WEDNESDAY, 4 MAY – A total of 52 students of the Faculty of Psychology and Education (FPP) Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) recently organised a Science and Technology Education Community Programme at Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan (SMK) Tambunan.

According to the programme supervisor, Dr. Siew Nyet Moi @ Sopiah Abdullah, the programme among others aimed at providing support to rural students to join the invention activities to solve problems in a creative and innovative way through Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM).

“A total of 50 Form Four Pure Science students of SMK Tambunan and SMK Desa Wawasan were directly involved in the programme that focused on group activities,” she said.

She said, the first STEM activities were based on the El Nino phenomenon and saw students worked in groups of five to create a model with the green technology concept to mitigate the impact of El Nino on plants, the environment and on themselves.

“The second activity was to build windmills using wind or water as the source of alternative energy that is free, clean and sustainable (renewable energy),” added Dr. Siew.

She explained that each group used existing knowledge and past experiences to design a water-pumping equipment to tackle the problem of irrigation in paddy fields in Tambunan.

“Based on the feedback received through interviews, the students said that daily living experience and revolution affects the way they generate lots of ideas in order to produce a variety of designs to solve a given problem.

“Through their participation in such activities, they would better understand the concept of science and apply  them in their designs thereby enhancing their creativity and expanding their imagination,” she added.

Also present were representatives from SMK Tambunan, Mohd Badrul Hisyam and SMK Desa Wawasan, Jovinia Yulus. - (fl)

Source: FPP