STEM at your service

This morning some of my students were helping some secondary schools students build a hydraulic robot arm.  They were using card boards, plastic syringes, and other simple implements to build robot arms that can pick up marbles.  Boys and girls worked together enthusiastically. It was obvious they were having fun. They had to figure out how to turn linear motion into circular motion, to use water to transfer power, to design graspers, to join links to each other yet allowing them to turn at the joint, to strengthen parts, … 

It was obvious they were learning something about science and engineering, and enjoying it - which was the purpose. My students are taking a class on service-learning related to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics), basically trying to make learning STEM more enjoyable. It looks like they are doing quite well.  A good start.