Evaluators sought to determine impact on math attitude and content knowledge of students (3rd - 6th grade), and math literacy workers (high school and college students), based on pre-post testing and observation of YPP after school programs, in which college and high school students teach math games to elementary and middle school students in marginalized and vulnerable communities. The study focused on the Chicago YPP site, 1 of 7 in the YPP national network. Increases in math attitude scores were not statistically significant, however in some instances evaluators found significant increases
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Norman LedermanYoung People's Project, Inc.
The 2010 Cyberchase Summer Challenge Outreach initiative was designed to allow local public television stations to develop community-appropriate outreach plans as part of a unique summer launch of a new season of shows for a PBS children's television program. The Cyberchase Summer Challenge was a national initiative; eight stations were selected for a pilot study of best practices related to summer programming. Grantee stations were provided modest funding and material support. RMC's evaluation focused on understanding how public television stations and their outreach partners can build
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Alice ApleyWendy GrahamElizabeth GoldmanThirteen/WNET New York
Goodman Research Group, Inc. (GRG) is serving as the external evaluator of the three-year, NSF-funded Science Festival Alliance (SFA) project with this report summarizing results from the first year of the project. First year data collection was completed in June 2010. It included: Surveys of 1,411 San Diego Science Festival (SDSF) and 1,054 Cambridge Science Festival (CSF) attendees; End-of-year focus groups with each of the festival (SDSF and CSF) team leaders; and An online survey of 11 principal Alliance team members. The report is organized around four key questions: 1. Who participated
In the spring of 2010, WGBH Boston (wgbh.org) delivered twenty new episodes for the television series FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman (pbskids.org/FETCH!/). These episodes, developed for FETCH!'s fifth season, reflected a broadening of FETCH!'s stem content to include more mathematics. Rather than focusing exclusively on science and engineering, as FETCH! had done in the first four seasons, Season 5 episodes also highlighted age-appropriate math skills and concepts. WGBH was interested in assessing the extent to which kids learned math concepts and skills from these episodes. WGBH hired Concord
The findings summarized in this summative evaluation report focus on three of The World's media venues: (1) its radio broadcast, (2) its Science Podcast (http://www.world-science.org/category/podcast), and (3) its online resources (e.g., articles, streaming audio and video). An additional focus is on The World's participatory Science and Technology Forums. The primary research aim was to assess the project's impact and success at reaching its intended goals while avoiding unintended negative outcomes. Toward these ends, The World's audience members were asked to respond to an online survey
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Arthur JohnsonPublic Radio International (PRI)
As part of a National Science Foundation grant for Season 8 of Cyberchase, Thirteen/WNET produced Summer Challenge broadcasts with accompanying online and offline activities to be posted weekly for eight weeks in the Summer of 2010. Summer Challenge learning opportunities included viewing broadcast and online half-hour episodes; viewing short video excerpts; earning points and rewards online by answering trivia questions about episodes; making one's own games; and doing at-home activities. To learn how children engaged in the opportunities and to explore strengths and weaknesses of the online
Research Questions: (1) To what extent do children's and parent's interest in math and science increase as a result of exposure to one or more of the project's components? (2) To what extent do children and parents want to engage further with Mateo y Cientina after initial exposure to the cartoon through one or more of the project's components? (3) To what extent do parents and children think they've learned new concepts about math and science as a result of completing a Mateo y Cientina activity? (4) To what extent do parents and children gain confidence in their understanding of math and
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Sarah MushlinUniversity of CaliforniaColleen Kuusinen
The Science Museum of Minnesota conducted the StretchAbility program on January 25th, and February 1st, 2010, and the Children’s Museum of Houston conducted the program on November 10th, 14th, and 25th, 2009. A total of 20 paired adult and child groups provided feedback through a survey designed to measure their engagement with and comprehension of the activity. After the activity, evaluators targeted participating children 8 or younger who were verbal for the interview, and gave a survey to the child’s parent to complete. Paired surveys were used due to the lower verbal nature of the younger