Introduce young learners to STEM with a yearlong journal featuring 36 hands-on engineering challenges designed specifically for Kindergarten. Created to pair with the Kindergarten STEM Full-Year Curriculum, the journal gives children a simple, repeatable structure for exploring problems, developing ideas, building solutions, and sharing their results.
The journal uses a developmentally appropriate four-step engineering process:
ASK → IMAGINE → BUILD → SHARE
Students identify a simple problem, think of an idea, construct a solution, and explain or demonstrate what they created. The activities also encourage children to try again when a design does not work, helping establish early persistence and an understanding that mistakes and redesign are part of engineering.
The resource includes drawing and tracing prompts, counting and measurement opportunities, construction challenges, simple testing activities, partner work, reflection pages, progress pages, and a final Invention Convention.
Challenges include:
- Tower Power
- Material Detectives
- A Chair for Teddy
- Fix-It Engineers
- Blueprint Builders
- Team Tower Trouble
- Three Little Houses
- Bridge for a Toy Car
- Strongest Shape
- Shelter Builders
- Paper Tower Challenge
- Block City
- Magnet Movers
- Playground Designers
The activities introduce foundational STEM concepts through familiar, engaging problems. For example, students can compare tall and short towers and count the blocks used, or build a bridge and determine how many toy cars it can support.
Students develop early skills in:
- Asking questions about problems
- Drawing and planning ideas
- Building with classroom materials
- Counting and comparing results
- Exploring shapes and material properties
- Measuring simple outcomes
- Testing designs
- Communicating their thinking
- Collaborating with partners
- Persisting when designs need improvement
The journal minimizes writing demands, allowing young children to demonstrate understanding through drawing, tracing, circling, counting, and simple responses. This makes the activities accessible to developing writers while keeping the engineering experience authentic.
Teachers can incorporate the journal into a weekly STEM routine, with the suggested pacing allowing approximately three pages per week. The consistent format reduces planning and helps children become increasingly familiar with the engineering process.
The challenges provide opportunities for hands-on exploration using accessible classroom materials and can support whole-group instruction, centers, partner work, or guided STEM activities.
The year concludes with an Invention Convention, giving students an opportunity to present and celebrate their designs while reflecting on their development as young engineers.
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Bundle
K - 5 STEM Journal Bundle | Full-Year Engineering Activities
K–5 STEM Journal Bundle | Full-Year Engineering Design Journals | 216 Challenges, 1,588 Pages Six full-year student STEM journals — 36 hands-on engineering challenges per grade, one for every week of the school year — with the recording pages, data tables, reflection prompts, and portfolios already built in. Print, staple, and your students have a year of documented engineering. These are the student-facing journals for the K–5 STEM program: the place where kids plan, sketch, predict, record trials, graph results, and explain what their evidence shows. The engineering process grows with the student — from four picture-supported steps in Kindergarten to a ten-step optimize-and-communicate cycle in 5th Grade — so a school running all six gets one coherent progression instead of six unrelated notebooks. What's Included Six complete grade-level journals (1,588 pages total): Kindergarten STEM Journal (152 pages) — 36 challenges, 3 pages each. Ask → Imagine → Build → Share. Drawing, tracing, circling, and counting prompts; minimal writing. Ends with an Invention Convention. 1st Grade STEM Journal (211 pages) — 36 challenges, 5 pages each. Adds Investigate and a two-test format (build, test, improve one thing, test again). Exit tickets, self-assessments, year-end portfolio. 2nd Grade STEM Journal (251 pages) — 36 challenges, 6 pages each. Adds three design ideas before choosing one, repeated trials, blank graph grids, and evidence-with-numbers prompts. 36 exit tickets, 6 unit self-assessments. 3rd Grade STEM Investigator's Journal (253 pages) — 36 investigations, 6 pages each. Adds testable questions, independent/dependent/controlled variables, typical values, and claim–evidence–reasoning–limitations. Teacher notes and pacing guide included. 4th Grade STEM Designer's Journal (324 pages) — 36 projects, 8 pages each. Adds client briefs, budgets with running totals, weighted decision matrices, measurable criteria, and cost-per-performance analysis. 5th Grade STEM Innovator's Journal (397 pages) — 36 projects, 10 pages each. Adds stakeholder analysis, test protocols, trade-off curves, optimization ("what did your design make worse, and why was that worth it?"), one-page technical summaries, flowchart and pseudocode practice, innovator badges, and a capstone showcase. Across the bundle: 216 weekly challenges and roughly 1,370 student journal pages, plus exit tickets, self-assessments, and year-end portfolio pages at every grade from 1st up. The Challenges The same six-unit arc runs through every grade — Engineering Design, Materials/Matter, Forces & Motion or Energy, Life Science, Earth & Weather/Space, and Engineering for Communities. A few examples: K: Tower Power · A Chair for Teddy · Three Little Houses · Bridge for a Toy Car · Magnet Movers · Playground Designers 1st: Towers, bridges, boats, balloon-powered cars, weather instruments, erosion barriers, signal devices 2nd: Stronger bridge, water filter, marble run, parachute, pollinator garden, water-saving device 3rd: Solar oven, wind-powered vehicle, earthquake-resistant structure, model ecosystem, weather station 4th: Food packaging, renewable energy, communication networks, earthquake-resistant buildings, shelters, biomimicry 5th: Water purification, wind turbines, energy storage, Mars habitats, assistive technology, sustainable cities How It Works in the Classroom Each challenge runs on a five-session weekly rhythm (K uses a simpler single-session routine). Students carry one journal all year, so their thinking, sketches, data, and improvements stay together — a complete record of growth you can send home, use for conferences, or grade against a rubric. Two printing options at every grade: print and bind the whole journal once, or print just that week's 3–10 pages to cut copying costs and let you skip or reorder weeks freely. How the Process Grows K — Ask · Imagine · Build · Share (3 pages/week): count and compare results 1st — adds Investigate, Test, Improve (5 pages/week): change one thing, test again 2nd — adds Plan (6 pages/week): three ideas, trials, graphs, numbers as evidence 3rd — adds Create, Analyze (6 pages/week): variables, fair tests, claim–evidence–reasoning 4th — 8-step design cycle (8 pages/week): clients, budgets, decision matrices, measurable criteria 5th — 10-step innovation cycle (10 pages/week): trade-offs, optimization, technical summaries, pseudocode What Students Practice, K–5 Observing, building, and sharing (K) → predicting, testing twice, and comparing (1st) → generating multiple ideas, running trials, graphing, and explaining with numbers (2nd) → controlling variables and writing claim–evidence–reasoning (3rd) → budgeting, scoring options, and writing measurable criteria (4th) → optimizing across trade-offs and communicating a recommendation someone could act on (5th). By Week 36 of 5th Grade, students independently define a problem, research it, run all ten steps, and report a result. Format 6 PDF files, 1,588 pages total Print-and-go; designed for whole-journal binding or week-by-week printing Teaching duration: 1 full school year per grade Materials for the challenges are everyday classroom supplies Pairs With the K–5 STEM Curriculum The journals contain the student pages. The teacher-facing lesson plans for every weekly challenge are in the grade-level STEM Full-Year Curricula, sold separately or together in the K–5 STEM Curriculum Bundle. Every journal is also usable on its own — the criteria, constraints, data structures, and prompts are printed on the student pages. Want the student-facing challenge cards too? See the K–5 STEM Challenge Cards Bundle. Want everything for all six grades? The K–5 STEM Mega Bundle includes the journals, curricula, challenge cards, and every other grade-level STEM resource in the store. Why Buy the Bundle Six journals bought separately cost $84.00. This bundle is $58.80 — and gives a STEM specialist, a grade-level team, or a whole elementary building one documented engineering progression from the first tower in Kindergarten to the final technical summary in 5th Grade. Ask. Imagine. Build. Test. Improve. Communicate — and write it all down.
$58.80
Bundle
Kindergarten STEM Bundle | Full-Year Engineering Activities
Kindergarten STEM Bundle | Full-Year STEM Curriculum | Engineering Activities, Projects, Task Cards & More Make STEM learning fun, hands-on, and easy to plan all year long with this comprehensive Kindergarten STEM Curriculum Bundle! This collection gives young learners multiple opportunities to explore engineering, solve problems, build ideas, and develop creative thinking through age-appropriate STEM activities. With a full-year STEM curriculum, picture cards, STEM journals, projects, task cards, early-finisher activities, and substitute plans included, this Kindergarten STEM Bundle gives teachers flexible resources for STEM instruction, enrichment, independent learning, and classroom coverage. What's Included This bundle includes 7 kindergarten STEM resources: • Kindergarten STEM Curriculum — 36 weekly challenges across 6 units • Kindergarten STEM Picture Cards — 60 picture-based cards for pre-readers • Kindergarten STEM Journal — 108 drawing-and-labeling recording pages • Kindergarten STEM Projects — 18 hands-on build projects • Kindergarten STEM Task Cards — 60 picture-supported skill cards • Kindergarten STEM for Early Finishers — 36 no-prep challenges with choice board • Kindergarten STEM Sub Plans — 12 emergency lessons with substitute scripts Together, these resources provide multiple ways to introduce, explore, practice, document, and extend STEM and engineering learning throughout the school year. How It Works in the Classroom Use this Kindergarten STEM Curriculum Bundle for: • Daily or weekly STEM instruction • Whole-group STEM lessons • Small-group activities • STEM centers and stations • Engineering challenges • Hands-on projects • Picture-supported STEM learning • STEM journals and reflection • Task card activities • Early-finisher enrichment • Substitute teacher plans • Flexible STEM exploration Use the curriculum for structured STEM learning, picture cards to support visual learning and discussion, projects for hands-on exploration, task cards for shorter activities, and journals for recording student thinking. Standards & Learning Goals Students develop foundational STEM and engineering skills through age-appropriate exploration, including: Engineering Design • Identifying simple problems • Brainstorming possible solutions • Designing and building • Testing ideas • Observing results • Making improvements Problem-Solving • Exploring different solutions • Thinking creatively • Making choices • Trying new strategies • Learning through hands-on discovery STEM Thinking • Observing and investigating • Asking questions • Making predictions • Exploring materials and designs • Connecting STEM concepts to everyday experiences Communication & Reflection • Sharing ideas • Describing designs • Explaining solutions • Recording learning through pictures and writing • Reflecting on STEM experiences Why Teachers Love It * Uses common classroom and recycled materials — full materials list included * Journals use drawing, labeling, and dictation, not written responses. * Complete kindergarten STEM resource collection * Seven complementary STEM resources in one bundle * Full-year engineering activities * Multiple formats for flexible STEM instruction * Picture cards support visual and language-rich learning * Encourages creativity and problem-solving * Includes hands-on projects and engineering activities * Provides meaningful early-finisher options * Includes substitute teacher plans * Works for whole-group, small-group, centers, and independent activities * Saves valuable planning time Instead of searching for different STEM resources throughout the year, teachers can use this Kindergarten STEM Bundle as a flexible resource library. Pull out a picture card for discussion, use a task card for a quick challenge, complete a hands-on project, or use the curriculum for structured STEM instruction. Download Today Add this Kindergarten STEM Curriculum Bundle to your classroom and give young learners a full year of opportunities to explore, create, build, test, and problem-solve! Whether you need a structured STEM lesson, a visual learning activity, a hands-on project, an independent task, an early-finisher activity, or a substitute plan, this bundle gives you flexible STEM resources for the school year.
$42.00
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