Students serve solar s'mores at Sanfordville in scrumptious STEM lesson

We've all heard the expression, "It's hot enough to fry an egg on the sidewalk." 

Well, yesterday morning, students in Ms. Haggerty, Ms. Kennedy, Ms. Larkin and Ms. Bauer's Extended School Year (ESY) classes took advantage of the sunny weather to do something similar. This week's ESY theme is Camping, so the classes made Solar Oven S'mores (no campfire needed) by harnessing the energy of the sun! The delicious STEM fun began in the classroom and continued in the toasty Sanfordville Elementary School courtyard.

See s'more pictures from the activity in the gallery all the way below this story.

First, activity presenter Afdal Tehseldar guided the students through the process of creating their own s'more ovens using some simple supplies. They started with flat, square cardboard boxes (imagine a small pizza box), which served as the main oven enclosure. They lined the ovens with black construction paper, which they learned is effective at absorbing and radiating the heat of the sun; perfect for getting the temperature up to chocolate melting levels.

They also used aluminum foil to help insulate their ovens and better contain the heat. Having already cut square holes in the tops of their boxes, the students used plastic wrap to cover them, creating windows they used to monitor their baking progress. The plastic wrap also served to contain the heat in the ovens.

Next, it was time to add the classic ingredients. The graham crackers went on the black paper, a couple squares of Hershey's on top of that, and then a marshmallow. The top graham was left off until the end, allowing the other ingredients to soak up the sun's power and cook to gooey perfection.    

If you're a charred mallow kind of person when it comes to how you take your s'mores, the students said that the sun-kissed s'more technique is definitely not recommended for you. But, if you enjoy your mallow and chocolate evenly melted, delightfully conflated and congealed between crispy grahams, their opinion is "yea... you definitely should try it this way!"

S'more gallery below this Facebook link.

And here's a look at some more fun from Camping Week during the Extended School Year program...