Universal Orlando Resort is taking students beyond the classroom and bringing education to life in a series of hands-on learning opportunities.
Your Classroom in Motion: A STEAM App Series is the latest Universal Orlando Youth Program. STEAM is an educational approach that uses science, technology, engineering, the arts and mathematics to guide learning. The lessons all correlate with middle school and high school national and state education standards in STEAM concepts.
The new series contains pre-visit classroom lessons, career-focused videos from NBC Learn followed by in-park attraction and app-based experiences at Universal Orlando.
“As a former educator, I know that when students are having fun with their work, learning is a natural outcome,” said Teresa Crews, Universal’s educational program developer.
Students learn about the engineering principles of the Six Degrees of Freedom. They reconstruct the motion sequences on Transformers: The Ride-3D. Then they work in small groups to collect data and measure speed at different points along the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit roller coaster. Then, use the data to prove the law of conservation of energy.
Students will use engineering principles to maneuver the ride vehicle around Skull Island: Reign of Kong. They use scientific observation to investigate discoveries at the dig site beneath Revenge of the Mummy. And the budding scientists will search for foliage in Jurassic Park using a digital map to collect photographic samples of Jurassic-era plants.
For performing arts students, the workshop, Sound Design: Music and the Art of Foley gives students the chance to experience a day in the life of a working movie musician. Band, choir or orchestra students can sync music or choral arrangements and create sound effects and voice-overs to Despicable Me and The Lorax.