Beyond the chance to make, shake and snack on the houses, the gingerbread challenge builds confidence, sparks creativity and hones essential engineering skills in Rhode Island Girl Scouts.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] - Building the perfect gingerbread house requires much more than golden graham crackers, a generous helping of icing and colorful candies.
It demands patience, precision, creativity, problem-solving and teamwork.
That's precisely what two dozen Rhode Island Girl Scouts discovered on Sunday, Dec. 17, when they vied for gingerbread glory at the X-treme Gingerbread Competition held in Warwick, R.I., at the Girl Scouts of Southeastern New England council headquarters.
The afternoon event was led by Brown University's student-led Society of Women Engineers.
The chapter - which has partnered with the Girl Scouts for nearly a decade to bring new programming to local troops - organized the holiday treat showdown to introduce local girls to the fundamentals of engineering in a unique, fun and festive way.
Caroline Snyder, a Brown senior and the society's outreach director, said constructing a gingerbread house requires the same planning and design that engineers consider when they create buildings, albeit on a smaller scale, fostering a practical and hands-on learning experience.
"To get the girls started, we go over some basic concepts of structural support - how thick the walls should be or how big a foundation it should have - which are all basic mechanical engineering principles," Snyder said. "Even though they're building gingerbread houses, the same principles apply to a real house."
