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What's On

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What is STREAM?

Supporting learning through fun! STREAM stands for Science, Technology, Reading, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics. From coding and numbers to circuits and crafts, our activities encourage curiosity and development. Read about all the activities that East Riding Libraries has to inspire your child's mind, and search STREAM on our What's On page to discover when our next librarian-led events take place.

the STREAM logo

What kind of activities does STREAM do?

We run many hands-on, event-led activities at our branch libraries throughout the year. There are also more self-paced activities such as our reading clubs for young people and afterschool Code Clubs. Check the What's On page for dates and details. We aim to make all STREAM activities inclusive for all abilities, at times there may be age restrictions for safety due to small parts being used. Below is a breakdown of more specific activities under each theme of STREAM. You can also watch this video montage of some of the fantastic Lego art our junior members created during STREAM activities over Summer 2021.

Science

Get creative and experimental with our range of science-based activities! All ages and abilities are invited to explore biology, chemistry and physics as we discover the science behind the fun.

  • Our young scientists will be amazed at the surprising experiments we can do with safe everyday equipment found around the home, while staff explain the science as we go.
  • We invite guest experts and qualified scientists for more advanced activities. Past engaging and educational sessions have included Harry Potter Potions Class, George's Marvellous Medicine, Lego wind turbines and exotic animals!

Technology

Our aim is to make coding fun and technology accessible to all from early years to teens. From Code-a-Pillar Storytime to Lego Robots, there's something for everyone!

  • We run regular Code Club groups at many of our libraries. Search for a Code Club near you on our What's On page
  • Younger children can attend our Code-a-Pillar Storytime. After enjoying a story, we play fun games to learn the basics of coding, before putting our skills to the test and coding our electronic Code-a-Pillars to re-enact the storyline. These take place throughout the year at various branches.
  • Our EaRL electronic robots are the next step in coding and can be coded directly using EaRL's buttons, or the more advanced can write the code on computers and download it to the robots. Can you code EaRL to navigate a maze? These take place throughout the year at various branches.
  • Older children will enjoy putting our Lego Boost Robots together and coding them up. You can build and code a robot, a rover, a guitar, an auto-builder Lego factory, and even a cat that purrs! Look out for Lego sessions throughout the year at all branches.
  • Fancy doing some coding at home? We have BBC Micro:bits available for you to borrow, along with a wide range of books to help you along the way. Reserve at your local library by logging in to your online account on the Library Catalogue.

Reading

At East Riding Libraries we are committed to supporting a life-long love of reading.

  • We are proud to participate in the Bookstart programme which encourages parents to read with their children from birth by offering free Bookstart Reading Packs for you to keep at ages 0-12 months and 3-4 years. Simply pop in to your local library and ask our friendly librarians about joining Bookstart and a free junior membership for your child. Your midwife may provide your first pack.
  • For our early years groups we hold regular Storytime sessions, and have also incorporated stories into many of our other activities such as Code-a-Pillar Storytime and Duplo Storytime.
  • We participate in the Reading Agency's Summer Reading Challenge each year to help you keep on reading throughout the long summer holidays, and put on lots of exciting STREAM activities to run alongside it.
  • In addition to our wide range of reading materials for young people, we also now hold a dedicated STREAM collection of books so that you can continue to learn, create and experiment at home.
  • Look out for our annual Festival of Words Children's Festival where you can meet the authors of your favourite children's books and attend workshops and activity sessions.

Engineering

Plan it, design it, create it, build it! We have sessions for all ages that encourage inventiveness and creativity.

  • Look out for our Duplo Storytime where we read a themed story and then engineer a scene from it using our matching Duplo brick collections. Great fun for inquisitive young minds.
  • Older children can take on our Lego Team Challenge where you will work together against the clock to create a Lego masterpiece, but can you design and engineer something that fits the technical brief?
  • Fancy learning about electronics? Our Makey Makey sessions will have you understanding how circuits work in no time. Look out for other electronics activities throughout the year such as making light-up Christmas cards.
  • From Autumn 2022 all of our East Riding Libraries will have their own Lego Club kits. What will you build?

Arts

We embrace all of the 'arts' from arts and crafts, to plays and performance.

  • Younger children and parents can enjoy singing along, playing instruments and dancing to nursery rhymes at our lively Bounce & Rhyme sessions.
  • For the Lego fans out there, why not join in with one of our hugely popular Lego Art sessions? We have a wide range of templates for you to work from, or you can design your own mosaic portrait. Great fun for all the family.
  • We regularly work with Arts Council England, artistic performers and creative organisations so that you can experience the performing arts in our libraries. Look out for exciting plays and performances throughout the year.

Mathematics

We want to support our young people to engage with mathematics in a fun and engaging way and are developing a series of number-based activities that can be enjoyed by all regardless of confidence or ability.

  • Younger children will love our new Number Time sessions where we read number-themed stories, play games and sing number songs. They'll be counting in no time!
  • Look out for our other number-themed activities throughout the year such as The Big Fish & Chip Take-Away - can you catch the right fish to bring your starting number down to zero?
  • We also adapt other STREAM activities to use mathematics where possible such as our Dicing with Micro:bits activity where we not only learn to code the Micro:bit to work like a dice, we then test its randomness against a real dice by working out averages!

Puzzles

Have fun and learn with a range of puzzles our team have put together. The East Riding Libraries team have adapted the questions from White Rose Maths.

Maths question How long are the ribbons?
Maths answer How long are the ribbons?

A piece of ribbon is 5 metres long.

Gina and Liam each use part of the ribbon to wrap a present.

  • Gina uses 1.6 meters
  • Liam uses 256 cm

The remaining ribbon is cut into 7 pieces of equal length.

How long is each piece of ribbon?

First of all, we need to convert Liam’s length of ribbon from cm into metres. There are 100cm in a metre, so if we divide 256 cm by 100 that will tell us how many metres it is:

256 ÷ 100 = 2.56m

Next, we need to add the lengths of ribbon used by Gina and Liam together and then subtract the total from the overall 5m of ribbon:

1.6m + 2.56m = 4.16m 5m – 4.16m = 0.84m

The 0.84m of ribbon that was left was then divided into 7 equal pieces, so:

0.84m ÷ 7 = 0.12m

So, each piece of ribbon is 0.12m long, or if we multiply that by 100 to convert it into cm, each piece is 12cm long.

Maths question What is the perimeter?
Maths answer What is the perimeter?

What is the mean perimeter of the shapes below?

The first step is to work out the perimeter of each shape. We have been provided with the measurement for one side on each shape and the little line through the other sides indicates that they are all equal.

So, as the triangle has 3 equal sides of 6cm, we can work out the perimeter by multiplying 6cm x 3; the square has four equal sides; and the pentagon has five equal sides.

6cm x 3 = 18cm 6cm x 4 = 24cm 6cm x 5 = 30cm

To find the mean, we first need to add all of the perimeters together:

18cm + 24cm + 30cm = 72cm

Now we need to divide the answer by the number of shapes:

72cm ÷ 3 = 24cm

The mean perimeter is 24cm.

Maths question How many of each coin?
Maths answer How many of each coin?

Jake has £6.30 in a moneybox.

He only has 50p and 10p coins.

For every 50p coin in the box, Jake has two 10p coins.

How many of each coin does Jake have in his money box?

To begin, we need to work out how much a 50p coin and two 10p coins totals:

50p + 10p + 10p = 70p

Now we need to divide £6.30 by 70p:

£6.30 ÷ £0.70 = 9

We know that for every 50p coin Jake has two 10p coins. So, we now know that there are nine 50p coins. There must therefore be twice as many 10p coins, so:

2 x 9 = 18

There are nine 50p coins and eighteen 10p coins in Jake’s moneybox.