An A-MAZE-ing Start to the Program!

Week 1 of the Connect: Engineering program

After a jam-packed summer of connect groups and other fun filled activities, I was so excited to kick-start our first connect group of the new school year – Connect: Engineering! This program is especially fun because the participants in the group will get to hone in on their creative and constructive skills over a span of 5 weeks!

As this was the first week, we welcomed in lots of new faces, and went over how the group will run, boundaries, and some rules. Then, to get everyone warmed up and familiar with each other, we did a fun ice breaker game. I asked everyone what their favourite Marvel/DC characters are, and we had some very enthusiastic answers! Some of the most popular ones were Venom (Spiderman’s enemy), along with Tom Holland, which everyone collectively agreed is the BEST Spiderman.

This week, everyone made their own marble mazes, which was so fun! Each group member was given a tray and supplies of their own, which included a package of clay, play dough, popsicle sticks, tape, various sizes of cups, and handmade paper ramps to shoot the marbles down. The challenge was to create a marble maze structure, which was balanced and could successfully carry a marble all the way through.

Of course, everyone got very creative with their mazes, and what was so fun is everyone made their mazes unique in their own way. Some kids chose to make “zombie repeller” structures instead of the maze, which they assured me are still “very useful.” At the end, everyone got to take home their marble maze tray and extra supplies, in case they wanted to do some revamping at home.

An overall key take away from this week was that everyone was very kind to one another, interactive, and got along with each other immediately. It is so cool to witness the budding of new friendships in the first weeks of these groups, and watch them flourish as the weeks go on.

I am so excited to see what’s in store for next week!

October 5, 2022
-Amy, BigsNBC Program Coordinator