Following last year’s successful pilot program, Catholic Education Western Australia (WA) again teamed up with Makers Empire on a world-leading professional learning program for primary school teachers focused on curriculum-aligned STEM.
Over terms one and two in 2022, Catholic Education Western Australia partnered with Makers Empire to deliver Makers Empire’s research-backed Learning by Design course to teachers at four Catholic schools in WA:
- St Vincent’s School, Parmelia
- St Luke’s Catholic Primary School, Woodvale
- Santa Clara School, St James
- Ursula Frayne Catholic Primary School, East Victoria Park
Students were taught how to use Design Thinking to reframe everyday problems as opportunities, and how to use the Makers Empire’s 3D app to create, prototype and test their designed solutions.
The four schools then came together for an online showcase event hosted by Makers Empire to celebrate and share their STEM learning with each other.
Students from each school took turns sharing their projects and then responding to questions and feedback from students from the other schools.
Benjamin Saulsman Numeracy K-10 at CEWA said, “This has again been an excellent opportunity for Catholic Education in Western Australia to collaborate with Makers Empire to provide opportunities for students to design solutions to contextual problems through a design thinking framework. It was wonderful to witness the varied creative and practical innovations during the showcase. The project enabled students to further develop capabilities for life, such as Appreciation, Collaboration, Thinking Critically, Innovation and opportunities to Create. These are central to our Vision for Learning and the Western Australia’s first State STEM skills strategy. It was a pleasure to team up with Makers Empire to bring the second year of this project to fruition.”
Mandi Dimitriadis, Director of Learning at Makers Empire said, “it has been great working with CEWA on this project for the second year. I would like to congratulate the students and teachers on the high quality of their projects and the thoughtful design thinking they have been putting into practice. Students presented their projects confidently and articulately during the Virtual Showcase, gave constructive feedback and asked lots of interesting questions.”
