This school year at Fountain Hills Middle School a new STEM (Sciences, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) elective class has had 30 fourth and fifth grade students exploring all parts of the scientific and technological world, from Newton’s Law of Motion to how the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office investigates a case.

FHMS fourth grade teacher, Mary McDonald, gave up her prep period to teach the class and has found it to be a great opportunity.

“Last year Linda McKeever wanted to do a STEM elective and she was able to talk me into doing it at the middle school,” McDonald said. “I have enjoyed it. I enjoy that none of the kids in my normal class are in it, so I get to interact with a whole new set of kids who I have never taught before but who I know outside of class from things like robotics or cross country.”

The elective’s course material is split into four subjects across the four-quarter school year.

In the first quarter, the gifted students studied the laws of motion by constructing their own rockets.

“So far my favorite memory of the class has been the rockets,” McDonald said. “Building them and launching them in the field was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed it.”

During the second quarter, the class of young scientists looked at the ecology of the environment around them.

“We did what I called urban ecology last quarter,” McDonald said. “Part of the program was looking at different birds in different settings, so we would go out once a week bird watching for class time.”

For the kids, the hardest part of bird watching was the absolute silence required.

“They knew they had to be super quiet,” McDonald said, “because they had to identify what bird they saw and what it was doing when they spotted it. The great thing was, they’re 10 and 11 so they talk constantly, so they really had to buckle down because, otherwise, they’d see nothing.”

For the third quarter, the class has put on their detective hats as they learn with a myriad of guest speakers from MCSO about the ins and outs of crime scene investigations.

“For the CSI, I have had 11 different people from MCSO come in,” McDonald said. “I have had people from the crime lab, detectives that actually do the crime scene analysis, first responders and forensic anthropologist. Our School resource officer, [Michael] Brooks, helped me set it all up.”

For their final project for the quarter the class was tasked with investigating the disappearance of FHMS principal James Carrick.

“Brooks and I put together a capstone project,” McDonald said. “There is going to be a missing person’s investigation, with multiple crime scenes to investigate. It will be the whole process, though. There will be a dig site that they’ll excavate and map. They will have some witness interviews as well.”

McDonald believes that the new elective has given her students more appreciation for the role science plays in everyday life.

“One of the good things that the students have been talking about is the education needed to do a job that [does not appear] that scientific, but really is,” McDonald said. “Not only the science skills, but the writing.”

In their final quarter, McDonald’s CTE class will focus on engineering.