Mission Make-It: The Georgia 4-H Engineering Challenge

What is Mission Make-It?

Mission Make-It: The Georgia 4-H Engineering Challenge is an exciting, one-day event designed to introduce middle school students to the world of engineering! Through a series of hands-on workshops taught by high school Teen Leaders, participants will get to experience the engineering design process firsthand by working together in small groups to complete different challenges. This is a non-competitive learning experience focusing on engineering, life skills, and workforce development.

Who can participate?

This program is open to Georgia students currently in grades 6-8 for the current school year. High school youth who are Teen Leader Level I Certified are able to apply to serve as the workshop instructors. All county delegations must be chaperoned by adult leaders. Youth cannot be sent as individual participants.

Engineering Overview

Engineering is the application of knowledge in order to design, build, and maintain a product or process that solves a problem and fulfills a need. Engineers use the Engineering Design Process as they create their products and processes:
– Ask: identify the problem, the criteria, and the constraints
– Imagine: brainstorm possible solutions; this step can also involve learning how similar problems have been solved before
– Plan: select one of the possible solutions identified in the previous step
– Create & Test: build and evaluate the prototype
– Improve & Retest: make modifications of prototype to ensure the goal is being met

Promotion Opportunities

Here are some creative ideas to promote Mission Make-It and recruit middle schoolers 4-H’ers to attend this event:

Spark Curiosity:

– In-Club Activity: Hold a mini-design challenge in your club meeting. Present a simple problem (like building the tallest tower out of recycled materials) and let students brainstorm and build solutions. This will pique their interest in the hands-on learning style of Mission Make-It.
– Guest Speaker: Invite a local engineer or someone who works in a STEM field to speak at your club meeting. They can share their experiences and the importance of engineering skills in various careers.

Get Interactive:

– Host a Challenge: Implement a large engineering challenge or series of challenges at an after-school county meeting, weekend, or school holiday event. Provide basic materials and let students try their hand at solving the problem. Include information about Mission Make-It and how they can experience more challenges at the event.
– Wax Museum and Innovation Day: Ask 4-H’ers to research a favorite product – this could be a video game, piece of sports equipment, or even something practical … like an ice-cream machine. Before the event, 4-H’ers will learn who invented their favorite product and dress up like the inventor. At the event, they will become “wax figures” and stand around the room. Once someone walks up to them, they become “alive” and share more about the inventor and invention.
– Family Event: Encourage families to explore the engineering design process together. These opportunities could be something as simple as constructing an item using toy building blocks or being challenged with a problem like building a picnic basket or finding a new way to sort the laundry at home.

By using these creative recruitment ideas, you can effectively promote Mission Make-It and encourage middle school 4-H’ers to participate in this exciting engineering experience!

Bonus! Mission Make-It also features guest speakers and a share-fair from Georgia 4-H Seniors. It’s a great way to meet other students who share similar science and engineering interests and learn from professionals in the field.