Making science and technology accessible to preschool and elementary school students is the goal of the “La Main à la Pâte” initiative, in which the Arts et Métiers campuses Arts et Métiers Lilleand Clunyhave been participating for nearly 20 years. This program was founded by Nobel laureate Georges Charpak in 1995. We take a look back at this educational partnership with a student in Grande Ecole Engineering Programme and the coordinator of the "La Main à la Pâte" Pilot Center in Mâcon, Saône-et-Loire.
Valeria Meiers, a Grande Ecole Engineering Programme student in Grande Ecole Engineering Programme in Lille, explains science to children
It was her desire to inspire others’ interest in science that motivated Valeria, a first-year student in the Grande Ecole Engineering Programme get involved.
My group and I work at Desbordes-Valmore elementary school in the Bois Blancs neighborhood of Lille with a second-grade class and another third-grade class, Valeria explains.
The activities of "La main à la pâte" focus on dialogue and scientific questioning by children. For example, this year, engineering students will work with second-grade students from the Desbordes-Valmore school on a robotics project, with equipment provided by the Lille city council, while they will tackle the transmission of movement with third-grade students. The enthusiasm of the Arts et Métiers engineering students Arts et Métiers such that nearly half of the class has gotten involved this year! In addition to the spirit of mutual aid and solidarity that is so important to Arts et Métiers engineering students, this success can also be explained by the dedication of Henri Fresko, who has been the coordinating teacher for the "La Main à la Pâte" program for nearly 20 years on the Lille campus.
Olivier Petit, coordinator of the "La Main à la Pâte" pilot center in Mâcon, Saône-et-Loire,requests the assistance of students from Cluny.
Olivier Petit, then a teacher at Pierreclos, discovered "La main à la pâte" through his educational advisor. She told him about a partnership between the Mâcon Sud district, which his school belongs to, and the Arts et Métiers campus Arts et Métiers Cluny around this educational project.
And to bring the elementary school students’ imaginative ideas to life, engineering students in Grande Ecole Engineering Programme Arts et Métiers campus Arts et Métiers Cluny have been working on this project for over twentyyears now. Michel Bon, an Arts et Métiers instructor, currently Arts et Métiers the “hands-on” track, which has about a dozen students. The Arts et Métiers students Arts et Métiers demonstrate ingenuity to overcome all manufacturing challenges. The models are largelybuilt in the Woodworking Shop, which since 2016 has expanded to include a new hall with a technical facility spanning over 1,000 m² and a full-scale experimental facade that measures wood aging based on its chemical and thermal treatment.
Some creations, such as storage furniture and weather stations, remain in the schools that created them. For other models, the idea is to prevent them from ending up in school cupboards. So the Resource Center located atthe Perrières school in Mâcon is used to store and maintain these models and circulate them among schools in the Saône-et-Loire department, says Olivier Petit, who has been running the pilot center since 2016.
The initiative involves around 100 students.
