RISES (Re-energize and Invigorate Student Engagement through Science) is a coordinated suite of resources including 42 interactive English and Spanish STEM videos produced by Children's Museum Houston in coordination with the science curriculum department at Houston ISD. The videos are aligned to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills standards, and each come with a bilingual Activity Guide and Parent Prompt sheet, which includes guiding questions and other extension activities.
Successful peer-to-peer practices in informal science learning (ISL) are often not well defined, but further investigation has the potential to help uncover how to motivate and scaffold children's joint learning in science and engineering. Team Hamster!, a PBS KIDS interactive digital series that helps youth think creatively and use engineering skills to solve problems with everyday tools, will be used to achieve the goals of this project.
In recent years, transmedia has come into the spotlight among those creating and using media and technology for children. We believe that transmedia has the potential to be a valuable tool for expanded learning that addresses some of the challenges facing children growing up in the digital age. Produced by the USC Annenberg Innovation Lab and the Joan Ganz Cooney Center, this paper provides a much-needed guidebook to transmedia in the lives of children age 5-11 and its applications to storytelling, play, and learning. Building off of a review of the existing popular and scholarly literature
DATE:
TEAM MEMBERS:
Becky Herr-StephensonMeryl AlperErin Reilly
Early childhood is a critical time for developing foundational knowledge, skills, and interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). For that reason, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) places a great priority on developing early childhood STEM content, especially through its television shows that are watched by over 60% of young children in the United States. Research suggests that adding in-the-moment interaction to television watching promotes learning and engagement. Toward this end, researchers from the University of California, Irvine and PBS KIDS have prototyped interactive versions of science shows that children view on internet-connected devices while they communicate with the main character powered by an AI conversational agent. Pilot studies show that when children watch these new interactive videos with the main character pausing periodically to ask probing questions about the learning goals of the episode and following up with appropriate responses, they are more engaged and learn more about science, with heightened benefits for children who speak languages other than English at home. Based on these early results, in this Innovations in Development project the research team will develop, test and produce publicly available conversational episodes for two PBS KIDS television shows, one focused on science and the other on computational thinking.
The project will iteratively study and develop six conversational videos with novel forms of support for children, including extended back-and-forth conversation that builds upon a child's responses, visual scaffolding that facilitates verbal communication, and bilingual language processing so that children can answer in English or Spanish. The conversational videos will be evaluated in both lab-based and home settings. The lab-based study will involve 600 children ages 3-7 in a predominantly low-income Latino community in Southern California, in which researchers compare children’s learning and engagement when watching the conversational videos with three other formats: (1) watching the non-interactive broadcast version of the video; (2) watching the video with pseudo-interaction, in which the main character asks questions and gives a generic response after a fixed amount of time but can’t understand what the child says; or (3) watching the broadcast version of the video with a human co-viewer who pauses the video and asks questions. The home-based study will involve 80 families assigned to watch either the non-interactive or interactive videos as many times as they want over a month at home. In both the lab-based and home studies, pre- and post-tests will be used to examine the impact of video watching on science and language learning, and log data will be used to assess children’s verbalization and engagement while watching. Following the home study, the six videos will be further refined and made available for free to the public through the PBS KIDS apps and website, which are visited by more than 13 million users a month. Beyond providing engaging science learning opportunities to children throughout the country, this study will yield important insights into the design, usability, feasibility, and effectiveness of incorporating conversational agents into children’s STEM-oriented video content, with implications for extending this innovation to other educational media such as e-books, games, apps, and toys.
This Innovations in Development project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program.
DATE:
-
TEAM MEMBERS:
Mark WarschauerSilvia LovatoAndres BustamanteAbby JenkinsYing Xu
Cyberchase: Mobile Adventures in STEM is designed to advance the STEM learning of children ages 6-8 and engage low-income families in informal STEM interactions. Based on a successful NSF-funded pilot, the project combines the appeal of the PBS KIDS series Cyberchase and the potential of mobile texting to deliver informal learning. WNET and Education Development Center will produce: three Cyberchase videos that blend math and environmental content; a bilingual family engagement campaign in 15 communities across the U.S. that combines this media with weekly text-based engagement; and research into use and impact of the model among low-income Latinx families. Mobile Adventures addresses the need to better engage underserved families in informal science practices that are foundational for future STEM learning. While the materials target low-income communities broadly, research will focus on low-income Latinx families with children ages 6-8, an age group overlooked in previous research on educational uses of texting. A needs assessment and formative testing will ensure that the project design meets the needs and interests of diverse Latinx and other families.
The goal of Mobile Adventures is to build knowledge about how innovative, culturally responsive tools can help Latinx and low-income families engage in fun STEM learning at home. A three-tiered research study will address the question: how and to what extent does a mobile text-and-media approach to delivering informal STEM learning materials foster joint media engagement between children and parents, building new repertoires for learning together? The study will combine analysis of observation in homes and community settings, backend data, and pre/post surveys. Research will deepen understanding of effective family engagement models that make media a central component, the potential of text messaging as a stimulus to parent/child STEM learning, and maximal design of media and community engagement to serve low-income Latinx families. Findings will be disseminated through national conferences and journals. The Cyberchase videos, distributed free on broadcast and digital platforms, will build the STEM literacy of millions of diverse children, while the family engagement campaign will involve a projected 3,750 families in 15 locations. Evaluation will assess how well the project has met its goals.
This Innovations in Development project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program.
Black girls display high interest, confidence and ability in STEM but face multiple barriers including racial, ethnic and gender stereotypes, low exposure to STEM role models, low awareness of diverse STEM fields and financial obstacles to STEM education. It is critical to infuse STEM education with specific and intentional culturally responsive and anti-racist strategies to attract and retain Black girls in STEM. Through this combination of media, role modeling and outreach, Black SciGirls will help increase access to STEM education for Black girls, preparing them for future workforce participation. This project will study the impacts on elementary/middle school Black girls’ exposure to early career Black female STEM professionals as role models. Deliverables include 1) professional development for STEM educators and Black STEM professional women to prepare them to lead STEM programs for girls 2) a PBS series of role model videos of early-career Black STEM professionals and 3) a research study that examines how/if in person and media-based STEM role models increase Black girls’ interest and confidence in STEM, motivation to pursue future STEM studies, and STEM identity. While women make up 47% of the U.S. workforce, they are underrepresented in STEM and only 1.6% are Black women.
The research study will examine how educators’ use of role models addresses a critical barrier for Black girls, seeing women in STEM who look like them. The research study questions are: How and in what ways do Black STEM women role models influence Black girls’ interest in STEM? How and to what extent do role models report changes in their confidence and ability to engage girls in STEM as a result of training in best practices in role modelling? and, How and to what extent are parents engaged in supporting girls’ involvement in STEM, as a result of the participation of role models? The research team will visit participating local SciGirls programs to collect qualitative data, including observations of program activities, interviews, and focus groups. To ensure reliable outcomes and utilize robust theoretical underpinnings, the research will combine pre/post survey data and an in-depth cross-case studies employing qualitative and quantitative data collection. This mixed-methods approach will enable gathering data that comprehensively offers insight into Black girls’ STEM experiences and those of the Black STEM professional women role models and parents who support them. Qualitative data that centers girls’, role models’, and parents’ perspectives will contribute to this identity-centered study. A culturally responsive evaluation will determine the extent to which the project builds educators’ ability to integrate equitable and anti-racist practices to build Black girls’ interest and confidence in STEM studies.
This Research in Service to Practice project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to (a) advance new approaches to and evidence-based understanding of the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments; (b) provide multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences; (c) advance innovative research on and assessment of STEM learning in informal environments; and (d) engage the public of all ages in learning STEM in informal environments.
DATE:
-
TEAM MEMBERS:
Rita KarlAngel Miles NashRonda BullockAdrienne StephensonLataisia Jones
This is a survey we developed in 2018 for our exploratory research study of listeners and their parents/guardians of the children's science podcast, Brains On!. The survey includes questions about who listens, when and where children listen, children's listening behaviors, motivations for listening, activities after listening, household information, and demographic questions.
Kid-focused STEM podcasts have grown in popularity over the years, but the ISE field lacks knowledge of the impact and value of this medium as a means for engaging children and families in science learning and discovery. This research summary shares the results of an exploratory study of the popular children's science podcast, Brains On!, in an effort to being to fill this knowledge gap.
The research was guided by three overarching research questions:
Who is the audience for Brains On! and what are their motivations for listening to children’s science podcasts?
How are Brains On
The Brains On! exploratory research study was guided by three overarching research questions:
Who is the audience for Brains On! and what are their motivations for listening to children’s science podcasts?
How are Brains On! listeners using the podcast and engaging with its content?
What kinds of impacts does Brains On! have on its audiences?
These questions were answered through a three-phase mixed-methods research design. Each phase informed the next, providing additional insights into answering the research questions. Phase 1 was a review of a sample of secondary data in the
This report, prepared for The Jim Henson Company, shares findings of a sub-study investigating the types of support parents and caregivers need when navigating and using the second-screen Splash and Bubbles for Parents app. This study originated from a prior field study finding indicating families would benefit from support around the app since it represents a new kind of digital tool. In partnership with local Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) stations, we provided parents and caregivers more detailed support around the features of the app. Based on survey and interview findings, parents and
The Splash and Bubbles for Parents app is a second-screen digital resource for parents and caregivers to support young children’s learning of ocean science. This report, prepared for The Jim Henson Company, shares findings of a field study conducted to examine the promise of the app in supporting parents’ and caregivers’ behaviors and attitudes toward science and technology; families’ joint engagement with media (adults and children watch and play together); and children’s science learning. Findings indicate that parents and caregivers found the app helpful for supporting their children’s