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
This report summarizes the evaluation results from the NSF funded Eight-Legged Encounters family event that uses arachnids as a hook to draw public interests towards science. The event involves informative and hands-on activities that bridge the gap between academia and the public, extending knowledge about arachnids to children and their parents. The Bureau of Sociological Research (BOSR) at UNL was contracted to evaluate Eight-Legged Encounters. The data collection for this report involves five events and three audiences: adults, children, and the volunteers of the event. Two events were
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University of Nebraska LincolnEileen Hebets
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.
This poster was presented at the 2014 AISL PI Meeting in Washington, DC. Through sustained collaborations that unite research, design, and professional development, members of the InforMath Collaborative are conducting design-based research on exhibits and programs that integrate art and science content from participating museums with the mathematics of topology and projective geometry.
Project STEAM aims to inspire art-interested girls to enter STEM careers through a series of activities, including summer academies that explore the biology and physics of color, science café-style presentations that feature the overlap between art and science, and the development of “kits” that can be used in informal and formal venues (Girl Scouts, science centers, and K-12 classrooms). Project research explores two questions: 1) How does an art-focused approach (STEAM) to teaching science support engagement in scientific practices such as experimentation, observation, and communication of
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University of Alaska, FairbanksLaura Conner
This poster was presented at the 2014 AISL PI Meeting in Washington, DC. It describes a project that creates incubators composed of community members to foster innovative solutions to regional challenges.
This poster from the 2014 AISL PI Meeting describes the Indianapolis/City as a Living Laboratory project, a city-wide civic collaboration engaging in cross-sector research that builds on prior research in informal science learning in public settings. It focuses on creating place-based science learning experiences in public settings.
This poster was presented at the 2014 AISL PI Meeting. It describes the radio and stage storytelling programs undertaken by the Center for Chemical Evolution, a CCI jointly funded by NSF and NASA.
Stereoscopic technology (3D) is rapidly becoming ubiquitous across research, entertainment and informal educational settings. Children of today may grow up never knowing a time when movies, television and video games were not available stereoscopically. Despite this rapid expansion, the field’s understanding of the impact of stereoscopic visualizations on learning is rather limited. Much of the excitement of stereoscopic technology could be due to a novelty effect, which will wear off over time. This study controlled for the novelty factor using a variety of techniques. On the floor of an
This poster was presented at the 2014 AISL PI Meeting in Washington, DC. It describes an EAGER project that conducts ongoing experiments on the chemical precursors to life as exhibit experiences in partner venues.
The data collection for this project involved three audiences: (1) a post-event survey completed by participants at the 'Eight-Legged Encounters' event, (2) a club experience survey completed by middle school students in an after-school club, and (3) focus groups, observations, and end-of-course evaluations conducted with students in the BIOS 497/897 'Communicating Science through Outreach' seminar class at the University of Lincoln, Nebraska. Year two data collection was completed from September 2013 - March 2014. Appendix includes survey.
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University of Nebraska-LincolnEileen Hebets