What if every kid had access to a real workshop? Like the ones in the corners of garages across the country: a basic array of tools, bits and pieces of hardware, piles of scrap materials and fasteners, plus stacks of unsorted boxes containing the remnants of projects gone by. Visualize also that the workshop held a few musical instruments-guitars, a keyboard, some percussion-as well as art supplies: markers, paints, clay, and the tools to shape it, ribbons glitter, beads, fabric, etc. n top of this, picture the workshop having a few hands-on exhibits to explore and manipulate-a vacuum chamber
In this article, we describe a preliminary study that integrates research on engineering design activities for K-12 students with work on microworlds as learning tools. Here, we extend these bodies of research by exploring whether - and how - authentic recreations of engineering practices can help students develop conceptual understanding of physics. We focus on the design-build-test (DBT) cycle used by professional engineers in simulation-based rapid modeling. In this experiment, middle-school students worked for 10 hr during a single weekend to solve engineering design challenges using
This action plan lays out a structure that will allow stakeholders from local, State, and Federal governments, as well as nongovernmental STEM education stakeholder groups, to work together to coordinate and enhance the Nation's ability to produce a numerate and scientifically and technologically literate society and to increase and improve the current STEM education workforce. Strategies for producing the next generation of innovators are not explicitly addressed in this action plan and will require subsequent study. A coherent system of STEM education is essential to the Nation's economy and
NSF's Cyberinfrastructure Vision for 21st Century Discovery is presented in a set of interrelated chapters that describe the various challenges and opportunities in the complementary areas that make up cyberinfrastructure: computing systems, data, information resources, networking, digitally enabled-sensors, instruments, virtual organizations, and observatories, along with an interoperable suite of software services and tools. This technology is complemented by the interdisciplinary teams of professionals that are responsible for its development, deployment and its use in transformative
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National Science Foundation
resourceresearchProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
Learning In and Out of School in Diverse Environments is the product of a two-year project during which a panel convened by the LIFE Center (an NSF Science of Learning Center) and the Center for Multicultural Education identified important principles that educational practitioners, policy makers, and future researchers can use to build upon the learning that occurs in the homes and community cultures of students from diverse groups. This report lays out an argument for focusing on cross setting learning as key to equity in STEM education.
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The LIFE Center (The Learning in Informal and Formal Enivronments Center)University of WashingtonJames BanksKathryn AuArnetha BallPhilip BellEdmund GordonKris GutierrezShirley HeathCarol LeeYuhshi LeeJabari MahiriNa'ilah Suad NasirGuadalupe ValdesMin Zhou
This report describes a summative evaluation of Secrets of Circles, a 2,600 square foot exhibition created by Children's Discovery Museum of San Jose and funded by the National Science Foundation. The exhibition and related programs were designed to highlight the uses of circles and wheels in everyday life. Circles have properties that make them extremely effective as an engineering tool, and they are ubiquitous in cultures around the world. The appendix of this report inclues interview and observation protocols and questionnaires used in this study.
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Sue AllenChildren's Discovery Museum of San Jose
Too Small to See is a 5,000 square-foot interactive traveling museum exhibition designed to provide hands-on nanotechnology science education to youth age 8 to 13 and adults. It debuted at Disney's Epcot and will reach over three million people during a five-year US tour. This evaluation examines the exhibition’s outcomes and impact on increasing visitors’ awareness of, interest in, engagement with, and understanding of nanoscale science, engineering, and technology. An overarching goal is to document the project’s contribution to the portfolio of federally funded Science Technology
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Douglas SpencerTina PhillipsTori AngelottiShane MurphyFred ConnerCornell University
resourceevaluationMuseum and Science Center Programs
Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination is a National Science Foundation funded project which developed a national traveling exhibition on science and technology themes depicted in the Star Wars movies. The Museum of Science, Boston (MOS) developed the exhibition in collaboration with Lucasfilm Ltd. and Science Museum Exhibit Collaborative (SMEC). The exhibition will travel to members of the SMEC in Los Angeles, Portland, Fort Worth, St. Paul, Columbus, Philadelphia, and Boston. Other venues will display the exhibition after the Collaborative tour. Tisdal Consulting was contracted to
It is relatively unknown what impact the Museum of Science has on its visitors once they leave our doors. This study aims to create a baseline understanding of how visitors follow up on what they have learned at the Museum. We examined follow up interviews from the Star Wars: Where Science Meets the Imagination exhibition evaluation and some of its accompanying programming, the Rethinking Urban Transportation forums, Bionics and Prosthetics forums, and The Force and Its Many Faces lectures. The follow up interviews were conducted via email and phone six to 10 weeks after visitors came to the
Forum is a program at the Museum of Science that promotes the exchange of different perspectives on topics in science, technology, and society through small group discussion. At previous Forums held at the Museum of Science, attendees were typically recent Museum visitors. Certain types of participants, such as individuals from politically conservative groups or individuals from lower income and/or lower socioeconomic levels, were not observed as attending. Hence, this study aims to explore various groups' perceptions of the Forum program. To assess their perception of the Forum program, five
This study was conducted to document how members of the Design Challenges team currently assist visitors as they engage in engineering design activities as a way of informing the practices of informal technology education at the Museum of Science about the types of scaffolds and supports visitors need when engaging in future engineering design labs in exhibitions. To collect data for this study, educators from the Design Challenges team were observed as they helped visitors complete the Solar Cars activity in Investigate! The Solar Cars activity was not designed as an engineering design lab
Retention of students in engineering continues to be of concern. To best address this area, we need to know what contributes to both students persisting in engineering and what contributes to their leaving.
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Pennsylvania State UniversityUniversity of Missouri