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STEM Town, USA

Manchester
New Hampshire

New England Map.png

Welcome to our first installment of STEM Town, USA. The goal of this weekly feature is to help you transform your summer vacation into a STEMmer vacation.What exactly do we mean by a STEMmer vacation? In our opinion, the most memorable family vacations aren’t created while waiting on endless lines at massive amusement parks.  Rather the most treasured memories are created during nostalgic road trips to new unexplored destinations all while playing Car / License Plate Bingo, Eye/I Spy, and Punch Buggy games.  Our STEMmer vacation plan is based on one simple ideal - Be With Those You Love.  By making our vacation plans wholesome, educational, nurturing, and budget conscience - we find greater freedom and joy in spending time with those we love the most.

You don’t have to travel far or spend excessive amounts of money to demonstrate your love for each other.  Your time is, and will always be, the greatest gift you have to offer.  Your time exploring the beauty of our country and areas nearest to you are far more valuable than waiting 60 minutes on a line for a 5-minute ride that yields an awkward photo for $25.  Learn something new.Do something new. Become something new with the family you love.

 

To help you try something new, we are featuring towns across the United States that provide unique STEM opportunities for families.  Our goal is to make these towns easy to access and centrally located in 15 regions of the United States.  This week we begin in New England and our first STEM Town, USA town is Manchester, New Hampshire!  Why did we pick Manchester, NH?  Manchester, NH is a centralized location for residents from: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island.  Take some time to learn more about this historical area and make sure to visit the following STEM Museums during your vacation:

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  1. See Science Center in Manchester: https://see-sciencecenter.org/

  2. Seacoast Science Center: This museum is in Rye, NH about an hour east of Manchester: https://www.seacoastsciencecenter.org

  3. Montshire Museum of Science: https://www.montshire.org is in Norwich, Vermont approximately 75 minutes northeast of Manchester.

  4. Squam Lakes Natural Science Center: https://www.nhnature.org/ in Holderness, VT 60 minutes north of Manchester.

  5. Children’s Museum of New Hampshire: https://childrens-museum.org/ in Dover, NH is one hour east of Manchester.

 

We look forward to seeing your family photos and we hope you enjoy your STEMmer vacations!

 

 

Our STEM Starter Activities

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​Our STEM experiments are slightly different from others.

At STEM Starter one can find activities that do not require the purchase of expensive scientific chemicals or equipment.  We do not ask you to: hand over your information; become a member or register for a monthly subscription.  If you wish to download our E-book - fantastic; if not - you will continue to find phenomenal experiments on this website. Our STEM Starter activities are based on regular, everyday items that can be found in your home.  We do not just provide the instructions for a STEM activity - we tell students why an activity works and where they can go for additional resources.  Science, Technology, Engineering and Math are not scary subjects that only a select few people can understand.  These fields of study surround our daily lives and STEM Starter was created to help children recognize the STEM around them while demonstrating that they are capable of learning complex ideas and concepts.  All they must do is ask questions and learn how to find the answers.

The goal of STEM Starter is perfectly captured in this quote from our founder.

           

​"Stem Starter doesn't reinvent the wheel,

we show how it works."

 

Our volunteers are college students and volunteers who are dedicated to the STEM fields.  We recognize that nurturing a genuine curiosity for the STEM fields can begin early in our lives and that is why our activities are designed for Pre-school, elementary and middle school students.  Additionally, STEM Starter links our experiments and activities to Individual Educational Plans to assist families educating children who fall on the Autism spectrum.

​We organized access to the activities by incorporating drop down menus via the Main Menu above.  The activities are separated by Science, Technology, Engineering and Math.  Should you wish to conduct additional experiments based upon the season, you can access them via the STEM of the Season Tab.  Here we provide free access to experiments that change with the season.  Lastly, we are thrilled to announce that our first book of experiments; STEM Starter: Charting a New Course is available as a free download.  This is an e-book that is only available via our website and it offers 52 experiments - that is one experiment per week for a year! 

We hope you find this website, and the activities provided, helpful, encouraging, and inspiring.  We know that nothing is perfect, so please make sure to rate the experiments and offer input and constructive criticism.  We want to do our absolute best to offer budding STEM students a phenomenal product that compliments their ongoing educational goals.

Enjoy!

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