STEAM Project Labs
Imagine a science class that works with childhood wonder and curiosity. Our STEAM Project labs begin with inquiry – noticing the world around us, asking questions, and exploring together to find answers and record evidence as well as creating art, projects, and other artifacts of learning.
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Our STEAM Labs
Each project lab begins with student questions. Together, we record our initial thoughts, then launch an activity or experiment to investigate further. Topics align on our schoolhouse menu and can span multiple weeks, scaling up to match student interest, curiosity, and new understanding.
- Walk through what happens in a typical Lab session: arrival, group launch (about 20 minutes), individual or small-group work cycle (about 90 minutes), share-out and reflection at the end.
- Outdoor Connections: Every program kicks off right where children thrive—outdoors! This open playtime gives kids the perfect opportunity to run, chat, and connect with their friends before we head into our academic day.
- Circle Up: Our very first group gathering may be indoors or out but it’s always a playful community game or team activity to get everyone activated, feeling connected, and ready with information they’ll need for the day.
- Setting the Stage: Once we head inside, we open up our journals. Together, we tackle a fun question or prompt, share a group discussion to pool our big ideas, and map out exactly what we want to explore next.
- Hands-On STEAM Adventures: Our Project Labs harness wonder, activate curiosity, and result in learning through action! Children jump into exciting experiments, research, data collection, and projects where they naturally apply science, tech, engineering, art, and math to the real world.
- Sharing & Celebrating: At the end of our lab, we gather back together to share our discoveries, show off the amazing things we’ve made, and give each other supportive, encouraging feedback.
- Montessori Work-Cycle: Next, the room buzzes with energy! During this busy, productive work-cycle, children can choose to keep rolling with their STEAM project or switch gears to any topic on our learning Menu.
- Reflecting & Caring for Our Space: Before we say goodbye, we take a moment to journal about our favorite moments and big ideas. Then, practicing Practical Life skills, we pack up our things and work as a team to tidy up and leave the Schoolhouse ready for the next group!
Our Project Lab Themes
Our Project Lab themes are constantly evolving to match our learning Menus, our Spiral Curriculum, and—most importantly—the curiosity of the children!
Most of the time, we are working together to answer a big question the kids came up with themselves. We might dive into a hands-on experiment, conduct research to learn a new skill, or explore the life and work of an artist or scientist who has caught our imagination. Our final results are as unique as the children themselves—ranging from sturdy bridges we’ve engineered to real data sets, interactive games to project posters, or beautiful art pieces inspired by a new medium to tasty treats – we find that there are always real connections and real learning in our results.
Fan Favorites: Food Labs
If you ask the kids, our most popular Lab themes almost always involve food! Some of our absolute favorite memories include:
- Shaking up homemade ice cream in a bag
- Churning our own butter in a jar
- Using Skittles to discover how dyes dissolve and move
- Kneading and baking bread in a bag!
- Of course, we don’t always eat – other favorites include-
- Exploring the work of Andy Warhol and making our own pop art
- Designing elephant toothbrushes and creating elephant toothpaste
- Building and testing paper and noodle bridges
- Creating structures with toothpicks and clay
- Testing all types of paper airplanes for features like speed, accuracy, hang-time, and distance
How It Differs From Regular Science Classes
In many traditional school settings, science is delivered in a passive way —focusing on memorizing facts from a textbook rather than truly exploring. We believe that children learn best when they get to take the lead with their own wonder and have adults to provide pathways to skills and new knowledge.
Our Project Labs are designed to give children real ownership and control over their learning. When kids get to ask the big questions, run the experiments, and test their own ideas, abstract concepts suddenly click. This hands-on approach creates a deep, lasting understanding and memories that stick with them far longer than any worksheet ever could.
Just as importantly, our labs are a team effort! Children get to explore alongside a wonderful mix of peers—some who bring lots of big questions, and others who bring a bit more background knowledge. Everyone has something unique and valuable to share. In this supportive space, children don’t just learn from a teacher—they learn with and from each other, their environment, and the world around them.
What Ages Is STEAM Effective For?
Our mixed-age groups bring together a wonderful variety of perspectives that everyone benefits from! In our Project Labs, we love seeing this dynamic come to life: our younger children often ask the most insightful questions, while our older students have the skills to help research the answers and take the learning even further. It creates a truly special community where everyone—no matter their age—is learning, growing, and discovering together in a meaningful way.
What Kids Leave With
Every Project Lab has five simple but wonderful goals that work for life just as well as laboratories:
- to work with wonder,
- to discover new ideas,
- to create a record of our learning,
- to stay curious, and to imagine next steps.
We find that the most magical projects are the ones where our students take the lead, our teachers guide the way, and the whole group jumps in together! To keep things extra engaging, our students routinely present their own project proposals and use rank-voting to choose our upcoming topics. Once a topic is picked and added to the calendar, the kids work hand-in-hand with teachers to plan and prepare for each session.
Because children often choose topics that naturally connect with our classroom learning menus, these projects are a fantastic way for the entire community to expand on what they’ve been studying during their regular work-cycles.
How does it combine with a Montessori Schoolhouse?
Because children often choose topics that naturally connect with the same Menus we’re exploring in Montessori Schoolhouse sessions, these projects are a fantastic way for the entire community to expand on what they’ve been studying during their regular work-cycles.
As a completely hands-on classroom experience, our Project Labs serve as the perfect launchpad for both shared community bonding and personal discovery! Together, we get to explore exciting new topics, follow the children’s natural lead, and give them real access to amazing tools and materials.
One of our absolute favorite things is when our families ask us for links and resources so they can repeat an experiment at home or keep exploring a new idea. It is a wonderful testament to how our inquiry-based learning naturally sparks independent curiosity and sharing in a student’s homeschool day. Project Labs are a truly joyful way to explore big ideas and provide hands-on experiences that children might not otherwise have the chance to try!
Yes! We have several members who find STEAM Project Labs to be the best fit for their personal style or schedule. All members of Schoolhouse and Labs have access to Lunch Club and our complete Community Calendar including Events and Family Field Trips.
Bring your water bottle, lunch, and/or snack and wear clothes that are comfortable for play are okay to get messy. We may send out occasional requests for household items such as cardboard and jars to reuse in our projects. Other than that, we’ve got it covered!
We don’t give grades but we do give feedback. All projects result in products such as data tables, writing, or constructions that may be brought home – and we always create and share a photo story-board of our learning together.
e love collaborating with our students to choose our themes and plan our next steps! Because the kids have so much say in what we do, it’s rare for someone not to want to jump in and join the fun.
However, we also know that everyone has days when they just need a little space or want to focus on something else. If a child ever prefers not to participate in a group project, that is completely okay! They are always warmly supported in choosing an independent task from our Menu or working on a personal project that inspires them. We want every child to feel comfortable and empowered in how they learn each day.
We do not give grades, but we do create a lot of evidence of progress, and we do give feedback. Children record plans and reflections in their journals each day; teachers prepare photo decks and a narrative to tell the story of each session in our daily SeeSaw posts.
Yes! We love family field trips and host them each month. See the list on our Calendar.
