Students at Warrior Ridge Elementary are no longer dreading the daily science lesson or peeling open tedious textbooks.Instead, they are eagerly awaiting the latest hands-on task with the recent implementation of the MySci exploration program.Earlier this week, students in Katrina Conway’s fourth-grade class constructed small-scale buildings meant to withstand both a minor and significant earthquake. They were only allowed to use marshmallows, toothpicks and glue, and their structure had to undergo a shaking test upon completion.Conway said she uses the curriculum in her classroom every day.“We have different lessons to where we are watching videos and analyzing and at the end of them there’s a unit with an engineering process,” she said. “Each unit is a little bit different with what they’re creating.”Currently, each elementary class, with the exception of kindergarten and third grade, has access to MySci kits and curriculum.MySci is a cornerstone program for the Washington University Institute for School Partnership. It equips teachers with instructional materials and professional development opportunities in science, technology, engineering and math — otherwise known as the STEM subjects.“The kids love it,” said Conway. “If we miss science now, they are disappointed. They want to get involved and they’re excited about it. It’s a complete 180 from the past.”Through the MySci curriculum, students have been able to experience paleontology firsthand by digging for bones, examining them and putting them together to create dinosaur models.Students also have built penguin habitats and identified properties of matter.Other classes have had the opportunity to observe seeds germinating with and without sunlight and used a grow light for plants. In addition, students have created flower models and created stakes to hold up plants.The older levels at fourth and fifth grade have been learning about soundwaves and the differences between physical and chemical changes.“With it being so hands-on, the students have really begun to love science,” said Principal Dr. Bobbi Russell. “They are learning more about those STEM subjects, and it’s helping them instill a love for those areas.”Russell anticipates the program will expand to soon include all grades.

Students demonstrate the different between a water and acid chemical reaction during Katrina Conway's fourth-grade science lesson on Tuesday. The lessons were part of the MySci curriculum implemented at Warrior Ridge Elementary. 

Record photo/Derrick Forsythe