STEM Day in Lakewood Ranch focuses on animal sciences.
By
Pam Eubanks
| 2:30 p.m. April 10, 2019
East County
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The Out-of-Door Academy seventh-grader Andrew Brewer and his partner Jack Meyers each grabbed a pair of tweezers and carefully began jabbing at blobs of neon yellow gelatin. Something round was buried inside and they were determined to retrieve it.
"I'm not sure what that is," 13-year-old Andrew said as he poked the gelatin carefully.
It was a pea, he later learned, but it didn't mater. To Andrew and Jack and their classmates, the peas represented tumors in need of biopsy. Seventy-four ODA students on April 10 spent the day in hands-on science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) lessons based on animal medicine.
During this particular exercise in teacher Stephanie Sassetti's classroom, they dug out the tumor and carried it to a computer, which spat out whether it was dangerous or not.
"I learned you have to be very careful," Andrew said of performing surgery. "You can't break any other tissue."
As part of ODA's annual seventh-grade STEM Day, students spent the day conducting experiments meant to simulate real-life surgeries or other medical scenarios, dissected a pig's heart and heard from industry-related speakers, among other activities.
Nick Sparma and Luke Flanders try to pull a pea out of a block of gelatin.
Thirteen-year-olds Andrew Brewer and Jack Meyers test the steadiness of their hands as they try to remove a "tumor" from a "patient."
Students had to remove a pea from gelatin to mimic a physician taking a tumor out of tissue.
Andrew Creed and Alex Ross take their "mass" in for biopsy and learn their patient has a dangerous tumor. "This person needs to get to surgery right away," Alex said.
Twelve-year-old Marty Gomien, front, tries to figure out what an animal "ate" in a simulation as 13-year-old Nathan Crosby watches.
Thirteen-year-old Lauren Dalton uses a scope in a box to try to figure out its contents.
Julieann Shapiro, 13, connects magnetic circuits. After the box encloses the circuits, Julieann and her partners try to hit a sensor with a laser and make a light turn on.
Julieann Shapiro, 13, connects magnetic circuits. After the box encloses the circuits, Julieann and her partners, Mason Alexander and Sara Chinnici, try to hit a sensor with a laser and make a light turn on.
Jenna Sanford, 13, focuses on her view of a sensor, hidden inside the box. She needs to hit it with the laser to get a light to turn on.
"What am I doing wrong? I'm aiming perfectly," says Zachary Szabo as he tries to hit a sensor with a laser.
"What am I doing wrong? I'm aiming perfectly," says Zachary Szabo as he tries to hit a sensor with a laser. His friend Christopher Nightingale monitors the light.
Teacher Joanne Barrett talks with students about adding a beeper for their activity to make it more like the game "Operation."
