Hyattsville Library STEM workshops - Spring 2025
Welcome to the Community STEM Workshop page, run by the University of Maryland, Balloon Payload Program!
If you are here, you are probably a student of the workshop, an interested learner, or a member of our club. This page has all of the resources from our workshop lessons: presentations, documents, codes, files, extra pamphlets, and challenge exercises!
If you participated in our event and want to provide extremely valuable feedback, please take this 5-minute survey: https://forms.gle/HNnK253b7mydUBFA9
Workshop Lessons
1. 3D Modeling & 3D Printing
In this workshop, we will learn about 3D modeling and 3D design using computer, along with 3D printers, how they work, and more! We will have a live 3D printer demo which you will get to see and interact with!!!
Week 1 Presentation
Week 1 Notes + Extra Problems!
2. Python Programming Introduction
In this workshop, we learned the basics of Python programming, and combined them together to make a "Rock, Paper, Scissors" videogame where you can challenge your computer!
Week 2 Presentation
Week 2 Notes + Extra Problems!
This week's code project: https://replit.com/@JeremyKuznetso1/RockPaperScissors#main.py
3. Forces and Spaghetti Towers!
In this workshop we learned about tension and compression forces and used what we learn to construct the best spaghetti and marshmallow towers we could!
Presentation Slides
4. Knot Tying
This week we learned about how flight lines of high altitude weather balloons are assembled. How forces effect how we need to treat out equipment and they types of knots that we use in order to achieve this
Presentation Slides
See more detailed directions on how to tie a variety of knots in the handout!
Knot Handout
5. Aerospace Engineering: How Things Fly
In this workshop we learned about different ways engineers can make technology fly. We then used what we learned to construct the best paper airplanes we could!
Presentation Slides
How to fold a paper airplane printable template
6. Forces and Balloons
In this workshop we learned more about the aerodynamic forces that act of object and related them back to how balloons fly! We then put our own engineering skills into action and created structures that would protect an egg from cracking when it falls.
Presentation Slides
7. Chemistry
For our last workshop of the semester we learned about atoms and how they interact with each other in chemical reactions. We then got to see this happen ourselves by mixing colored water and oil with Alka-Seltzer to make our own DIY lava lamps!
Presentation Slides