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John Evans
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Over the summer of 2021, I collaborated with our 6th grade science teacher as part of a grant to find ways to incorporate makerspace activities into the curriculum. (Look for posts coming soon about some of the projects we did). Part of our work was reading the book, Making Science: Reimagining STEM Education in Middle School and Beyond. I found it to be a fantastic, practical resource for bringing hands-on maker learning into the classroom. Reading this book as a maker librarian gave me a ton of ideas for new ways to collaborate with our STEM classes. And it’s an excellent resource for classroom teachers as well.
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John Evans
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A well-designed STEM activity helps elementary students understand the basics of physics and design thinking.
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On this blog I’ve shared thousands of web tools, apps, and resources that are free or offer a freemium option for teachers. However, I’ve been asked by several educators what recommendations I have for STEM labs, makerspaces, and technology classes. Below are six products that engage students, promote hands-on learning, and spark creativity. Also, students of all ages love learning science, math, engineering, and programming with these products. Most are reasonably priced for a kit that can be used by an entire class for several projects and lessons. The products are easy to manage, store, and work for K to 12 learners. These products also come with a great support team, support materials, lesson plans, and activities. Even if you are just a beginner these products are easy to learn and implement. These companies did not pay me or ask me to write about them. I just have tinkered with them and truly enjoyed these products.
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John Evans
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Every year there are new tech toys for kids on the hottest most wanted list and parents run around in December trying desperately to get hold of sold out toys. If it moves, flies or makes noise, it’s sure to be a hit. Some of the ideas for new toys on the market will have you scratching your head and thinking what will they come up with next?
There are loads of interactive toys that are perfectly designed to minimise screen time, or even get them a little more involved with their favorite technology. From coding wands to robot unicorns, check out the list below of the hottest tech toys for kids in 2019.
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John Evans
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The Girl Powered initiative provides tools and resources to students and mentors to promote female involvement in STEM and helps create an environment where students’ confidence and abilities can flourish.
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John Evans
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Many adults joke about not being able to do simple math or not being a “science person.” Students hear these perceptions and enter the STEM classroom with negative views. This creates a fixed mindset where students believe that you need to already have certain abilities to be successful in math and science. As educators, we need to create opportunities for students to overcome this mindset.
Connecting classwork to subjects that students are already excited about creates an environment where kids are receptive to learning. They find personal meaning in the lessons, and it gives them an entry point and the confidence they need to become more engaged in a STEM curriculum.
Keep a pulse on what is fun and interesting for kids by reading young adult literature and watching popular shows and movies. Integrating STEM with topics that students are passionate about decreases STEM anxiety and helps students experience how math and science are rooted in creativity and imagination.
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John Evans
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The Fourth Industrial Revolution requires that today’s youth are equipped with the skills, tools and mindsets needed to think creatively, leverage technology wisely and solve wicked problems collectively. Answering the call, leading education systems around the world are striving to integrate STEM, STEAM and Maker learning experiences into students’ daily lives. Globally, we are moving away from an antiquated industrial approach toward one more suitable for today’s digital natives.
Recent thinking moves beyond the basic definition of STEM as Science, Technology, Engineering and Math toward positioning STEM/STEAM as an integrated learning experience that leverages knowledge from traditionally siloed subjects such as math, science and even art and the humanities, in order to creatively solve complex human problems while employing new technologies and developing innovative thinking capacities. Applying “soft skills” such as creativity, collaboration, communication and emotional intelligence to technical STEM knowledge unlocks the potential for purposeful and impactful innovation.
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John Evans
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As Saneeya Khan looks around at her workplace, she doesn’t see many people who look like her. Khan works as a UX designer, and says her industry is male-dominated—a fact that hasn’t changed much since she switched over from graphic design for the new challenges and opportunities that UX presented.
“I think the number one reason that women fall out of STEM is because they get in the workplace and find that it’s a very masculine-dominated field, and that there’s a lot of office politics to deal with,” says Khan, who adds that despite the number of women working in technical careers, very few of them hold senior-level positions within their respective industries. “Most of the tech leads in my office are men, and we have one head female software developer. That’s about it.”
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John Evans
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Simone’s always making things to bring her fun ideas and crazy plans to life. Why not send candy to the whole school by drones, or 3-D print your science assignment? When Simone and her friends, Type-A musician and star student Lana, uber-energetic gaming enthusiast Bevan, and class cutup Jackson, ‘King Of The Meme’—aren’t hanging out in Rowat High School’s MakerSpace, they’re in constant contact on their video chat, ‘Konnect’, in a never-ending group hang. Together, they solve high school problems, make each other laugh– and crack the Emerald Code!
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An abundance of resources and links with STEM connections and activities.
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John Evans
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At the end of Nevertheless Season Two, we commissioned another four female illustrators from South America, Africa, the Middle East and China to produce a new set of posters. We now have eight beautiful posters in our collection for you to download.
The women featured serve as amazing role models in their fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (or STEM as it’s often referred to). You can listen to our episode on STEM Role Models here.
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"What motivates students to excel in STEM may be less about the classroom or curriculum, and more about their individual interests and ambitions."
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QUINCY, Wash. — A few years ago, a young female engineer named Isis Anchalee was featured on one of her company’s recruiting posters only to be subjected to a barrage of digital feedback questioning whether she was really an engineer. People posting on Facebook and Twitter said Anchalee was too attractive to be an actual software engineer and must be a model.
Anchalee responded like the techie she is. She wrote a blog post about her experience and added a photo of herself with the hashtag #ILookLikeAnEngineer. Twitter exploded with selfies of female engineers of all backgrounds and male engineers of color declaring they looked like engineers, too.
If she had known about the hashtag campaign and taken a look, Alessandra Gudino Aguilar, age 8, might have seen a grown-up version of herself. Alessandra, a student at Pioneer Elementary School in rural Quincy, Washington, spent part of the fall term in an enrichment class focused on teaching elementary-age students the principles of engineering design through a curriculum designed by educators and scientists at Boston’s Museum of Science.
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John Evans
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Discover how video games and digital reality could hold the key to preparing students to meet the challenges of tomorrow head-on. Join keynote and award-winning educator Melissa Burns and explore how the world of e-sports and gaming is crucial to developing global competencies, digital literacy and critical thinking skills for the next generation. Game to Learn: Empowering future "game-changers" through digital gaming
Time: Saturday, January 29, 2022 11:00 AM in Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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John Evans
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"Anyone who has ever watched a toddler methodically take apart a Tupperware drawer should know that many children are natural-born (ha ha!) engineers. Your only job as a parent is to nurture their creativity... and, well, clean up the mess afterward. Wrap up a few of these STEM toys and books for your future scientist to blow up, burn up, or dismantle. They'll (hopefully) thank you for the early encouragement when they're older."
"According to the STEM (Science Technology, Engineering, and Math) Coalition, there are 26 million STEM jobs in the U.S., comprising 20% of all jobs. By 2022, there will be 9.2 million new STEM jobs in the U.S. Despite the need for these workers, only 45% and 30% of high school seniors are prepared for college-level math and science courses, respectively. As the American K-12 system continues to look for ways to boost student interest and aptitude in STEM learning, technology is playing an increasingly pivotal role. Children who come to classrooms today have an inherent aptitude for technology, and educators should encourage that skill set with resources that integrate STEM learning. Where do teachers find resources to incorporate into their STEM instruction? The easiest place would be via the internet. To save you some time, we decided to compile a list of resources that provide teachers with the tools that they need to deliver quality STEM instruction to their students. Without further ado, here is our list."
Via Tom D'Amico (@TDOttawa) , Yashy Tohsaku
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John Evans
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I can’t stop thinking about Caine’s Arcade.
If you haven’t seen it, you gotta check it out. It’s a bit dated – 2012 is ancient history in the EdTech world – but to date, this YouTube video has over 8 million views. Caine’s Arcade is still inspiring people everywhere.
If you still haven’t seen it, then let me break it down for you. Caine, a nine-year-old boy hanging out at his dad’s auto parts store in a rough East LA neighborhood, had an idea to use the stuff lying around – mostly used cardboard – to create his own arcade. One particularly inspired customer stumbled upon it and…well, just go watch the video. Trust me, it’s worth your time.
I love this story because it reminds me about the power of STEM and how easy it can be to implement if you’re keeping your eye on the goal. When we educators aim to inspire and empower our students to do something great, we’ll find that often, we can deliver some life-changing learning experiences without breaking the bank on sophisticated robots and bleeding-edge technology.
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John Evans
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Does STEM scare you?
It scared me for a long time. I was that guy who put IKEA furniture together… backwards. When the oil light came on in the old Pontiac 6000 I used to drive, I thought it meant the car needed more gas.
I recently found myself at the helm of a Montessori Elementary schools’ new STEM program. Needless to say, I felt like a fish out of water. But as is the case with any new project I take on, I have realized, success is about 0.5% due to me and 99.5% the result of the team I put in place around me. Fortunately, I have two brilliant team members – one, a hippie science whiz who would give Bill Nye a run for his money and another, an easygoing, affable Canadian who could probably figure out how to reassemble a computer having never seen the inside of a CPU.
Together, we have slowly introduced STEM to elementary students within our brand new MakerSpace. And while it’s been slow going and we have made TONS of mistakes along the way, I believe we are starting to gain traction.
If you are new to STEM or are trying to figure out how to maximize the use of your new MakerSpace, here are five things to consider:
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John Evans
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Mathematicians and scientists are socially awkward men who wear glasses—at least, according to children.
In several studies, when children were asked to draw a mathematician or scientist, girls were twice as likely to draw men as they were to draw women, while boys almost universally drew men, often in a lab coat. I decided to try this out at home with my 12-year-old son, who said, “Really anyone can be a mathematician, but this is your average one,” and promptly sketched a man in a checked oxford shirt with a pocket protector.
Persistent, subconscious images of male mathematicians and scientists that start at the earliest ages may be one explanation why girls enter STEM fields—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—at dramatically lower rates than boys.
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John Evans
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The saying, "If she can't see it, she can't be it," speaks to the importance of introducing girls to female role models, especially in areas where women's accomplishments were often overlooked or minimized such as in science, mathematics, and technology. A new poster collection aims to bring more of these women's stories to light — and inspire today's Mighty Girls with the knowledge that she can be whatever she aspires to be!
The free downloadable posters, created by Nevertheless, feature eight trailblazing women who have made an impact in STEM fields. Each poster is also uniquely designed by a different female artist from around the world. Nevertheless, a podcast which celebrates women transforming teaching and learning through technology, hopes that you will download the posters and print them out for your school, home, or workplace. Below, you'll find links to download each poster, as well as a description of the scientist featured and recommended reading for both kids and adults to help you explore her story in more depth.
"This is the perfect STEAM Challenge for the chilly weather we are having! It will teach students all about why we put salt on icy roads during winter.
Are you up for the challenge? Can you determine what makes ice melt faster?
This challenge will take around an hour to complete. "
"Microsoft has two excellent and free resources for those who are seeking ideas for hands-on STEM lessons. The first is MakeCode. MakeCode offers free programs that students can use to develop their programming skills. These include coding with LEGO Mindstorms, Adafruit, and Micro:bit. Checkout the MakeCode YouTube channel for great project ideas.
"The second offering from Microsoft is called Hacking STEM. The idea behind Hacking STEM is to make low-cost or no-cost hands-on STEM projects accessible to as many people as possible. You can follow Microsoft's directions as written or modify the projects to use other materials to build the projects. In the following video I explain how I modified one of the Hacking STEM projects. So you might say that I hacked a Hacking STEM project.
"Science Snacks from Exploratorium has been a recommendation of mine for a few years now. Science Snacks are activities that can be conducted with inexpensive and readily available materials. Each Science Snack comes with a materials list and step-by-step directions. Science Snacks are also accompanied by a written explanation of the science at work in the activity. Many Science Snacks, like Penny Battery, include video demonstrations and explanations."
Via Jim Lerman
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John Evans
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"Looking for ideas that just might spark a PBL math idea?"
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