In this paper, we describe our approach to designing electronic puppet-building workshops for middle to early high school students. Power Puppet uses traditional puppet building materials - paper and cloth as the main resources, together with simple circuits elements such as LED’s, batteries and magnets. We document our process of designing puppet-building workshops that include STEM education criteria. We collaborated with the Center for Puppetry Arts to design these workshops in such a way that part of the making will include basic electronic input and output components. We aim to open this
We report on an ongoing collaboration that uses puppetry as a shared cultural expression in educational workshop that inform intercultural exchange. Collaborators in Atlanta, USA and Medellín, Colombia work in tandem on the design and implementation of puppet-building workshops. These workshops use narrative framing, craft-based prototyping, and performance-based validation to teach students basic prototyping skills. They specifically encourage them to relate to their local culture and to inform an ongoing dialogue between the two cultural spheres.
Based on preliminary findings from two puppet making and prototyping workshops, an emergent importance of ownership is identified among participants. The workshops center around puppet construction and performance but differed in population and design. We identify key mechanisms of the observed feeling of owernership in the different populations and lay out directed design choices to further support such ownership effects.
The Prototyping Puppets project presents a craft-based prototyping project for STEM education of early middle school level students in informal learning. The project combines crafting and performing of hybrid puppets. It was pilot tested in two expert workshops (n=6 and n=10), which focused on crafting practices and materials and two student workshops (n=8 and n=9), which included performance elements. The resulting data back the main design concept to combine craft and performance in a STEM-focused maker project. They suggest particular focus on key elements of our educational scaffolding
Many of the Hispanic children and families who live in the Rio Grande Valley lack opportunities to engage in inspirational and educational experiences introducing Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) concepts and related careers. The University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) will adapt and research the "Energy and U Show," which will introduce thousands of children and families to an exciting and dramatic that shows interconverting different forms of energy. The show will meld the excitement of chemical demonstrations and the natural connection between energy and STEM education in a fully produced, on-stage science extravaganza. A foundational philosophy of the show is that there is additional real value in getting children and youth onto a college campus. For many of its participants, this is their first time sitting in a seat at a university, the first opportunity for them to envision themselves in this environment. In partnership with the University of Minnesota, which originally developed the show, UTRGV will adapt the show, now presented in English, to a bilingual, culturally accessible format that is designed to Hispanic family audiences and student groups in learning about energy and related careers. Evaluation results demonstrate that the show has effectively engaged thousands of Minnesota students. The target audience will be upper elementary (4th-5th grade), middle school students, and their parents. This project will be led by UTRGV, nation's second-largest Hispanic Serving Institution, with a student enrollment of 28,000, of which over 90% are Hispanic and more than 60% are first-generation college students). In addition to the show, the project will include: (1) a manual to guide implementation of the program and related resources at different national or international venues; (2) educational resources for parents, teachers and school counselors introducing STEM careers and specific STEM college majors; (3) mentoring of UTRGV faculty in outreach activities; and (4) dissemination of the show to other campuses and venues.
The project will conduct ongoing research and evaluation guiding the adaptation of the show and investigation of factors contributing to positive educational impacts of the project, which will be carried out by a bilingual/bicultural researcher. Project research instruments will measure student level of engagement, interest and learning, as well as college interest, in surveys and analysis of data pre and post demonstration. The project will specifically investigate the impact of language on student impacts. Each component of this project will be studied to determine program intervention effectiveness (the scientific demonstration and language of the demonstration). To determine program effectiveness, a baseline of data before program implementation will be established concerning Hispanic students, their persistence, and perceptions of the environment. The project will measure parent perceptions of STEM careers for their children through pre and post demonstration surveys and focus groups. Student and parent research participants will be able to use surveys or respond to other research activities in the language of their choice. Project findings will contribute to the knowledge base concerning how linguistically and culturally adapted science shows and related resources adapted into can have positive impacts regarding the STEM knowledge and careers of students and parents from low-income and Hispanic communities.
This project is funded by the National Science Foundation's (NSF's) Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which supports innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of learning settings.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Karen LozanoArturo FuentesAaron MassariBrian Warren
Calabrese Barton and colleagues examine the beliefs and science practices of two students in a two-year study across settings. The study seeks to answer the question, “What do girls from non-dominant populations do to author themselves into or out of science, in spite of – or because of – their grades?” The study also examines how structures such as teacher support, community organizations, and school tracking systems promote or hinder opportunities for these students to author identities in science.
This poster was presented at the 2014 AISL PI Meeting in Washington, DC. Madison Area Technical College, in collaboration with the Institute for Chemical Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the American Chemical Society (ACS) and area science centers and museums will create a national program to disseminate the Fusion Science Theater (FST) model which directly engages children in playful, participatory, and inquiry-based science learning of chemistry and physics topics.
The article discusses the research which showed that the usage of drama in the classroom by the educators can promote a deeper learning in the variety of verbal fields. Drama has been considered as an effective tool to improve the accomplishment in story understanding, reading achievement, reading preparedness and writing. The result has demonstrated that the drama helps the children to master the texts they enact and to practice the new materials that are not yet enacted. The study has showed that drama instruction can serve as a creative and effective instrument for learning that exceeds
Presentation on NSF grant DRL-1114568 (""Fusion Science Theater National Training and Dissemination Program"") presented at the CAISE Convening on Professional Development and Informal Science Education, February 2nd, 2012.
In summary, this Planning Grant has demonstrated that the Fusion Science Theater mode successfully uses the dramatic structure of a play to create an investigative, participatory theater event that conveys science information, concepts, and methodology in a way that is engaging to children and attractive to parents and educators. The model can be transferred to others both by teaching others to develop their own shows and by training undergraduates to perform FST shows that have already been created. Finally, significant achievements have occurred in publicizing the model and in recruiting
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Joanne CantorMadison Area Technical College
In late spring 2010, Goodman Research Group, Inc. (GRG) was contracted by the Museum of Science, Boston, to conduct an outcomes evaluation of their educational live performance, The Amazing Nano Brothers Juggling Show (ANB). The show presents scientific concepts about atoms and nano science in a highly entertaining and engaging performance. The evaluation focused on the learning outcomes of children, adults, and middle school students. The goal of this evaluation was to examine the effectiveness of the show in increasing audiences' knowledge of and interest in nano science and nanotechnology
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Rachel SchechterMuseum of ScienceMolly PriedemanIrene GoodmanCarol Lynn Alpert
The Fusion Science Theater National Training and Dissemination Program builds on the success of the Fusion Science Theater (FST) planning grant (DRL 07-32142). Madison Area Technical College, in collaboration with the Institute for Chemical Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the American Chemical Society (ACS) and area science centers and museums will create a national program to disseminate the FST model which directly engages children in playful, participatory, and inquiry-based science learning of chemistry and physics topics. The primary target audience is children aged 4-11, while undergraduate chemistry students, faculty, and formal and informal educators comprise the secondary professional audience. The project will result in the development of a robust, creative, and highly visible national dissemination program. The National Training and Dissemination Program includes three deliverables. First, a Distance Performance Training Program will be developed to teach groups of undergraduate students, faculty, and educators how to perform FST Science Investigation (SI) Shows. The Training Program includes a Performance Training Package and a 3-day Performance Training Workshop. The Performance Training Package will be comprised of training videos, performances videos, scripts, rehearsal schedules, and training exercises. These materials will be pilot tested while training representatives of five groups from around the country to perform SI Shows during the Performance Training Workshop at Madison Area Technical College in summer 2012. Participants will be selected from ACS undergraduate groups, outreach specialists, and museum professionals. Workshop participants then return to their home institutions and lead their groups through the improved Performance Training Package delivered via Moodle, with support from FST team members and social networking tools. The second deliverable is the FST Methods Workshop. The Methods Workshop is designed to teach formal and informal educators to use selected methods (Investigation Question, Embedded Assessment, and Act-It-Out) in their outreach efforts and classroom teaching. Four workshops will be presented at national meetings and at the invitation of colleges, universities, and science centers. Follow-up with workshop participants will be mediated through an online forum to encourage experimentation, modification, and dissemination of a second generation of FST activities. The final project deliverable is the development and implementation of a Promotion and Recruitment Plan to connect professional audiences with FST. The Distance Performance Training Program and workshops will be evaluated using mixed methods, while embedded assessment will be utilized to measure the impact on youth participants attending SI shows to determine the overall effectiveness the Distance Performance Training. This project is designed to have important impacts on STEM education and society. The proposed dissemination program brings innovative models and methods into the hands of informal science education practitioners who can use them to engage local audiences and enhance their own teaching and communication practices. Finally the project offers likely benefits for society through the creation and dissemination of innovative practices to combat science illiteracy, diminishing pools of scientists and engineers, lack of understanding about the nature of science, and the achievement gap that exacerbates these problems. This project could be transformative in informal science education as SI Shows use theater to engage audiences in multiple aspects of science learning. It is anticipated that this project will reach up to 2,500 individuals in public and professional audiences.