On May 18, 2019, Vegas PBS Ready To Learn staff presented a session of the locally designed The Cat in the Hat Knows A Lot About That! Family and Community Learning workshop at the Vegas PBS Educational Technology Campus. The two-hour workshop engaged families in science and engineering concepts through play and child-led projects. Families participated in three bridge-building challenges, using the Engineering Design Process to plan, create, test and improve their structures. They also explored the free The Cat in the Hat Builds That! app and watched a corresponding episode of the popular PBS KIDS program.
One activity challenged families to create a bridge strong enough to hold blocks using only Post-It Notes! A remarkable young engineer designed her “Sticky Bricky” bridge to hold an impressive 36 blocks! Visit the Vegas PBS Flicker page to see photos of her and her accomplishment, as well as all the bridge-building activities that allowed families to think and explore like scientists. By the end of the workshop, everyone discovered that strength and length are important factors needed to build a good bridge!
Thanks to a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and donations from community partners, all families received A Book of Bridges: Here to There and Me to You by Cheryl Keely and a printed deck of “Daring Design Challenge” cards. This funding will also support three multi-session PBS KIDS Family and Community Learning Programs at local libraries this summer, including the new East Las Vegas Library. Providing these high-quality educational workshops throughout Southern Nevada supports Vegas PBS Ready To Learn’s mission to give young children from low-income families a strong foundation in early science and literacy.
