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.
How do afterschool programs view their local public libraries? Are they working with them, and in what ways? These are the questions that the Afterschool Alliance, along with its partners at the Space Science Institute’s National Center for Interactive Learning (NCIL) and the American Library Association, wanted to answer. Overall, our goal is to build bridges between the afterschool and library fields, so that both can share knowledge and resources to better serve our youth. While our work together has primarily focused on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education through
The L.C. Bates Museum will provide 1,700 rural fourth grade students and their families museum-based STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics) educational programming including integrated naturalist, astronomy, and art activities that explore Maine's environment and its solar and lunar interactions. The project will include a series of eight classroom programs, family field trips, TV programs, family and classroom self-guided educational materials, and exhibitions of project activities including student work. By bringing programs to schools and offering family activities and field trips, the museum will be able to engage an underserved, mostly low-income population that would otherwise not be able to visit the museum. The museum's programming will address teachers' needs for museum objects and interactive explorations that enhance student learning and new Common Core science curriculum objectives, while offering students engaging learning experiences and the opportunity to develop 21st century leadership skills.
Virtual Missions and Exoplanets (vMAX) will develop and test a three-dimensional, virtual world environment that will engage middle school students and educators from high-poverty schools in NASA-related exoplanet mission simulations. The Patricia and Phillip Frost Museum of Science will serve as the lead institution, in partnership with the following institutions: U.S. Space and Rocket Center, New York Hall of Science, Chabot Space & Science Center, and Sci-Port: Louisiana¹s Science Center; Aimee Weber Studios will be responsible for virtual exhibit fabrication, and WestEd will serve as the project¹s formative and summative evaluator. The overall goal of the project is to create a NASA resource on exoplanet astronomy that will engage students, educators, and the general public in NASA¹s search for worlds beyond our own. The project aims to increase underserved students¹ engagement in STEM, knowledge of exoplanet missions, and awareness of NASA-related careers; and advance the growing body of knowledge on the use of virtual world technologies to provide opportunities for students to participate in NASA Mission-related science teaching and learning. The project will result in the development of vMAX world, a virtual world with simulations related to exoplanet astronomy designed for use as the core content of a 30-hour out-of-school learning experience for middle school students. An Educator Implementation Guide will be developed and made available online for download by secondary school teachers and science museum educators. In addition, an interactive, multiuser exhibit kiosk, utilizing the simulations created for vMAX world, will be developed and made available to interested Visitor Centers, museums and planetariums.