The Practices of Play and Informal Learning in the miniGEMS STEAM Camp

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) play an important role in the educational reform and global economy. However, STEM education lacks the hands-on laboratory in the formal middle school and high school curricula. The widespread gender gap in multiple STEM disciplines causes middle-school aged girls have lower positive attitudes and interests towards STEM fields than male students. In recent years, Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) education has been viewed as other approaches to increase students’ interests and improve study accesses to STEM fields in the United States. The addition of the arts in STAEM education provides more learning opportunities and real-world contexts which meet more students’ interests. miniGEMS 2017 was a free two-week summer STEAM and programming camp for middle school girls in grades six to eight hosted by the Autonomous Vehicle Systems (AVS) Research and Education Laboratory at the University of the Incarnate Word (UIW). miniGEMS was the first free camp with a special focus on engineering and programming in San Antonio. The camp utilized project-based learning curriculum and provided multiple hands-on experiments, field trips, and significant interactions with guest speakers, all of which were designed to increase the middle school girls’ interests in STEM-related fields. This paper provides an overview of miniGEMS STEAM camp, motivation for miniGEMS camp, and details on practicing project-based play activities in an informal learning environment.