STAMFORD — “Revolutionary advances sometimes come at a glacial pace, but not at Bi-Cultural Day School,” said Jacqueline Herman, principal of the Stamford day school, in announcing the addition of the school’s new MakerSpace Engineering Lab, one of the first of its kind in a New England elementary school. “In this specially-equipped new space, students are provided with a vast array of raw materials, along with a 3-D printer and other advanced gadgets like Nabi BigTabs, 3-D Doodlers, Osmos and Ozobots to help them invent, design, experiment and build. The MakerSpace taps their creativity and talents in ‘STEAM’ — Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math.”

According to Herman, activities in the MakerSpace include prototyping, electronics, robotics, coding, digital fabrication and building kinetic machines, with guidance from teachers and outside experts as needed.

“It’s a mix of self-directed and guided projects combined with work table dynamics that encourage collaboration and teamwork,” she said.

The idea for the BCDS MakerSpace came last summer from two longtime Bi-Cultural teachers, Adrianne Robinson and Beth Fritz, who conceived, designed, developed, and now oversee its curriculum and operation.

“When they brought the idea to our head of school, she encouraged them to ‘run with it,’ and they sure did,” said Robert Zitter, president of Bi-Cultural’s Board of Directors.

Adapting MakerSpace for an elementary school wasn’t a simple process, said Robinson.

“As teachers, we often refer to established curriculums to guide our lessons. However, as we are among the pioneers in this ‘Maker’ movement, and in line with the nature of this program, we took a constructivist approach and designed our own curriculum,” explained Robinson. “This is a whole new area for educators and it’s a very progressive form of educating students, tapping into every capacity they have. We had to sit down and brainstorm what we wanted the children to be able to do, and then we collaborated with them by bringing students into the process to gather their input and wishes.”

“Our third graders will soon be designing and building tin can robots that they will engineer so they can ‘move,’” said Fritz. “Across the grades, based on their own level of sophistication, students will design and build a working catapult and will fabricate a marble maze. We know the results are going to amaze our students and us.”

“We envision Bi-Cultural not just as a place where our students are prepared for experiences off in the future, but where they can come into a room chock-full of supplies and materials and be inventors, engineers, designers and mathematicians today,” Herman said. “The lost art of ‘tinkering’ now has a home at Bi-Cultural. We can’t wait to be dazzled by our students’ new MakerSpace creations.”