TEACHERS at St Joseph’s School Barmera have been left “amazed” with the engagement, creativity, construction and improvement their students are making in their new discovery room.
Staff at the school have said the new learning environment has exceeded their expectations of what they thought the space would deliver.
St Joseph’s School Barmera purchased two transportable buildings last year to transform them into a double-sized discovery room for its students, as the old room had been outgrown due to accumulating many resources and the increase of student enrolments.
Middle years teacher Matthew Min described the transportable as a “clever investment”.
“Lee (the principal) bought a transportable from Adelaide last year through Catholic Education and it has been just what the school needed,” he said.
“It came as two regular classrooms and needed a bit of a re-vamp, so with the help from Centofanti builders, they managed to transform it into the perfect space.
“They painted it, put in new floor boards, sound panels for echoing, storage and decking.
“The beauty of the space is that it’s suitable for all year levels and the students love it.”
Mr Min said the discovery room is used for subjects beyond STEM.
“A lot of the buzz is around STEM but good STEM teaching can be done across most subject areas,” he said.
“This space is not dedicated to a single subject, it’s a learning environment that all staff can use.
“We have deliberately not created a dedicated STEM room and refer to our space as a discovery room because the learning opportunities are endless and students are constantly making discoveries across all subjects.
“We also believe that STEM-based activities can happen anywhere.
“Teachers bring students in here for things like maths, literacy, religion and humanities, and it’s great.”
Mr Min said teachers bring their students into the room frequently.
“Lee teaches science in the room so the kids come in here for that, but teachers like to bring students out here as an alternate learning space,” he said.
“It’s important to change up a learning environment because kids love variety and they work better in different spaces – not all students like being in the classroom all day.
“Though our classrooms are creatively designed and non-traditional, engaging lessons can still be run in this room and the amount of equipment and resources in here are incredible.”