In the Communities of Learning for Urban Environments and Science (CLUES) project, the four museums of the Philadelphia-Camden Informal Science Education Collaborative worked to build informal science education (ISE) capacity in historically underserved communities. The program offered comprehensive professional development (PD) to Apprentices from 8-10 community-based organizations (CBO), enabling them to develop and deliver hands-on family science workshops. Apprentices, in turn, trained Presenters from the CBOs to assist in delivering the workshops. Families attended CLUES events both at
This evaluation reports on the Mission: Solar System project, a 2-year project funded by NASA. The goal of the Mission: Solar System was to create a collection of resources that integrates digital media with hands-on science and engineering activities to support kids’ exploration in formal and informal education settings. Our goal in creating the resources were: For youth: (1) Provide opportunities to use science, technology, engineering, and math to solve challenges related to exploring our solar system, (2) Build and hone critical thinking, problem-solving, and design process skills, (3)
This professional development event was held on November 6 and 7, 2006, at the Museum of Science, Boston, under the direction of the Museum’s Director for Strategic Projects, Carol Lynn Alpert. This event was sponsored by the Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing NSF Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center (NSEC) headquartered at Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts – Lowell, and by the “Science of Nanoscale Systems and their Device Applications” NSF NSEC headquartered at Harvard University. Research and evaluation of the Symposium was funded independently by the
This professional development event was held on November 6 and 7, 2005 at the Museum of Science, Boston, under the direction of the Museum’s Director for Strategic Projects, Carol Lynn Alpert. This event was sponsored by the Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing NSF Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center (NSEC) headquartered at Northeastern University, the University of Massachusetts – Lowell, and by the “Science of Nanoscale Systems and their Device Applications” NSF NSEC headquartered at Harvard University. The Symposium was intended to provide educators from middle schools, high schools
The Museum of Science partnered with the Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing to create a sequence of professional development experiences in science communication and hands-on learning for graduate students and post-docs. The Sharing Science Workshops were intended to help graduate students who work with the CHN program to improve their abilities to present their research to a variety of scientific and nonscientific audiences. The sequence included a half-day "Sharing Science" workshop, a half-day guided "Practicum" with museum visitors, and optional participation in NanoDays events at MOS
In this article, researchers for the University of North Carolina at Asheville describe findings from their study that assessed the impact of two interactive, hands-on, informal science-learning programs on elementary and middle school children's (1) general interest in science learning and (2) short-term science learning. They used a separate-sample pretest-posttest research design to evaluate the impact of two informal science-learning programs--a robotics program and an electricity program at the Health Adventure at Pack Place. The appendix of this report includes the survey, observation
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Mark L. Harvey, Ph.D.Brandon HudsonBri Tureff
This report presents findings from the evaluation of the Baseball Stories user generated content (UGC) project. The Baseball Stories project was created by the Information and Interactive Technology Department to allow people to share stories about their experiences with baseball for display in the Baseball As America traveling exhibition. As a part of the project, a website was created where people could create and post their stories and view other stories, and an exhibition kiosk was created where people could view their or others' stories or send an email to remind themselves to create a
During Fall 2008, the Science Museum of Minnesota's outreach staff visited schools throughout northern Minnesota to deliver the Energy Connections program. A summative evaluation was carried out to gauge the impact the program had on students' understanding of three of the program's key learning goals. As a result of participating in the Energy Connections program, students will learn that electrical energy can be generated from a variety of sources, which can be either renewable or non-renewable, and can have different environmental consequences/impact. People influence what decisions are
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Amy Grack NelsonClaire PhilippeScience Museum of Minnesota
This report evaluates the program entitled “Treating Tumors with Gold” by looking at visitor feedback in an attempt to assess the success with which the presentation was able to educate the public on a particular study using nanotechnology. The exit survey instrument is included in the appendix of this report.
This report summarizes evaluative findings from a project titled “What Curiosity Sounds Like: Discovering, Challenging, and Sharing Scientific Ideas” (a.k.a.: “Discovery Dialogues”). The project, a Full-Scale development project funded by the National Science Foundation as part of its Advancing Informal Science Learning (AISL) program, explored new ways to actively engage both lay and professional audiences, and foster meaningful communication between scientists and the general public. Appendix includes survey and interview questions.