Future City, operating since 1992, is “a national, project-based learning experience where students in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade imagine, design, and build cities of the future. Students work as a team with an educator and engineer mentor to plan cities using SimCityTM software, research and write solutions to an engineering problem, build tabletop scale models with recycled materials, and present their ideas before judges at regional competitions in January. Regional winners represent their region at the National Finals in Washington, DC in February.
Future City’s cross-curricular
Sense-making with data through the process of visualization—recognizing and constructing meaning with these data—has been of interest to learning researchers for many years. Results of a variety of data visualization projects in museums and science centers suggest that visitors have a rudimentary understanding of and ability to interpret the data that appear in even simple data visualizations. This project supports the need for data visualization experiences to be appealing, accommodate short and long-term exploration, and address a range of visitors’ prior knowledge. Front-end evaluation
The National Federation of the Blind (NFB), in partnership with scholars from Utah State University and educators from the Science Museum of Minnesota (SMM), has developed the Spatial Ability and Blind Engineering Research (SABER) project to assess and improve the spatial ability of blind teens in order to broaden their participation in STEM fields. The goals of the project include:
Contribute to the knowledge base of effective practices regarding informal STEM education for the blind, particularly relating to the development of spatial reasoning abilities.
Educate families, blind