The independent evaluation firm, Knight Williams, Inc., developed a two-part post-program survey to gather information about the Year 1 SciGirls CONNECT2 outreach programs conducted by 14 partner organizations. The evaluation aimed for one educator from each organization to complete Part 1 of the survey, which consisted of program reporting questions. In all, one educator from 13 partner organizations completed Part 1, for a response rate of 93%. Part 2 of the survey asked for program reflections, with a focus on perceived program goals, impacts, highlights, and challenges. Given the
The independent evaluation firm, Knight Williams, Inc., administered an online survey and conducted follow-up interviews with educators from 14 SciGirls CONNECT2 partner organizations to gather information about their use of, reflections on, and recommendations relating to the SciGirls Seven strategies. The evaluation aimed for two educators from each partner organization – specifically the program leader and one educator who was familiar with the SciGirls Seven – to share reflections on the strategies after they completed their Year 1 programs. In all, 24 educators from 13 partners completed
This position paper, co-authored Center for Childhood Creativity's Director Elizabeth Rood and Director of Research Helen Hadani, details the importance of exposing children ages 0-8 to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) experiences. The review of more than 150 empirical studies led Rood and Hadani to conclude that, despite what has been previously thought, modern research supports the understanding that children are capable of abstract thinking and STEM-learning from infancy, beginning before their first birthday.
The Roots of STEM Success, authored in support of classroom
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Helen Shwe HadaniElizabeth RoodAmy EisenmannRuthe FousheeGarrett JaegerGina JaegerJoanna KauffmannKatie KennedyLisa Regalla
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative resources for use in a variety of settings. This project will advance knowledge in the design of interest triggers for science in immersive digital simulation learning games. When learners are interested in a topic, it can have a profound impact on the quality of their learning. Although much is known about how informal learning experiences can promote interest in STEM, much less research has addressed links between technology use and interest development. This Exploratory Pathways project will investigate (1) the impact of entertainment technology use by middle school learners on STEM interest development, (2) the design of interactive educational technologies created specifically to trigger interest in astronomy, and (3) informal learning resources for sustained interaction with STEM content over time. In particular, learners will have the opportunity to interactively explore the scientific consequences of considering alternative versions of Earth via "What if?" questions, such as "What if the earth had no moon?" or "What if the earth were twice its current size?". While using the simulations, learners will be invited to make observations and propose scientific explanations for what they see as different. Given recent discoveries of potentially habitable worlds throughout the Galaxy, such questions have high relevance to public discourse around space exploration, conditions necessary for life, and the long-term future of the human race. Studies will occur across three informal learning settings: museum exhibits, afterschool programs, and summer camps, and are driven by the following research questions: What technology-based triggers of interest have the strongest influence on interest? Which contextual factors are most important for supporting long-term interest development? And, what kinds of technology-based triggers are most effective for learners from audiences who are underrepresented in STEM? This research will result in an empirically tested approach for cultivating interest that will allow educators to leverage the "What if?" pedagogy in their own work, as well as downloadable materials suitable for use in both informal and formal learning settings.
Planned studies will identify features that are effective in triggering interest, with an emphasis on groups underrepresented in STEM, and elaborate on the importance of engaging learners in explanatory dialogues and in service of interest development. It is hypothesized that interacting in such novel ways can act as a trigger for interest in astronomy, physics, and potentially other areas of STEM. Design iterations will also investigate different forms of learning supports, such as guidance from facilitators, collaboration, and automated guidance available within the simulations, and identify how features vary with respect to learning contexts. Data collected will include interview and survey data to track interest development, measures of knowledge in astronomy and physics, and log files of simulation use to better understand how behaviors in the simulations align with stated interests. Results of the studies will advance the theoretical understanding of interest development and its relationship to interactive experiences, and will also have practical implications for the deployment of technology in informal settings by identifying features critical for triggering the interest of middle school learners. This project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. This includes providing multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences, advancing innovative research on and assessment of STEM learning in informal environments, and developing understandings of deeper learning by participants.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
H Chad LaneJorge Perez-GallegoNeil Comins
The Cyberlearning and Future Learning Technologies Program funds efforts that will help envision the next generation of learning technologies and advance what we know about how people learn in technology-rich environments. Cyberlearning Exploration (EXP) Projects explore the viability of new kinds of learning technologies by designing and building new kinds of learning technologies and studying their possibilities for fostering learning and challenges to using them effectively. This project brings together two approaches to help K-12 students learn programming and computer science: open-ended learning environments, and computer-based learning analytics, to help create a setting where youth can get help and scaffolding tailored to what they know about programming without having to take tests or participate in rigid textbook exercises for the system to know what they know.
The project proposes to use techniques from educational data mining and learning analytics to process student data in the Alice programming environment. Building on the assessment design model of Evidence-Centered Design, student log data will be used to construct a model of individual students' computational thinking practices, aligned with emerging standards including NGSS and research on assessment of computational thinking. Initially, the system will be developed based on an existing corpus of pair-programming log data from approximately 600 students, triangulating with manually-coded performance assessments of programming through game design exercises. In the second phase of the work, curricula and professional development will be created to allow the system to be tested with underrepresented girls at Stanford's CS summer workshops and with students from diverse high schools implementing the Exploring Computer Science curriculum. Direct observation and interviews will be used to improve the model. Research will address how learners enact computational thinking practices in building computational artifacts, what patters of behavior serve as evidence of learning CT practices, and how to better design constructionist programming environments so that personalized learner scaffolding can be provided. By aligning with a popular programming environment (Alice) and a widely-used computer science curriculum (Exploring Computer Science), the project can have broad impact on computer science education; software developed will be released under a BSD-style license so others can build on it.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Shuchi GroverMarie BienkowskiJohn Stamper
Developing and maintaining a diverse, innovative workforce in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (known as STEM) is critical to American competitiveness in the world, but national surveys report a current and future shortage of highly qualified STEM professionals in the US. One problem creating this shortage is that more than half of all college students who declare a major in STEM fields drop out or change their majors in the first two years of their post-secondary education. This problem is particularly acute for first generation college students. If we could increase the STEM degree completion rate by just 25%, we would make up 75% of the additional workforce needed over the next decade.
Our project aims to increase the STEM persistence of first generation college students and focuses on rural students in West Virginia. Project partners including scientists from National Labs, college faculty, local school system staff, informal educators, State Department of Education officials, and West Virginia college students will collaborate to develop summer and academic year activities that support young undergraduates majoring in STEM. Activities that we will pilot include early opportunities to do science research, academic year courses that develop science, math and communication skills, and the formation of Hometown STEM Ambassadors; undergraduate STEM students that encourage younger students back in their hometown schools. We will study the impact of these activities on students' persistence in STEM majors.
Our Project is called FIRST TWO: Improving STEM Persistence in the First Two Years of College (FIRST TWO).
Technical Details:
During the Development Launch Project, partners will create and pilot components of two courses that will confer college credit to students in two and four year schools. Each course will have as its center piece a research and development internship. By the end of the Project Development Pilot, FIRST TWO course modules will be integrated into courses the State, and be transferable between community colleges and four-year schools.
An innovative component of FIRST TWO is the creation of Hometown STEM ambassadors--students who participate in both courses will be prepared to mentor their peers, and also conduct outreach in their home school districts. They will make presentations to hometown K-12 students, and will discuss STEM college readiness issues with local education leaders. We believe reconnecting post-secondary students with their home communities and providing place-based relevance to their STEM education will have a positive impact on their persistence, as well as the added benefit of encouraging K-12 students to envision themselves as future STEM professionals.
FIRST TWO will:
- integrate early experience in STEM internships, online communities of practice and STEM skills development into a discovery-based "principles of research and development" college seminar for first year students;
- sustain engagement through a second service learning course, called STEM Leadership that will develop communication and mentoring skills and produce peer mentors who will mentor younger students, join in the efforts to change the STEM education experience at their schools, and conduct outreach in their hometown communities during the students? second year and third years.
- secure state-wide adoption and transferability of these courses, or course materials, and ultimately scale the program across the Appalachian region and to other states with large rural student populations.
- collaborate with National Labs to determine the feasibility of a National STEM Persistence Alliance partnering National Lab internship programs with 2 and 4-year schools who serve FGC students.
Finally, there are many studies that inquire into the factors that correlate with post-secondary retention in general, and with STEM attrition specifically but few that focus on rural students. FIRST TWO will fully articulate a rigorous educational research project aimed at advancing understanding of the factors affecting rural students' entry into and persistence in STEM career pathways. This research will study the impact FIRST TWO program components make on rural FGC students' persistence in STEM majors. Instruments will be developed and validated that test the components proposed in FIRST TWO interventions. As we scale the program to a larger Alliance, so will the research study scale, providing a unique opportunity to inform the education community about the rural students' experience.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Sue HeatherlyKaren ONeilErica Harvey
As part of an overall strategy to enhance learning within informal environments, the Innovations at the Nexus of Food, Energy, and Water Systems (INFEWS) and Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) programs partnered to support innovative models poised to catalyze well-integrated interdisciplinary research and development efforts within informal contexts that transform scientific understanding of the food, energy, and water systems (FEWS) nexus in order to improve system function and management, address system stress, increase resilience, and ensure sustainability. This project addresses this aim by using systems thinking and interdisciplinary integration approaches to develop a novel immersive educational simulation game and associated materials designed to highlight the role and importance of corn-water-ethanol-beef (CWEB) systems in supporting the ever increasing demands for food, energy, and water in the United States. The focus on FEWS and sustainable energy aligns well with both the INFEWS program and the sizable sustainability-related projects in the AISL program portfolio. The development and broad dissemination of a multiuser game specific to CWEB systems are particularly innovative contributions and advance for both program portfolios and their requisite fields of study. An additional unique feature of the game is the embedding of varying degrees of economic principles and decision-making along with the nuisances of cultural context as salient variables that influence systems thinking. Of note, a team of computer science, management and engineering undergraduate students at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln will be responsible for the engineering, development, and deployment of the game as their university capstone projects. If successful, this game will have a significant reach and impact on youth in informal programs (i.e., 4-H clubs), high school teachers and students in agriculture vocational education courses, college students, and the public. The impact could extend well beyond Nebraska and the targeted Midwestern region. In conjunction with the game development, mixed-methods formative and summative evaluations will be conducted by an external evaluator. The formative evaluation of the game will focus on usability testing, interest and engagement with a select sample of youth at local 4-H clubs and youth day camps. Data will be collected from embedded in-game survey questionnaires, rating scales, observations and focus groups conducted with evaluation sample. These data and feedback will be used to inform the design and refinement of the game. The summative evaluation will focus on the overall impacts of the game. Changes in agricultural systems knowledge, attitudes toward agricultural systems, interest in pursuing careers in agricultural systems, and decision making will be aligned with the Nebraska State Science Standards and tracked using the National Agricultural Literacy Outcomes (NALOs) assessment, game analytics and pre/post-test measures administered to the evaluation study sample pre/post exposure to the game.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Jeyamkondan SubbiahEric ThompsonDeepak KeshwaniRichard KoelschDavid Rosenbaum
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative resources for use in a variety of settings. This project will develop and research an integrated children's media and early childhood educator professional development strategy to prepare preschoolers with social-emotional skills that provide a foundation for later math learning success. The social-emotional skills include persistence, risk-taking, regulating anxieties, and collaborating to solve problems. Media components include Peg+Cat television episodes, videos, games and apps distributed through PBS broadcast and online. The integrated professional development model is designed to impact these educators' understanding of math and develop their skills for fostering in children a positive math mindset. Additional resources include a new Peg+Cat summer day camp at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh. The project partners include a media company, The Fred Rogers Company; researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and St. Vincent College; and the evaluator, Rockman et al. This project is unique in its focus on integrating social-emotional skills with early math learning and educator skill development. It will fill an important niche in the research literature and has the potential to impact media practice which is undergoing significant change as new digital tools and technologies become available for learning. Both standardized and researcher-developed measures will be used to assess learning outcomes, including early childhood educators' attitudes and quality of instruction, as well as children's interest and engagement in math. The research design includes iterative data collection to inform the development and refinement of the professional learning for teachers. The mixed methods approach will include classroom observations, interviews and focus groups with educators, and parent questionnaires. Key questions include: does exposure to Peg+Cat positively relate to children's use of social-emotional skills during math learning activities? Does educators' exposure to the professional development training improve their attitudes and abilities to infuse math instruction with social-emotional skills? Does having an educator who received Peg+Cat training impact children's engagement and interest in math?
Xraise provides experiences that empower individuals by making science familiar and accessible. Immersed with scientists themselves, we facilitate hands-on, minds-on activities that involve the direct exploration of physics phenomena. Our relationship with K12 students, educators and community partners provides us with a platform for exploring personal intuitions, developing understandings and fostering excitement in science.