Wantagh elementary schools collaborated in an exciting evening of hands-on learning for students and their families, featuring creative centers that brought STEAM, literacy, and math to life in fun and engaging ways. Elementary Family Night drew over 300 participants to Forest Lake Elementary who hosted the event this year where Alison Hazut, Director of Elementary Curriculum and Instruction K-5, and her team highlighted the district’s innovative approach to learning.

"Last year we launched our first district wide Elementary Literacy Night and this year we decided to offer a variety of sessions to also showcase our work in STEAM, Math and the Libraries aka IMCs (Instructional Media Centers),” says Mrs. Hazut. “We wanted to give families a broad perspective of the hands-on learning activities we work with through the core content areas.”

The night was organized in various stations inviting families to experience elementary learning across disciplines. The activities were designed to showcase learning in classrooms across all elementary schools while giving families ideas for ways to extend and enrich learning at home.
Literacy games included letter/sound correspondence, recognizing tricky words by sight, making inferences about text and understanding rich vocabulary to name a few. Students also enjoyed a scavenger hunt in the IMC helping them learn how to find books on the shelves which can be challenging at times. 

The STEAM rooms encouraged students to create the Eiffel Tower using straws and tape. Across the room students were making Sink or Float “boats” using popsicle sticks, foil, pipe cleaners, paper and tape. “You win!” shouted one little participant who showed his excitement as an older student’s boat stayed afloat.

Math games made learning fractions fun by using foam pieces with vibrant colors and rolling dice to create the greatest product through multiplication.Recognizing colors and shapes using puzzle pieces was one of the favorites amongst the younger attendees. 
We had several student volunteers from Wantagh High School who were fully engaged with the students helping them master each station.
“It was wonderful to see children excitedly sharing their favorite tech apps, new math strategies, problem solving in STEAM challenges, as well as using kinesthetic materials to practice making words in literacy games," says Mrs. Hazut.

At the end of the evening, fun prizes were raffled off to a few participants. While everyone didn’t walk away with a raffle prize, everyone walked away happy having learned new and fun ways to experience learning with their families.