the varied array of subjects available. Choices ranged from the adventurous Wild About Wildlife Camp to the hands-on Making with Microcontrollers, as well as Engineering Camps, ActivityBots Camp, and Flying Robots Camp. Some programs even included field trips and interactive learning opportunities to enrich students' educational journeys.

Location : Corvallis, OR (Oregon State University)

Dates : TBA

Cost : $90-300

Eligibility : Rising 6-8th graders

Deadline : Registration opens in late February

4. Junior Scientist Training Program at Scripps Research

During the execution of a research project, students will acquire essential hands-on skills, participate in lab tours, and partake in various STEM activities. At week's end, they'll share their discoveries with peers. Additionally, participants will be granted a completion certificate from Scripps Research, recognizing their active participation. To begin the application process for the Junior Scientist Training Program for middle schoolers, you'll need to register by providing personal information.

Following this, you'll be able to register your child and any additional middle schoolers via the provided link .

Location : La Jolla, California

Dates : TBD

Cost : $300

Deadline : Rolling, registration ends on May 13th. 

5. Georgia Tech: The Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing Expanded Learning Programs

The program is committed to equipping students with vital skills like coding from an early stage. By engaging in hands-on experimentation, participants will nurture creativity while tackling their STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) projects. For students who cannot attend the physical location, online alternatives are available, ensuring accessibility and flexibility in learning.

Location : Atlanta, GA (Georgia Tech) and online

Dates : April 19th.

Cost : $225-450

Eligibility : K-12

Deadline : Students are accepted on a rolling basis

6. Tech Explorer Camp at the University of North Texas

The Tech Explorer Camp, held at the University of North Texas, caters to middle and high school students intrigued by technology . Spanning five days at Frisco Landing, attendees engage in hands-on activities designed to fuel curiosity and inspire innovation.  Led by seasoned instructors, the camp features a stimulating curriculum encompassing diverse tech topics, from coding workshops to robotics challenges.

Designed to spark creativity and foster critical thinking, the program emphasizes teamwork and problem-solving skills. Beyond equipping participants with practical abilities, the Tech Explorer Camp aims to cultivate a deep appreciation for technology, whether students aspire to careers in programming, engineering, or simply harbor a love for tech. It presents an enriching opportunity for attendees to expand their skill set and kindle their passion for the technological realm.

Location : Frisco Landing, Preston Rd, Frisco, TX

Dates : from July 8 to 12, 2024

Cost : $350 for the 5-day camp. Meals are not included.

Eligibility: Summer camp participants must be middle or high school students

Application Deadline: TBA

7. SMU Lyle School of Engineering’s Introduction to Engineering Summer Camp

This 5-day residential summer camp, with an intake limited to just 20 students annually, is a rather exclusive program. It offers a comprehensive introduction to various fields of engineering including electrical, mechanical, civil, and environmental engineering, as well as computer science basics. Through a variety of hands-on projects and activities, participants will gain practical experience and theoretical knowledge.

Each project is meticulously crafted by faculty to simulate real-world engineering processes. Prior STEM experience is not required to attend this camp, making it an ideal starting point for middle school students eager to begin their journey into STEM education. If you're enthusiastic about diving into the world of engineering, SMU's Introduction to Engineering Summer Camp provides an excellent opportunity.

Location : SMU Lyle School of Engineering, Texas

Dates : Boys-only camp: June 3-7, 2024 | Girls-only camp: June 10-14, 2024 | Boys/Girls camp: June 17-21, 2024 (tentatively)

Cost : $600

Eligibility :  Rising 7th and 8th grade students

Deadline : NA

8. UNH Tech Camp

The TechLeaders initiative at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) offers an innovative summer program centered on the convergence of technology and healthcare, with a particular emphasis on regenerative medicine . Through hands-on projects and discussions, students delve into how technological progress is revolutionizing tissue regeneration and healing processes. Under the guidance of expert faculty and mentors, participants explore topics like fabrication and bioprinting, gaining valuable insights into the application of technology in regenerative medicine.

This immersive experience not only hones students' data analysis skills and experimental capabilities but also fosters critical thinking and problem-solving. TechLeaders not only sparks students' enthusiasm for STEM but also showcases the transformative power of technology in healthcare.

Location : In-person on the UNH Durham campus

Cost : Tuition is $700 per week for day students and $1,350 per week for residential students Program Dates : July, exact dates to be announced

Eligibility: Middle or high school students

9. MIT DYNAMIT

Catering to students entering grades 6 through 9 from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, this initiative is dedicated to fostering a love for STEM fields through engaging experiments and challenges. MIT students generously volunteer their time to educate these underserved middle schoolers about STEM concepts, with the goal of sparking their passion for science and engineering and molding them into future leaders in STEM.

The program encompasses a variety of STEM topics, such as mathematics, biology, chemistry, mechanical engineering, earth and space sciences, and computer science.  Students participate in captivating activities like experimenting with bouncy bubbles, launching bottle rockets, and constructing water balloon slingshots, enhancing their learning experience and igniting their curiosity. Find the application form  here. 

Location : MIT campus, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Dates : Rising 6th and 7th graders- August 14th to August 18th, 

Rising 8th and 9th graders- August 21st to August 25th

Cost : Entirely Free

Eligibility :  6th to 9th graders from the Boston area

Deadline : March 10th. 

10. SALLY RIDE SCIENCE ACADEMY

The Sally Ride Science Academy's summer program offers STEAM workshops customized for students ranging from 3rd to 12th grade. These workshops provide opportunities for participants to explore different roles, including space explorer, marine biologist, and computer programmer, through interactive hands-on projects.  Guided by experienced STEAM instructors who double as mentors, the workshops integrate stories of successful women in each field, with the goal of inspiring students and promoting greater accessibility to STEAM careers.

Location :  Both in person and live-online session

Dates : 8th July- 2nd August

Cost : $135 to $149 per course

Eligibility : 3 - 12th grade

Deadline : May 31st

One other Option - Lumiere Junior Explorer Program

The   Lumiere Junior Explorer Program  is a program for middle school students to work one-on-one with a mentor to explore their academic interests and build a project they are passionate about .  Our mentors are scholars from top research universities such as Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Yale, Duke and LSE.

The program was founded by a Harvard & Oxford PhD who met as undergraduates at Harvard. The program is rigorous and fully virtual. We offer need based financial aid for students who qualify. You can find the application in the   brochure ! 

To learn more, you can reach out to our Head of Growth, Khushi Malde, at [email protected]  or go to our   website .

Multiple rolling deadlines for JEP cohorts across the year, you can apply using this application   link !  If you'd like to take a look at the cohorts + deadlines for 2024, you can refer to   this page!

Stephen is one of the founders of Lumiere and a Harvard College graduate. He founded Lumiere as a PhD student at Harvard Business School. Lumiere is a selective research program where students work 1-1 with a research mentor to develop an independent research paper.

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STEM Studies Community Health

Seventh-graders at the STEM Academy at Smith Middle School are working all semester on a project that begins with community health and reaches around the world. Titled “Here’s to Your Health” or H2YH, the Project Based Learning activity started Feb. 2 with seventh-graders at Carl Levin Park in Harker Heights surveying residents, examining pond water and learning about composting.

STEM Tiny House Design

The sixth-grade architects in the Smith Middle School STEM Academy showed off their tiny house model structures during presentations Thursday. Sixth-graders worked in teams to meet with clients, mostly teachers and other school staff members and built tiny houses based on their customers’ specifications. Keeping with the “tiny house” concept, the students used environmentally friendly material and made their designs energy efficient.

Cancer Research Outreach

Seventh-graders sought out complex facts about specific kinds of cancer, interviewed experts and presented their findings in a public health fair. The STEM Academy science students worked through the first nine-week grading period researching a particular kind of cancer, mostly varieties that affected someone they knew. The project, with its required presentation segment and action plan made up the first project for the new academy, which is located at Killeen ISD’s new Roy J. Smith Middle School.

Eclipse Viewing

Wedged neatly between planning for the coming start of school and greeting families picking up class schedules, faculty members at Roy J. Smith Middle School in Killeen took some time Monday for an eclipse. About 23 people – middle school STEM Academy faculty with a few guests - stepped into the home side stands at the new school’s stadium, where they followed the progression of the solar eclipse.

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Raleigh middle schoolers head to Texas for world's largest robotics competition

F our Raleigh middle school students arrived in Dallas, Texas, on Tuesday afternoon to compete in the largest robotics competition in the world.

The 8th graders from Carnage Magnet Middle School won the state robotics championship in February which earned them a spot to compete against the best young engineers on the planet.

On Wednesday, Vedhanth, Dhruva, Lashwin and Sathvik will start competing against young robot makers from 50 different countries at the Vex Robotics World Championship at the Dallas Convention Center.

The days-long competition includes a teamwork challenge, a robot skills challenge and a STEM research project.

The boys call their team, 'A Few Bolt Men.'

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Summer 2023 STEM Enrichment Experience for Middle School Youth of Diverse Backgrounds

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• Observational study — observes people and measures outcomes without affecting results.
• Interventional study (clinical trial) — studies new tests, treatments, drugs, surgical procedures or devices.
• Medical records research — uses historical information collected from medical records of large groups of people to study how diseases progress and which treatments and surgeries work best.
• Rochester, Minnesota: 22-013452

About this study

The purpose of this study is to increase STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math career) identity, career knowledge, and engagement in middle school aged youth of diverse backgrounds.

Participation eligibility

Participant eligibility includes age, gender, type and stage of disease, and previous treatments or health concerns. Guidelines differ from study to study, and identify who can or cannot participate. There is no guarantee that every individual who qualifies and wants to participate in a trial will be enrolled. Contact the study team to discuss study eligibility and potential participation.

Inclusion Criteria:

• John Adams Middle School Summer of Discovery student participants.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Non-Participants in Summer of Discovery at John Adams Middle School.

Note: Other protocol defined Inclusion/Exclusion Criteria may apply.

Eligibility last updated 6/6/23. Questions regarding updates should be directed to the study team contact.

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High school student helps transform 'crazy idea' into innovative research tool

Like many good ideas in science, it started with a walk in the woods.

During a stroll through the Berlin Botanic Garden in 2019, HHMI Janelia Research Campus Group Leader Jan Funke and some of his scientific colleagues started chatting about a familiar topic: how to get more information out of insect connectomes.

These wiring diagrams give researchers unprecedented information about brain cells and how they connect to each other, but they don't tell scientists how the signal from one neuron affects the other neurons in its network.

The group wondered if they might be able to use information from previous experiments identifying the neurotransmitters released from some neurons to predict the neurotransmitters released from others in the connectome. Neurons use neurotransmitters to communicate with each other, with different chemicals responsible for different signals.

The human eye can't tell the difference between the synapses on neurons where different neurotransmitters are released, but perhaps a computer model could. Funke and his colleagues were skeptical, but they thought it might be worth giving it a try.

"This is basically where we left it: we have the data, I guess we could try," Funke says. "We were not particularly optimistic."

Back at Janelia, Funke decided to give the project to Michelle Du, a high school student who was starting a summer internship in his lab. The project would allow Du to learn how to train a neural network to recognize images -- a useful skill for a budding computer scientist even if the project did not yield results.

A few days into her internship, Du showed up in Funke's office having trained the model on published data and evaluated its performance on test data. Though Funke had little hope it would work, the model was more than 90 percent accurate in predicting some neurotransmitters.

"I couldn't believe it," Funke says. "The numbers were way too good."

After checking the data and the model, Funke, Du, and their colleagues were convinced that the numbers weren't a mistake: The model could predict neurotransmitters. But the team was still cautious, and they didn't have a good grasp on how the network was making the predictions.

"I should have been very happy, but instead I was worried because we didn't understand what was going on," Funke says.

After ruling out possible confounders that could be skewing their results, the team developed a way to understand what the network was seeing that allowed it to make predictions.

First, they used their network to predict a neurotransmitter from a known image, which it did successfully. Then, they asked a separate network to take that known image and change it slightly to create an image corresponding to the release of a different neurotransmitter -- essentially identifying the minimum traits that need to be changed for the model to predict one neurotransmitter over 4another. Lastly, the team developed a separate method to identify these distinct traits.

From this information, the team understood the different features their original network used to make predictions. This gave them confidence to release their method to the wider neuroscience community in 2020.

"What most of the neuroscience community has seen from this work is the predictions," Funke says. "They were happy to use it, but for us it was very important to make sure it was actually working."

Five years later, Du is now an undergraduate at Duke University, and the method she helped develop has been used to predict neurotransmitters in connectomes of the fruit fly hemibrain, ventral nerve cord, and optic lobe created by Janelia researchers and collaborators, as well as the adult fly brain connectome created by FlyWire.

The information helps scientists understand how neurons in a circuit affect each other so they can then form hypotheses about the function of brain circuits that can be tested in the lab.

"It really all started with a bit of a crazy idea, something that no one was really too optimistic about. And what do you do with a crazy idea? You give it to a high school student as a learning experience," Funke says. "We were very fortunate that Michelle was extremely talented."

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Materials provided by Howard Hughes Medical Institute . Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference :

• Nils Eckstein, Alexander Shakeel Bates, Andrew Champion, Michelle Du, Yijie Yin, Philipp Schlegel, Alicia Kun-Yang Lu, Thomson Rymer, Samantha Finley-May, Tyler Paterson, Ruchi Parekh, Sven Dorkenwald, Arie Matsliah, Szi-Chieh Yu, Claire McKellar, Amy Sterling, Katharina Eichler, Marta Costa, Sebastian Seung, Mala Murthy, Volker Hartenstein, Gregory S.X.E. Jefferis, Jan Funke. Neurotransmitter classification from electron microscopy images at synaptic sites in Drosophila melanogaster . Cell , 2024; 187 (10): 2574 DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2024.03.016

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