MIDLAND, Texas — The Midland Hispanic Chamber and Educate Midland have collaborated with XTO Energy to provide at-home science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) lessons and experiments to students of all ages.
The weekly STEM Facebook lessons started on June 10th. Each lesson will be held every Thursday at 3pm on XTO Energy's Facebook page.
For the first week, the team made elephant toothpaste.
"The regulatory team here we were able to kick off the very first exercise. We did an exercise in chemistry we did it outside yesterday. We made elephant toothpaste and it was a lot of fun," says Janie Kenney, XTO Energy's SHE & Regulatory Manager.
These Stay-At-Home STEM experiments are a fun way for kids to continue some summer learning, while using products right at home.
"Because as parents you try to wonder, how can I do something educational what's something quick what's something easy and XTO Energy has done a great job of laying out these experiments to be easy quick. We predominantly use things you already have at home so there's not really a bunch of things you have to go get anything that's quick and easy as a working mom we love to utilize," says Kenney.
For eight weeks, kids will learn about gravity, aerodynamics, physical and chemical reactions and more.
"I have two high schoolers at home and believe it or not we made elephant toothpaste last night and they enjoyed it and they are definitely outside of that middle school range. Another colleague popped in this morning and he was saying he and his daughter, who is a 5th grader they went and did it last night as well. So I think it has a wide range of applicability," she says.
XTO hopes these little fun and free lessons can introduce kids to the STEM field at an early stage to prepare for their future.
"We want to make sure middle schoolers get engaged, they start getting excited. That way when they go in the high school here in Midland they have the opportunity to take several different tracks and if they go ahead and take that STEM track or take a more rigorous course track, they'll be better prepared when they get to college," says Kenney.