NOVA Wonders is a multi-platform media project from the producers of NOVA exploring the biggest questions on the frontiers of science. From the mysteries of astrophysics to the secrets of the body to the challenges of inventing technologies that could rival—and even surpass—the abilities of the human mind. With content delivered across broadcast, digital and social platforms, the project’s total video content was viewed approximately 17 million times, reaching a range of audiences. The centerpiece was a six-part PBS series which premiered on April 25, 2018, hosted by a team of young
The United Nations Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 is a key initiative within global efforts to halt and eventually reverse the loss of biodiversity. The very first target of this plan states that "by 2020, at the latest, people are aware of the values of biodiversity and the steps they can take to conserve and use it sustainably." Zoos and aquariums worldwide, attracting more than 700 million visits every year, could potentially make a positive contribution to this target. However, a global evaluation of the educational impacts of visits to zoos and aquariums is entirely lacking in
This project takes an ethnographic and design-based approach to understanding how and what people learn from participation in makerspaces and explores the features of those environments that can be leveraged to better promote learning. Makerspaces are physical locations where people (often families) get together to make things. Some participants learn substantial amounts of STEM content and practices as they design, build, and iteratively refine working devices. Others, however, simply take a trial and error approach. Research explores the affordances are of these spaces for promoting learning and how to integrate technology into these spaces so that they are transformed from being makerspaces where learning happens, but inconsistently, into environments where learning is a consistent outcome of participation. One aim is to learn how to effectively design such spaces so that participants are encouraged and helped to become intentional, reflective makers rather than simply tinkerers. Research will also advance what is known about effective studio teaching and learning and advance understanding of how to support youth to help them become competent, creative, and reflective producers with technology(s). The project builds on the Studio Thinking Framework and what is known about development of meta-representational competence. The foundations of these frameworks are in Lave and Wengers communities of practice and Rogoff's, Stevens et al.'s, and Jenkins et al.'s further work on participatory cultures for social networks that revolve around production. A sociocultural approach is taken that seeks to understand the relationships between space, participants, and technologies as participants set and work toward achieving goals. Engaging more of our young population in scientific and technological thinking and learning and broadening participation in the STEM workplace are national imperatives. One way to address these imperatives is to engage the passions of young people, helping them recognize the roles STEM content and practices play in achieving their own personal goals. Maker spaces are neighborhood spaces that are arising in many urban areas that allow and promote tinkering, designing, and construction using real materials, sometimes quite sophisticated ones. Participating in designing and successfully building working devices in such spaces can promote STEM learning, confidence and competence in one's ability to solve problems, and positive attitudes towards engineering, science, and math (among other things). The goal in this project is to learn how to design these spaces and integrate learning technologies so that learning happens more consistently (along with tinkering and making) and especially so that they are accessible and inviting to those who might not normally participate in these spaces. The work of this project is happening in an urban setting and with at-risk children, and a special effort is being made to accommodate making and learning with peers. As with Computer Clubhouses, maker spaces hold potential for their participants to identify what is interesting to them at the same time their participation gives them the opportunity to express themselves, learn STEM content, and put it to use.
Through a comparative case study, Sheridan and colleagues explore how makerspaces may function as learning environments. Drawing on field observations, interviews, and analysis of artifacts, videos, and other documents, the authors describe features of three makerspaces and how participants learn and develop through complex design and making practices. They describe how the makerspaces help individuals identify problems, build models, learn and apply skills, revise ideas, and share new knowledge with others. The authors conclude with a discussion of the implications of their findings for this
How do people make sense of conflicting beliefs? Although Gottlieb & Wineburg’s paper is about highly educated professionals reading history, informal science educators will recognize similar issues when working with people who hold beliefs incompatible with scientific ways of understanding the world. “Epistemic switching” was a way of considering criteria for truth, reliability, and validity according to one belief system or another. Rather than simply believing or excluding ideas as people who held to only one value system, the people with multiple, competing affiliations actually more
The Cyberlearning and Future Learning Technologies Program funds efforts that support envisioning the future of learning technologies and advance what we know about how people learn in technology-rich environments. In this Cyberlearning EAGER project, the project team is developing foundations for using "paper mechatronics" as a learning technology. Paper mechatronics makes possible a craft-oriented approach to engineering and computing education that integrates key concepts from mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, control systems, and computer programming, while using paper as the primary material for learner design, exploration, and inquiry. In this approach, learners will design foldable paper components and assemblies; program motors, sensors and controls; test their ideas iteratively; and share their designs on a website. This paper-based modeling approach to learning concepts in and practices of mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, control systems, and computer programming ultimately aims to make it possible for all learners to have exposure to and the opportunity to participate in creative engineering, design, and computer programming.
The approach to learning through designing and making through paper mechatronics is made possible by a convergence of many different technological factors -- the array of small computers, sensors, and actuators that are becoming available at low cost and a size that children can use; availability of a wide variety of manipulable conductive materials (threads, paints, fabrics); low-cost and precise desktop and laser cutters for paper and similar materials; a wide variety of novel paper-like materials; and new ways of interacting with the computer. The approach has its foundations in Papert's constructionism and in the current maker movement, but it has potential beyond constructionism itself, both in practice and with respect to what can potentially be learned about learning and development in in context of its use.
This University of Wisconsin System will conduct research to understand how the Madison Public Library (MPL) is building a production-oriented approach to literacy and learning through their maker-focused program, the Bubbler. On a national level, this project speaks to educational research communities, professionals, members of informal learning institutions, and organizers of designed makerspaces. At the local level, it addresses underserved populations in the Madison area and MPL in evaluating and developing the Bubbler. Findings will be shared through conference presentations, journal articles, and networks of library professionals.
This project by teams at the University of Alaska and the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry will engage the public in the topic of the nature and prevalence of permafrost, its scale on the earth and the important role it plays in the global climate. It builds on 50 years of informal education and outreach at the Alaskan Permafrost Tunnel near Fairbanks, AK, which, since the 1960s, has been the Nation's only underground facility for research related to permafrost and climate. The project has four components: (1) a nationally distributed 2,000 square-foot traveling exhibition; (2) exhibit and program enhancements to the learning opportunities at the tunnel; (3) programs, table-top exhibits and oral history research in 27 Native Alaskan villages; and (4) an education research study. Each of these components will be evaluated over the course of the work. By upgrading the displays at the tunnel, and by taking traveling programs to the villages, the work will extend the tunnel experience across Alaska. In the villages the team will collect stories about climate change, along with samples of real ancient ice and permafrost. These stories and materials will be used in the traveling exhibit which is expected to be at three museums per year for eight years. The research component of the initiative will build on the observation to date that the tunnel has provided thousands of visitors with an underground immersive environment where they learn about the science research being conducted and engage with climate-sensitive materials (e.g., permafrost, wedge ice, frozen silt, Pleistocene bones) using all of their senses. It has been conjectured that their learning experiences are enhanced by interacting with real vs. replicated objects. As museums often contain exhibits that are more likely to contain replicated and/or virtual objects and environments, understanding the impact that these different categories of objects have on learning is important. Using both types of materials, the project will investigate differences in their efficacy in informal science learning institutions related to climate change. Real objects are postulated to have the following attributes that stimulate fuller engagement; they are (1) information-rich by virtue of such features as their texture, odor, and dimensionality; (2) at real-life scale; (3) authentic, i.e., original objects; and (4) often unique, i.e., have inherent value. Research questions will explore the potential impacts on learning of these and related features. Methods employed will be observation, video, and interviews of the public with a particular focus on visitor talk with respect to explanations and elaborations about permafrost, tipping points, climate change, and geological time.
This research project led by the Exploratorium will use a combination of tracking and timing, cluster analysis, and focus groups to seek to answer the research question: To what extent and in what ways do female-responsive designs more effectively engage girls at STEM exhibits? This project addresses the need for more research in this area by pioneering the study of potential female-responsive design (FRD) principles for exhibits across a wide variety of STEM topics and exhibit types. This project includes four phases that will build from the work of the PI that developed an initial Female-Responsive Design (FRD) Framework regarding female engagement and learning in STEM -- based on extensive literature review and practitioner interviews. This project will expand on and validate this FRD Framework, with the ultimate goal of having a set of criteria for female-responsive designs (FRD) that effectively engage girls at STEM exhibits. The four phases of the research project are: Phase 1: Track 1000 boys and girls across three institutions using over 300 physics, engineering, and math exhibits to identify which exhibits engage boys and girls equally, and which are less engaging for girls. Phase 2: A panel of experts and girl advisors identify additional female-responsive design principles, expanding on those identified to date in literature and practice. Phase 3: Combining results from the first two phases, the third phase employs statistical analyses to reveal the most effective combinations of design principles for engaging girls across a variety of exhibits. Phase 4: This qualitative phase conducts focus groups with girls to explore how the final FRD Framework works to better engage them, and how their learning differs at exhibits that exemplify the principles in the Framework.