STEM students build friendships through compassion

It was somewhat an unusual request for Mrs. Sharp’s fourth-grade STEM class at Prairie View Elementary School in Mustang, but it will have a lasting impact not only on the students but also on the teachers.

“When people ask me what I do, who are not familiar with STEM, I tell them that I teach kids how to think,” said Prairie View STEM teacher, Paula Sharp.

Like most STEM classes, they are focused on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics

“We also add in a lot of the engineering elements, and we try to talk about real-life problems and how we solve them,” said Sharp.

When the kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Cox, approached them with a challenge, the kids were all in.

“We were like, wouldn’t it be cool if there was something that would motivate him to want to push his name stamp and so we said, why not present it to the STEM teacher,” said Special Education teacher, Mrs. Cox.

Max is nonverbal, and teachers challenged the students to create a name stamp that would be interesting enough to keep his attention and help him to sign his class papers.

“We added some stuff that would really like pop out for Max, like pom poms, and we covered it in his favorite color, pink,” said Lily, a fourth-grade student at Prairie View.

“We created like a little strap, so we could like put on the stamp, and then we made decorations for it,” said Nathan, a fourth-grade student at Prairie View.

It sounds pretty interesting, and I really wanted to see it, but…

“Uh, my friend kind of took it home,” said Nathan.

The students took the project to heart, going above and beyond the class.

“They would come down and they would ask questions, and they were like, can we borrow the name stamp, could we do this?” said Cox.

“I mean this little boy is not like them in any capacity and they did it and then some,” said fourth-grade teacher, Alexsis Atherton.

In the end, Max had his favorites, but his choice really depended on his mood for the day. The students, however, gained a new compassion for someone who may be just a little different than them

“They really began to form a friendship with him, whereas before they didn’t have that,” said Sharp.