This project had three objectives to build knowledge with respect to advancing Informal STEM Education:
Plan, prototype, fabricate, and document a game-linked design-and-play STEM exhibit for multi-generational adult-child interaction utilizing an iterative exhibit design approach based on research and best practices in the field;
Develop and disseminate resources and models for collaborative play-based exhibits to the informal STEM learning community of practice of small and mid-size museums including an interactive, tangible tabletop design-and-play game and a related tablet-based game app for skateboarding science and technology design practice;
Conduct research on linkages between adult-child interactions and game-connected play with models in informal STEM learning environments.
Linked to these objectives were three project goals:
Develop tools to enable children ages 5-8 to collaboratively refine and test their own theories about motion by exploring fundamental science concepts in linked game and physical-object design challenge which integrates science (Newton’s Laws of Motion) with engineering (iterative design and testing), technology (computational models), and mathematics (predictions and comparisons of speed, distance, and height). [Linked to Objectives 1 & 3]
Advance the informal STEM education field’s understanding of design frameworks that integrate game environments and physical exhibit elements using tangibles and playful computational modeling and build upon the “Dimensions of Success” established STEM evaluation models. [Linked to Objectives 1 & 2]
Examine methods to strengthen collaborative learning within diverse families through opportunities to engage in STEM problem-based inquiry and examine how advance training for parents influences the extent of STEM content in conversations and the quality of interactions between caregivers and children in the museum setting. [Linked to Objectives 1 & 3]
The exhibit designed and created as a result of this grant project integrates skateboarding and STEM in an engaging context for youth ages 5 to 8 to learn about Newton’s Laws of Motion and connect traditionally underserved youth from rural and minority areas through comprehensive outreach. The exhibit design process drew upon research in the learning sciences and game design, science inquiry and exhibit design, and child development scholarship on engagement and interaction in adult-child dyads.
Overall, the project "Understanding Physics through Collaborative Design and Play: Integrating Skateboarding with STEM in a Digital and Physical Game-Based Children’s Museum Exhibit" accomplished three primary goals. First, we planned, prototyped, fabricated, and evaluated a game-linked design-and-play STEM gallery presented as a skatepark with related exhibits for adult-child interaction in a Children's Museum.
Second, we engaged in a range of community outreach and engagement activities for children traditionally underserved in Museums. We developed and disseminated resources for children to learn about the physics of the skatepark exhibit without visiting the Museum physically. For example, balance board activities were made portable, the skatepark video game was produced in app and web access formats, and ramps were created from block sets brought to off-site locations.
Third, we conducted a range of research to better understand adult-child interactions in the skatepark exhibit in the Children's Museum and to explore learning of physics concepts during physical and digital play. Our research findings collectively provide a new model for Children's Museum exhibit developers and the informal STEM education community to intentionally design, evaluate, and revise exhibit set-up, materials, and outcomes using a tool called "Dimensions of Success (DOS) for Children's Museum Exhibits." Research also produced a tool for monitoring the movement of children and families in Museum exhibit space, including time on task with exhibits, group constellation, transition time, and time in gallery. Several studies about adult-child interactions during digital STEM and traditional pretend play in the Museum produced findings about social positioning, interaction style, role, and affect during play.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Deb DunkhaseKristen MissallBenjamin DeVane
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The Center for Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE) is a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded resource center, working in cooperation with the NSF Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program to build and advance the informal STEM education field. CAISE continues the work it began in 2007--serving professional audiences in informal STEM learning, which includes those working in science centers and museums, zoos and aquariums, parks, botanical gardens and nature centers, events and festivals, libraries, making and tinkering spaces, media (TV, radio, film, social), cyberlearning and gaming, and youth, community, and out-of-school time programs.
What We Do:
CAISE seeks to characterize, highlight, and connect quality, evidence-based informal STEM learning work supported by a diversity of federal, local, and private funders by providing access to over 8,000 (and growing) resources that include project descriptions, research literature, evaluation reports and other documentation on the InformalScience.org website. In addition, CAISE convenes inquiry groups, workshops and principal investigator meetings designed to facilitate discussion and identify the needs and opportunities for informal STEM learning.
In this award, CAISE is also tasked with advancing and better integrating the professional fields of informal STEM learning and science communication by (1) broadening participation in these fields, (2) deepening links between research and practice, and (3) building capacity in evaluation and measurement. These activities are being undertaken by cross-sector task forces of established and emerging who will be responsible for conducting field-level analyses, engaging stakeholders, and creating roadmaps for future efforts. CAISE is also building on existing communication channels for dissemination to the larger field, and through the InformalScience.org website. An External Review Board and Inverness Research are providing oversight of CAISE's program activities and evaluation of the center.
Who We Are:
CAISE operates as a network of core staff housed at the Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC) in Washington, D.C. and co-principal investigators and other collaborators at academic institutions and informal STEM education (ISE) organizations across the U.S. Other key collaborators are the American Association for the Advancement of Science's Center for Public Engagement with Science, the National Informal STEM Education Network, and Arizona State University.
The Orlando Science Center (OSC) in partnership with BASE Camp Children's Cancer Foundation and the University of Central Florida (UCF) will engage chronically ill children (cancer, sickle-cell, HIV/AIDS, etc.) and other Orlando area youth ages 10-18 who face the greatest educational disparities in NASA-themed Aeronautics, Space Exploration, and Space Science exhibits through a STEM engagement and educator professional development project entitled STEM Satellites: A Mobile Mathematics and Science Initiative for Orlando Metropolitan Area Children's Hospitals. OSC will partner with educational researchers, evaluators, and planetary scientists from the University of Central Florida to create three mobile exhibits for each of the three children's hospitals in the Orlando metropolitan area. Two additional sets of the three mobile carts will be used at OSC and UCF. The three mobile exhibits will be based on the planned NASA missions that the UCF planetary scientists are leading including a Mars-themed exhibit focusing on space exploration, an asteroid-themed exhibit, and an exhibit on microgravity. Each cart will include multiple STEM activities that incorporate NASA data and artifacts from prior NASA missions, UCF planetary science collections, and Kennedy Space Center. OSC will provide professional development and training to BASE Camp volunteers who will supervise the use of the mobile exhibits in the hospitals. These exhibits will provide authentic experiences that mirror current and planned NASA missions at a level that the children can understand. These hands-on and engaging exhibits will not only help motivate children to pursue STEM careers but will also help educate the general public about the exciting and important work that NASA carries out. Providing this level of engaging and authentic STEM activities through the mobile exhibits to this historically underrepresented population is unprecedented.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
JoAnn NewmanJosh ColwellBrandan LanmanMegan Nickels
Life on the Edge will be a 1,500-sq-ft traveling exhibition to engage museum guests with space, space exploration, and the search for life beyond our home planet through the lens of Earth's extremophiles. The exhibition will explore life forms in extreme, harsh environments on Earth, and how studying these creatures informs the search for extraterrestrial life and habitable environments within and beyond our solar system. This exhibition will provide open-ended challenges and hands-on activities that utilize NASA research and educational materials to inspire elementary-aged youth ages 5-11 and their families. Based in Ithaca, NY, Sciencenter will focus the tour on small, rural museums, including SpectrUM Discovery Area (Missoula, MT), Flathead Reservation (MT), Science Zone (Casper, WY), and Imagination Place Children's Museum (Gadsden, AL). Schools and other community partners of the host museums will be leveraged in presenting family science nights, field trips, and facilitated science programs. These activities will provide additional opportunities for learners to increase their knowledge of core STEM content and science-process skills related to astronomy and astrobiology. In this institutional engagement project, Sciencenter will partner with (1) Cornell University's Department of Astronomy throughout the 5-year grant period to develop the scientific content and to ensure that content remains current and relevant with up-to-date NASA research, and (2) the University of Montana's SpectrUM Discovery Area, who will serve as the STEM outreach hub for the region, including outreach with youth of the Flathead Reservation. The expected short-term outcomes for youth ages 5-11, after visiting Life on the Edge are (1) 75% of participants will have increased understanding of basic principles of astrobiology and astronomy, along with the breadth of NASA scientific research and missions, and (2) 50% of participants will have increased awareness of career possibilities in STEM, specifically astrobiology, astronomy, and related space sciences.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Michelle KortenaarAlexander HayesLisa KalteneggerHolly TruittAdrienne TestaCharlie Trautmann
This project will research factors influencing the implementation of programs designed to increase diverse participation in informal science. The goal is to provide the informal science education field with information and tools that will help them design effective programs that more effectively engage a broad range of diverse audiences. The project has two major components. First, the project will research the implementation of a citizen science project, Celebrate Urban Birds (CUB), in major U.S. cities. Citizen science projects involve public volunteers in gathering scientifically valid data as part of ongoing research. Second, building on results of the research, the project will launch a website and learning community (called a Community of Practice or CoP) supporting informal science educators that are involved in designing and implementing informal science programs with an emphasis on engaging diverse participants. The project will be lead by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology (CLO), a leader in designing and researching citizen science projects, in collaboration with the Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC) and five science center members of ASTC, where the CUB program will be implemented and researched. The objective of the research is to better understand contextual factors and how they impact implementation even when accepted practices are followed. Such research is key not only to revealing accepted practices but also to understanding how projects are implemented in the face of concrete operational, cultural, economic, and demographic variables. The research will use a comparative case study approach, which is designed for studies requiring holistic, in-depth investigation. The development of the website and the CoP will be guided by a Network Improvement Strategy, a research-based approach to designing educational CoPs. The development of the CoP will involve the project stakeholders including the informal science organization practitioners, community organization representatives, CUB staff, ASTC staff, advisors and consultants. This strategy will allow the project team and pilot sites to leverage their diverse experiences and skill sets to improve practice; provide space for researchers and practitioners to work together as partners; and develop a nuanced set of strategies that can be implemented across a variety of organizational contexts.
This project will bring STEM education to rural communities through local public libraries. Museum quality exhibits labelled as "Discover Earth", "Discover Technology", and "Discover Space" will spend 3 months at a series of locations around the Nation. Twenty four medium sized libraries will be chosen for the large exhibits and forty small libraries will be chosen for scaled down versions. The project's intent is to provide exhibits in every state and to reach as many under-represented individuals as possible. The significance of this project is that rural areas of this country are underserved regarding STEM education and since this segment of society is represented by 50-60 million residents, it is important to reach out to them. There is a significant segment of the Nation's population (50-60 million) that is underserved by out-of-school learning venues such as museums and science centers. An earlier phase 1 project demonstrated at 18 sites that rural libraries and librarians could provide STEM education to community members ranging in age from adults to children using these hands-on exhibits. Each exhibit (earth, space or technology) includes information about the topic and technologically enabled models to provide interesting and fun discovery mechanisms. They use common layman friendly language that highlights the most recent discoveries in each area. Each exhibit will be placed in the selected library for 3 months during which the library will organize events to feature and advertise the STEM learning opportunities. Another feature of this project will be to determine the models of learning in library settings and as a function of the demographics. The partners in this project that bring the necessary expertise are the American Library Association, the Afterschool Alliance, the Association of Rural and Small Libraries, the University of Colorado Museum, Datum Advisors, LLC, Evaluation and Research Associates, the Lunar and Planetary Institute, the American Geophysical Union, and the Space Science Institute.