APSU College of Ed grad class partners with Moore Magnet on outdoor science lessons

CLARKSVILLE, TN – On an October afternoon in 2013, students at Moore Magnet Elementary School began their first hands-on lessons in an innovative outdoor classroom. The space, developed by local architect Brad Martin, featured a garden and a pond for students at this STEM school to explore their curiosity.

Eight years later, the outdoor classroom sits abandoned, with teachers no longer taking their students to learn in this space. When Kelsea Cox arrived earlier this year as the school’s new principal, she knew this important space needed to be restored.

“The big thing about Moore is we have this garden and this pond, but they need to be revived,” she said. “What can we do with that space?”

The school’s teachers were focusing on how to incorporate STEM topics into all subject areas, while also continuing to deal with an ongoing pandemic, so they didn’t have time to focus on reestablishing this outdoor space. Then one day, kindergarten teacher Hannah Oglesbee reached out to her former professors at Austin Peay State University’s Eriksson College of Education. Specifically, she contacted Drs. Donna and Phillip Short, who run the college’s Jack Hunt STEM Center.

The Shorts added the project to their Education 5360 course – a master’s level class that integrates science and social studies into school curriculums. This semester, their students are developing lesson plans for the teachers at Moore to use in the outdoor classroom.

“We have so much on our plate right now, so when they agreed to help us, it was like, ‘wow, this is really something,’” Oglesbee said. “And we know it’s going to be high-quality instruction.”

The Shorts already required their students to develop lesson plans, but often those plans went unused at the end of the semester. Now, the grad students are providing free STEM lessons for the magnet school’s teachers.

“What we’re really trying to do is integrate those subjects (science and social studies) and provide the K-5 students with a richer experience with their learning,” Donna Short said.

The APSU students recently presented their plans to Cox, Moore Magnet’s principal. The elementary school, the Eriksson College of Education and the College of STEM will continue to build upon this collaboration throughout the coming year.