Using Balloon Creativity Challenges to Set Up Balloons Over Broadway STEAM Activity

Balloons Over Broadway is our favorite Read Aloud Book for Elementary Teachers during the Thanksgiving season. Students love to make balloons and floats and have a classroom parade.

One of the problems we run in to with making floats is in the imagine / brainstorming phase of the planning. Students either pick their first idea and don’t think any further, or they are afraid to share their idea and make something of their own.

Use the Balloon Creativity Challenges to Set Up Your STEAM Activity.

Our solution is to use part of the Balloons Over Broadway Creativity Challenges to help students warm up their brainstorming skills. We have 3 balloon challenges of varying difficulties (6 Balloons, 12 Balloons, 30 Balloons).

Each challenge is designed for students to think of as many ideas of what a balloon could be other than a balloon in a short amount of time (3-10 minutes).

The goal of creativity challenges is to help students think in different ways. The ability to generate unique thoughts and ideas is known as divergent thinking. When students are thinking outside the box it results in creative solutions.

Applying Creativity to Balloons Over Broadway STEM Challenges

Once students have warmed up their brains with creativity challenges, we ask them to design a balloon float for a Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Since students already have around 6-30 ideas of what a balloon could be, it helps them feel confident in choosing a design they are excited about. The challenge of coming up with a lot of designed quickly helps them move beyond their first idea and select the best balloon plan going forward.

We hope you enjoy creating floats in your classroom for Thanksgiving Week this year!

You can get all of these Creativity Activities, STEM Challenges, and more in our TpT Store or as part of the STEM Teachers Club Membership.

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