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Idea Bank

Incorporating the Stories of Women, People of Color, and LGBTQ+ Scientists Into the Physics Classroom

The Science Teacher—March 2020 (Volume 87, Issue 7)

By Hannah Pell

Incorporating the Stories of Women, People of Color, and LGBTQ+ Scientists Into the Physics Classroom

 

The Game of Life and Death

Students discover how natural selection helps animals adapt to their environment.

Science and Children—January 2020 (Volume 57, Issue 5)

By Lindsay Todd, Lisa Keim, and Dale Broder

The Game of Life and Death

 

NSTA Press

Explore Before Explain to Engage More Students

By Carole Hayward

Posted on 2020-02-23

A new addition to the Instructional Sequence Matters series has arrived! Instructional Sequence Matters, Grades 3-5 by Patrick Brown offers examples and strategies for using POE (Predict, Observe, and Explain) and 5E (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate) with students to tap into their innate curiosity and prepare them for deep learning.

Instructional Sequence Matters focuses on explore-before-explain teaching, which the author explains is a way of thinking “more purposefully and carefully about the nature of how we design instruction.”

Students come to the classroom as knowers already. They come with knowledge, ideas, experiences that have developed their understanding of how the world works. They come with a sense of curiosity, and questions, such as why do rainbows appear in the sky; why do leaves change colors; and why does the moon go through different phases, explains Brown. As they learn in school, they build on their previous experiences, correct errors in their thinking, revise misconceptions, and build new knowledge.

“I firmly believe that a significant task of science teaching is cultivating the innate skills that child scientists bring to school and balancing their ideas with purposeful pedagogical practices,” says Brown. “Bringing an explore-before-explain mindset to science teaching is a way to develop the budding scientist in each of your students.”

According to Brown, this instructional method has far-reaching implications in the elementary school classroom, beyond science instruction.

“[It] lends empirical support for the placement of other experiences in the elementary classroom to leverage the best possible learning experiences for students,” says Brown. “One of the hallmarks of explore-before-explain teaching is its emphasis on learning for understanding and wiring (or rewiring) the brain, so knowledge is deeply blanketed in evidence-based experiences.”

Brown’s objective is also to rewire how educators think about sequencing. Instructional Sequence Matters helps educators to understand the developmental psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, and science education research that explains why the order in which lessons are structured is so critical.

The book provides examples that show how specific aspects of all three dimensions of the Next Generation Science Standards can translate into the classroom: 1) science and engineering practices, 2) disciplinary core ideas, and 3) crosscutting concepts. It includes detailed, ready-to-teach lessons that use either a POE or 5E sequence to cover a variety of science topics such as heat and temperature, magnetism, and electric currents.

Instructional Sequence Matters will help educators to promote long-lasting understanding by motivating their students, encouraging them to think critically, and engaging them more deeply with content.

Read the free chapter “Learning About Ecosystems.”

A new addition to the Instructional Sequence Matters series has arrived!

 

Go Green This Spring, Apply for a Green Ribbon School Award by Jim Elder

By Kate Falk

Posted on 2020-02-20

Is your school a green school?

boy with butterflyIs it doing amazing work in reducing environmental impacts, such as waste, water, energy, and transportation?

Does your school work to improve the health and wellness of students and faculty with coordinated school health programs that take into consideration air quality, contaminant control, acoustics, daylighting, thermal comfort, school food, and more?

Is your school a leader in effective environmental and sustainability education that emphasizes hands-on, real-world learning, civic engagement, STEM connections, and green career preparation?

Then you should apply for a Green Ribbon School Award sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education and administered by state education authorities.

Only 50-80 schools in the country win each year, so it’s a big deal. it puts your school in an elite national group of green schools; winning schools get a good deal of national, state and local press; the award helps schools attract more funding as well as community support; and the award builds school spirit both within the school and in the community. Winning schools are invited to the award ceremony in Washington DC.

The premise of the Green Ribbon Schools is simple: It seeks to promote effective school sustainability and collaboration.  Applicants are measured on how they perform on three key pillars:

  • Reducing environmental impact and costs;
  • Improving health and wellness; and
  • Providing effective environmental and sustainability education.

Here are two examples of the great programs coming out of Green Ribbon Schools:

For over twelve years, Virginia Beach Public Schools has been moving towards a more sustainable model. To date, it has completed eight LEED buildings ranging from basic certification to Platinum. The Sustainable Schools Committee works with a Sustainable School Liaison in each school, and have been able to establish 64 schools with outdoor teaching gardens, 72 schools with environmental clubs, and over 60 schools that partnerstudents planting with third party environmental organizations like the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

Environmental education extends far beyond the walls of a traditional science classroom at Quincy High School, a career and technical school. Summer Leadership Camp, which pairs upperclassmen with incoming 9th grade students, offers an outdoor learning experience that builds friendship and leadership skills. The school’s STEM wing is home to a greenhouse, where students are actively involved in learning how to grow their own food. Students complete “Service to School and Community” hours that allow them to focus on how singular responsible actions can benefit the larger environment and affect the sustainable practices of other members within the community.

Schools and districts do not apply for the award to the U.S. Department of Education, but to their state education authorities. (State participation in the award is voluntary so contacting your state official will help them to determine their level of participation.)

If you are interested in learning more, I encourage you to contact your state departments of education or the state authority on this list.


Jim Elder is Executive Director of the Campaign for Environmental Literacy.


The mission of NSTA is to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.

Is your school a green school?

boy with butterflyIs it doing amazing work in reducing environmental impacts, such as waste, water, energy, and transportation?

Does your school work to improve the health and wellness of students and faculty with coordinated school health programs that take into consideration air quality, contaminant control, acoustics, daylighting, thermal comfort, school food, and more?

 

Ask a Mentor

Multicultural Scientific Contributions Matter Every Day

By Sharon Delesbore

Posted on 2020-02-18

 

February is designated as Black History Month. Why is this the only time that black inventors and scientists are recognized?
—Tammy, Alabama

It is important to expose students to the many significant accomplishments that black scientists and inventors have contributed to the world. I don’t know of any performance expectations or state standards that specifically state, “Expose students to multicultural scientists and inventors within the curriculum of science education,” but cultural relevance has come to the forefront of engaging students to increase academic success. Students become more engaged in their learning when they recognize themselves in the concepts they’re studying. For example, a lesson in computer science class may become more interesting to students of color when they learn that a black female was one of the inventors behind animated GIF technology. Lisa Gelobter played an integral part in the creation of Shockwave Flash, which helped popularize web animation. Pique the interest of black male students with a discussion of Philip Emeagwali, who was inspired to rethink computer processing while studying bees. In 1989, he invented the world’s first supercomputer able to perform 3.1 billion calculations per second. Known as “the Black Bill Gates of Africa,” he ignited a revolution in technology. Check out “14 Black Inventors You Probably Didn’t Know About” on Thinkgrowth.org at http://bit.ly/2uxx23S for more. Educators should take the opportunity to incorporate multicultural acknowledgement in their curriculum, integrating them in lessons throughout the school year because Black History is American History.

 

February is designated as Black History Month. Why is this the only time that black inventors and scientists are recognized?
—Tammy, Alabama

 

Early Childhood / Preschool Blog

Using rain to manipulate art media, and modeling rain

By Peggy Ashbrook

Posted on 2020-02-15

A day where the rain had lasted so long that the playground became soupy led to an investigation of the properties of art media—tempera paint and oil pastels. As a science investigation we (most of us) followed my procedure of using tempera paint on one half of a page and oil pastels on the other half.

What the children designed with the media was their choice. As they worked I asked children to compare the two media—how well did the media stick to the paper, what kinds of lines could they make with either media, were the media wet or dry, and if they had a preference for hand-and-stick of pastel or paint-on-brush.

Most of the children, ages 3.5-5 years old, did not draw “anything,” perhaps because it wasn’t truly their creation, simply an investigation that I suggested with certain media. They applied the media in layers, adding colors until they decided they were finished. A few interests were revealed in the children’s work: math (shapes and patterns), spreading paint, mixing colors, the freedom to “scribble scrabble,” and rainbows, as well as stylistic differences. 

In a separate activity I provided some plastic quart containers with holes in the bottom to model rain, or to just see what happens when we drop water over objects: plastic toys, sticks, and shells. Children had fun controlling the dripping flow of water (ESS2.C The roles of water in Earth’s surface processes). We had small towels at hand to absorb spills as children practiced pouring.

One child observed the displacement of water, something I had not planned on but a wonderful opportunity to discuss what she thought.

Another child observed that when most of the water had dripped out, a little water remained in the container and did not go through the holes. To extend this activity I could provide containers with even smaller holes which make the water come out in drops, set up some activities to closely view water flow and water tension, and give children materials that change when “rained” on, perhaps sand to make a landscape (ESS2.A Earth materials and systems). The links to the Next Generation Science Standards provide information on the Science and engineering practices, Disciplinary core ideas, and Crosscutting concepts–children’s understandings of them are built on these kinds of beginning explorations.

The next time we met, our conversations about what changes the rain made to their finished work with the two media were brief. “It got wet!” “Now it’s dry.” What I want to know is if they wondered why the pastel lines did not blur or spread out in the rain like the paint shapes did, and if they are aware of the waxy feel of the pastels (PS1.A Structure of matter ). What next steps could I introduce? Maybe I should wait for children to bring up their own experiences with rain. Perhaps we could get out the “rain” containers on a warm rainy day and compare the shape of natural rain drops splashes to those from the containers. Or on one of the scheduled summer playground “water days” have children paint directly on a large Plexiglas easel and spray it after painting. Oil pastels on the Plexiglas? The children would probably enjoy scrubbing it off with soapy water—another way to learn about the differences between media.

A day where the rain had lasted so long that the playground became soupy led to an investigation of the properties of art media—tempera paint and oil pastels. As a science investigation we (most of us) followed my procedure of using tempera paint on one half of a page and oil pastels on the other half.

 

Legislative Update

President Releases Education Budget for FY21 Programs

By Jodi Peterson

Posted on 2020-02-14

The Trump Administration released its education budget for FY2021 last week, and it was immediately and rounded criticized by education advocates and denounced by Democratic lawmakers.

The president is proposing a 7.8 percent cut to U.S. Department of Education programs. The $66.6 billion request represents a $5.6 billion reduction from the department’s enacted 2020 funding level and is part of the Administration’s plan to cut billions in non-defense spending.

Further, the budget seeks combine 29 K-12 grant programs into a $19.4 billion unified block grant, called the Elementary and Secondary Education for the Disadvantaged Block Grant.  This represents a $4.7 billion cut from the enacted FY2020 funding levels for these combined programs. It would affect practically every program under the Every Student Succeeds Act, including ESSA Titles IVA, ESSA Title II, ESSA Title I, and the 21st Century Community Learning Centers.

The proposed Elementary and Secondary Education for the Disadvantaged Block Grant would be allocated through existing Title I grant formulas and could be used to support any activity supported by the consolidated programs.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said the new block grant would “end education earmarks” and transform how states use federal dollars in a way that aligns with the federal education law.  

Education advocates were not happy with this budget. In a statement, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten said the block grant proposal was “simply code for less funding to the schools and communities that need it most.”

The Title IVA Coalition (NSTA is a member) released this statement shortly after the budget was released: “While we are not surprised by the President’s failure to provide adequate funding for public education programs under the Every Student Succeeds Act, we are deeply concerned that the FY21 budget proposal would violate congressional intent. The proposal aims to consolidate 29 discretionary education programs and combine them into a singular block grant while failing to provide equal to or more funding for the existing programs, resulting in a net cut. Specifically, we are dismayed that this Administration would cut Title IV-A of ESSA, the strongly bipartisan flexible block grant that provides funding for safe and healthy students, well-rounded programs, and the effective use of educational technology. Sadly, this budget is yet another demonstration of the Administration’s complete lack of commitment to the success of the public education system and lack of respect for Congressional intent.”

The administration’s budget also includes plans for Education Freedom Scholarships that would create a $5 billion federal tax credit for donations to scholarship-granting organizations to pay for students to attend private schools or expand their public education options. Legislation to authorize these scholarships has been introduced in the House as H.R. 1434 (116) and the Senate as S. 634 (116).

The budget also proposes a $900 million increase for career and technical education programs. In a fact sheet, the White House Office of Management and Budget states this increase “would help ensure that all American high schools offer high-quality vocational training programs and that all students have access to pathways other than costly 4 year degrees to well-paying jobs.”

The President budget is seeking $931 million for the National Science Foundation Education and Human Resources Directorate, and is calling for eliminating funding for NASA’s Office of STEM Engagement.

In previous years, Congress has largely rejected the attempts by the Administration to cut funding for specific education programs.  NSTA will be working with other advocates throughout the year urging Congress to increase funding for vital education programs such as Title IVA, Title II, and Title I.

The budget tracker developed by our friends at the STEM Education Coalition is below.

Program FY2019 Omnibus POTUS FY2020 Request FY2020 Minubus POTUS FY2021 Request
ESSA Title I-A Grants to Local Education Agencies $15.86B $15.86B $16.30B $0 (consol.)
ESSA Title II SupportingEffective Instruction Grants $2.05B $0 $2.13B $0 (consol.)
Title IVA Student Support and Academic Enrichment Grants $1.17B $0 $1.21B $0 (consol.)
Title IVB 21st Century Community Learning Centers $1.22B $0 $1.25B $0 (consol.)
ESEA Formula and Competitive Block Grant1 n/a n/a n/a $19.36B
National Science Foundation’s Education and Human Resources Directorate $916M $823M $940M $931M
NASA STEM Engagement $110M $0 $120M $0
Career and Technical Education State Grants $1.26B $1.26B $1.28B $1.96B
Education Innovation and Research Program $130M $300M $130M $0 (consol.)

__________
1In their FY2021 request, the administration proposed to “consolidate nearly all currently funded formula and competitive grant programs authorized by ESSA into a single state formula grant program.”

Stay tuned, and watch for more updates in future issues of NSTA Express.


Jodi Peterson is the Assistant Executive Director of Communication, Legislative & Public Affairs for the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) and Chair of the STEM Education Coalition. Reach her via e-mail at jpeterson@nsta.org or via Twitter at @stemedadvocate.

The mission of NSTA is to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.

The Trump Administration released its education budget for FY2021 last week, and it was immediately and rounded criticized by education advocates and denounced by Democratic lawmakers.

The president is proposing a 7.8 percent cut to U.S. Department of Education programs. The $66.6 billion request represents a $5.6 billion reduction from the department’s enacted 2020 funding level and is part of the Administration’s plan to cut billions in non-defense spending.

Archive: Science Update: Hubble's 30th Anniversary, April 29, 2020

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was launched into Earth orbit on 24 April 1990 by the Space Shuttle. A flaw in the primary mirror initially made it look destined to be a historic failure. Space-walking astronauts made repairs and upgrades on five missions, and the resulting flood of outstanding science results made Hubble an epic comeback story.

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was launched into Earth orbit on 24 April 1990 by the Space Shuttle. A flaw in the primary mirror initially made it look destined to be a historic failure. Space-walking astronauts made repairs and upgrades on five missions, and the resulting flood of outstanding science results made Hubble an epic comeback story.

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was launched into Earth orbit on 24 April 1990 by the Space Shuttle. A flaw in the primary mirror initially made it look destined to be a historic failure. Space-walking astronauts made repairs and upgrades on five missions, and the resulting flood of outstanding science results made Hubble an epic comeback story.

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was launched into Earth orbit on 24 April 1990 by the Space Shuttle. A flaw in the primary mirror initially made it look destined to be a historic failure. Space-walking astronauts made repairs and upgrades on five missions, and the resulting flood of outstanding science results made Hubble an epic comeback story.

 

NSTA Press

Fact or phony? Scientifically evaluating data

By Claire Reinburg

Posted on 2020-02-13

From information about the novel coronavirus to viral posts on social media, it can be a challenge to sort out fact from fiction in what we read on the web. Students face this challenge in their daily reading, too, and these featured resources can help your students learn ways to think critically about data and information they encounter. Share with us in the comments the resources you find most helpful for supporting students’ critical thinking skills.

Just the facts

NSTA Press authors Laura Tucker and Lois Sherwood provide an engaging lesson in “Fact or Phony? Scientifically Evaluating Data” from Understanding Climate Change, Grades 7–12 that will help your students develop their abilities to evaluate information about climate change. Students explore a purely fictional web page cleverly designed as factual and are challenged to consider whether the “Pacific Northwest tree octopus” is, in fact, in danger of extinction due to the effects of climate change. By reviewing data and evaluating their validity as well as using reputable sources of data, students practice key methods to sort out fact from phony. Also check out Steve Inskeep’s NPR piece “A Finder’s Guide to Facts,” which suggests quick questions to ponder when evaluating news stories, such as “Is the story so outrageous you can’t believe it?” and “Who is the news source, anyway?”

Discussing the novel coronavirus in science class

NSTA stepped up this week to provide teachers with a classroom lesson centered on the novel coronavirus that originated in Wuhan province in China. William Reed created this secondary lesson designed to engage students in a discussion and exploration of what we know and still need to learn about this public health event. For additional resources on viruses and how to uncover what your students know or think they know about viruses and infectious diseases, download Page Keeley’s formative assessment probes “The Virus Debate” (from Uncovering Student Ideas in Life Science, Volume 1) and “Catching a Cold” (from Uncovering Student Ideas in Science, Volume 4). Explore all the popular formative assessment tools in Keeley’s Uncovering Student Ideas in Science series.

Win a bundle of NSTA Press books in February

Enter to win a bundle of books of your choice this month during NSTA Press’s “I Love Science Book-Bundle Giveaway.” Between now and February 28, 2020, enter the book-bundle giveaway that features elementary,middle, and high school collections of 10 resources each. All you need to do is tell us what you love about NSTA Press books and select which bundle you’d like to win. Three winners will be selected each week over the course of the three-week campaign. Best of luck to all who enter!

From information about the novel coronavirus to viral posts on social media, it can be a challenge to sort out fact from fiction in what we read on the web. Students face this challenge in their daily reading, too, and these featured resources can help your students learn ways to think critically about data and information they encounter. Share with us in the comments the resources you find most helpful for supporting students’ critical thinking skills.

 

Feature

Trust the Process

Developing STEM Mindsets Through Family Storytelling

Connected Science Learning January–March 2020 (Volume 2, Issue 1)

By Carrie Tzou, Daniel Rother, Ashley Braun, Elizabeth Starks, Meixi Ng, Enrique Suárez, Amanda Rambayon, Philip Bell, Don LaBonte, Amy Twito, Shawn Peterson, Sara Marie Ortiz, and Megan Bang

Trust the Process

Tell the story of an important event that happened in your family. Tell the story of a place that is important to your family. Tell the story of how your family or the world will change in 10 years.

With these prompts, TechTales invites families to tell and animate their stories using robotics components and everyday materials. Over the course of five weeks, families build a diorama that depicts a scene in their story. In the first two sessions, families brainstorm a story they would like to tell using one of the three prompts listed above. They choose a scene in the story they would like to build into a diorama using cardboard boxes, construction paper, and recycled plastic (see Figure 1). In the second and third sessions, they learn about how to program robotics components, such as making an LED light blink or controlling a servo motor. TechTales provides families with a Hummingbird robotics kit, which includes a circuit board, sensors, motors, and LED lights. Users can build projects with everyday materials and program them using Scratch and other programming languages. In our project, after families decide on their story and design their diorama boxes, they build and program those boxes during the third and fourth sessions. Finally, families present their dioramas in a community storytelling event during the fifth session of the workshop (see Table 1 for an overview of the program).

In this article, we share our design principles and process, findings from our research on TechTales, and the structure of our partnership—as well as how TechTales supports a STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) mindset in families and project staff.

Figure 1

Diorama depicting a family’s traditions around Dia de los Muertos, created in TechTales.

 

Table 1

Overview of TechTales sessions


TechTales is part of a larger National Science Foundation–funded four-year partnership between the University of Washington, the Pacific Science Center, the Seattle Public Library, Red Eagle Soaring, and the Highline School District Native Education Program. We have created a series of family STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and math) workshops centered on family storytelling and redefining families’ relationships with technology. There are two programs within our project: TechTales and TechStyle Tales. While TechTales connects families’ stories to robotics, TechStyle Tales connects family stories to e-textiles. In TechStyle Tales, families use conductive thread to sew LED lights and sensors onto textile projects (aprons, blankets, tote bags) that tell a story. The LED lights are programmed so that the lights flash in patterns or in response to input from sensors on the board. TechStyle Tales follows a similar structure as TechTales, emphasizing family storytelling in the first two sessions, coding and project building in the second two sessions, and sharing in the fifth.

In both TechTales and TechStyle Tales, we start with one of the oldest human technologies, storytelling (Archibald 2008), and build connections between families’ lived experiences, engineering, robotics/e-textiles, and computer science. We have found that stories are the grounding for family members to work for hours to achieve a certain “twinkle” effect to mimic stars in the night sky, or to experiment with how to make an owl’s head turn. This perseverance, innovation with technology, and deep connection between engineering and families’ personal histories and stories are hallmarks of both programs and integral to program goals of building a STEM mindset.

All together, our programs have served over 65 families—almost 200 participants over the life of the projects. We conducted research on families’ interactions and learning during the workshops to understand the role that storytelling, cultural practices, and family knowledge played in family engineering practices. We collected data by recording video of families during each workshop session, documenting their projects and final storytelling to the community, and interviewing families. As a result, we have over 15 hours of video data from each family, along with pictures of each of their final projects. The vignettes that follow are from that video data corpus. In addition, our evaluator administered surveys to all workshop participants (adults and children) after each workshop session and interviewed all of our partners about the program. Qualitative evaluation findings are incorporated throughout the sections that follow. As we share our findings from our research and evaluation, all of the names of facilitators, families, and family members are pseudonyms that participants themselves chose.

We have used a participatory design research model (Bang and Voussoughi 2016) to codesign and cofacilitate our program (Tzou et al. 2019). This means that, rather than one partner—for example the university—designing the program for the library, community, or partner school, all of the institutions codesigned alongside each other. In this way, we designed a program that truly addresses each partner’s needs. A core design group made up of members from all partner organizations met regularly to brainstorm, prototype, and design the program. When one of our program sites involved a low-income housing organization, case workers who deeply knew the families were also part of the design team.

We recruited children’s librarians and other practitioners to facilitate the program and codesigned professional development to orient these new facilitators, who did not need any previous engineering, coding, or making background to run the workshops. Because children’s librarians and educators in the Native Education Program had close relationships with the communities in which they work, they recruited families into the workshops, which were capped at five families (or 20 people) per session. Although learners of all ages were welcome, we encouraged families with children ages five and older to attend. The programs were free for all participants, and childcare for younger siblings and dinner were provided. To support the whole program team’s learning during implementation, we designed a way to regularly check in after each workshop session (see the “Trust the Process” section below) to continually improve the design and pedagogy of the program and learn from each other and the participating families. We have codesigned a complete set of facilitator’s guides to capture the activities, pedagogical strategies, and structures of both TechTales and TechStyles Tales family workshops.

The evaluation found that members of partner organizations said the following about our collaboration:

  • “This is such an interesting and unique example of a partnership. The power sharing that’s going on; seeing how just in many different ways that we’ve been able to plug into each other and work for the project.”
  • “I think it gets messy but a big takeaway is … it’s important to involve all of our partners equally with an equal footing [at] the table and having them have a voice about what is design.”
  • “A commitment from all to see each other as partners—as experts and as collaborators—instead of competitors or as obstacles. I think that sometimes when we partner with others, we may see their interest or their missions or their goals as obstacles to our own. But I don’t get the sense of that happening here at all.”
  • “This kind of real integrated deep partnership is just something that I really have not observed or been a part of.”

Design principles: Building STEM mindset through culturally based family STEM learning

Other hallmarks of our program are the foundational principles about learning and equity that drive our design (Tzou et al. 2017; see Figure 2). In this section, we describe four of these design principles and illustrate each in action with a vignette from a participating family. These principles are grounded in research in the learning sciences that shows the rich and varied ways that families learn outside of school (Banks et al. 2007), as well as the importance of understanding the role that culture and identity play in learning (Nasir et al. 2006).

Figure 2

Learning design principles from the TechTales project

 

We begin with the idea that all learning is cultural. A Framework for K–12 Science Education argues that, “All science learning can be understood as a cultural accomplishment … What counts as learning and what types of knowledge are seen as important are closely tied to a community’s values and what is useful in that community context” (NRC 2012, p. 284). Therefore, we understand that families bring their histories, languages, experiences, and values into learning settings—and we designed TechTales to make space for those ways of knowing.

1. Promote multiple ways of knowing and making

We designed our programs in a way that did not assign value to different ways of knowing and making. There was no one “right” way to make or learn—families engage in projects in many ways based on the knowledge and expertise they bring to the program. While the facilitators often supported families in building their stories, the intergenerational nature of the program also made space for parents to act as facilitators and center their own family and cultural knowledge in story-building and making. In this way, multiple areas of expertise and interest can intersect with STEM learning, even if the program facilitator is not necessarily familiar with each family’s cultural practices.

While brainstorming their story, the Pony family, a Native family from the Seneca-Cayuga Nation, had a conversation about their child’s first lightning storm. During the conversation, Corey (the father) and Tracy (the mother) ask Gwen (the child) some questions about the lightning storm:

Corey: What story would you tell your kids, Gwen?

Gwen: Lightning storm.

Tracy: Lightning storm? Okay.

Corey: That would be a good one because you could do like … with LEDs behind it. Gwen’s first big lightning storm. A real one.

Gwen: Scared lightning, it makes me scared.

Corey: So what do you remember of that storm? How did you feel about the storm?

Gwen: Scared.

Corey: You were scared? And? What—did you smell anything, hear anything? See anything? Did you see it?

Gwen: Boom.

Corey: You heard it? Was it so loud you could feel it?

Gwen: No. Scared.

In this example, Corey teaches Gwen about how to tell a story and how to observe the land. By asking the questions about what she smelled, heard, saw, and felt, he is embedding Indigenous ways of knowing through stories (Archibald 2008) and relating to the land through observation (Kawagley, Norris-Tull, and Norris-Tull 1998), all while he is thinking about how to use robotics components (e.g., LEDs) to depict the event (see Figure 3). This example shows how, when activities are designed to make space for families to connect to multiple ways of knowing rather than being prescriptive about what to build and how, families have opportunities to connect to their cultural practices in engineering learning environments.

Figure 3

The Pony family’s diorama of Gwen’s first lightning storm. LEDs in the cloud flickered to depict lightning, and a motor attached to Gwen’s hair on the top floor made her hair stand on end.

SAMSUNG CAMERA PICTURES
 

2. Scaffold playful thinking and teaching

Families learn through playful and collaborative exploration of concepts and materials. Learning is not about step-by-step sequencing, but rather about creating depth and space for play and creativity with materials. To that end, we wanted to design experiences to make learning new skills, such as wiring, programming, sewing, and robotics, fun and engaging.

During one workshop activity in which families learn about algorithms, kids “program” adults to do things: walk around the table, sit in a chair, or walk in a straight line while avoiding a tree. In this way, they learn how detailed and specific their “code” needs to be for the “robot” to perform a task. They also learn about how to “debug” their code and keep trying until their robot family member correctly performs the task . In the Lee family (one mom and two sons), the older son programmed his mom to “do the happy dance.” His mother jumped up and down and waved her arms, much to her son’s delight. When it was the younger son’s turn to program his older brother, he had a “happy dance” in his program, too!

When we designed TechTales, we wanted learners to playfully learn together within and across families. We found that playful learning allowed families with children from wide age ranges to participate in the activities. We also found, as in the example from the Lee family, that playfulness helped flip traditional roles. In this case, the playful programming of the parent allowed the sons to be “in charge” of their mom, and the younger son to give commands to his older brother.

3. Learning experiences should grow out of the lives of learners

Families can relate technology to their lives in meaningful ways rather than program facilitators letting technology define their experiences. The ways families design and create their projects can be deeply personal and filled with family history and community goals. In TechTales, we create space for families to bring their own learning pathways, experiences, and interests into STEM learning. The overarching goal is to overlap the STEM learning with the lives of families and their communities.

The Wanbli family, a Native family who is Lakota, Paiute, and Mayan, chose to tell a traditional story about how the inipi (sweat lodge) came to the Lakota people. As one of the sons, Yoshi, programmed an LED light, he worked with his father, Charles, to recreate the medicine wheel with accurate colors placed in the correct order. As they work together, their talk switches between English and Lakota languages:

Yoshi: Ooh, wait! The yellow looks way better in here. Oh that’s right, the white in here.

Charles: I think the blue—blue I think shows the most. Nah. I think the blue showed up, which is fine ’cause that’s actually the first direction.

Yoshi: Wait. What order does it go in?

Charles: Blue, red, yellow, white.

Yoshi: What’s after blue?

Charles: Huh?

Yoshi: What’s after blue?

Charles: Shah.

Yoshi: Red. What’s after red?

Charles: Zi.

Yoshi: Yellow. And after yellow is white?

Charles: Uh-huh.

This is an example of how, while working with the LED lights to tell a meaningful cultural story, the family uses Indigenous knowledge systems embedded in the Lakota story and language to create a specific effect with the lights. After this interaction, Yoshi iterated his programming of the lights to reflect his conversation with his father (see Figure 4). This shows the importance of designing activities that allow learners to draw on their own life experiences for learning and creative engineering.

Figure 4

The Wanbli family’s diorama that depicts the traditional Lakota story of how the Inipi came to the Lakota people.

 

4. Broaden what counts as STEM using everyday and professional forms

STEM learning environments often work within very narrow and overly uniform views of what counts as STEM (Warren et al. 2001; NRC 2012). When family stories are at the center, new forms of STEM learning emerge—sometimes in unexpected ways. In TechTales, we broaden definitions of STEM and create opportunities for new forms of participating in and learning STEM.

The Diamond family built their diorama around a trip that they took to “family camp,” depicting their cabin under a night sky filled with stars. One challenge they encountered was how to program the LED lights so that they would “twinkle” like stars. In one workshop session, Command Block, the older son of the family (age 9) spent two hours experimenting with how to program a multicolored LED light to be the desired color and twinkle in a way that would resemble a star (see Figure 5). He worked with a program that his dad started and tried to refine it. After a couple of hours, he asked his dad (John), “Dad, do you know how I can make this [the light] faster? Stars don’t really twinkle.” John looked outside the window at the night sky and replied, “Yeah, I mean like ever so faintly because of the air, the differences in temperature in the air. Yeah, they don’t really. But if they’re just static in the box, it won’t look quite as cool as if there’s something happening.”

As they tried to re-create a memory and program a certain effect into their project, the family started to explore the reason why stars twinkle. It is not hard to imagine this becoming the basis for a much longer or more in-depth conversation into space science—or Command Block recalling something about stars twinkling in his space science unit in school. This also helps us understand that everyday knowledge about ideas such as stars twinkling may be embedded for learners within these kinds of complex networks of everyday practices, stories, memories, and experiences. Providing opportunities in programs for learners to connect to these networks of knowledge is an important way for them to use their rich everyday knowledge in learning science.

Figure 5

Command Block programming an LED to twinkle.

 

Fostering a STEM mindset

Building community

A safe and supportive community was key for a STEM mindset to flourish. All of our workshop series started with dinner and “About Me, About Us” cards. This was a chance for families to share a meal and introduce themselves to the group. The cards asked each family member to write something they like about themselves and something they like to do. They switched cards with someone and then introduced this person’s card. We held workshops in school-affiliated programs for Native American families, in low-income housing centers, in neighborhood community centers, and at Seattle Public Library and Pacific Science Center locations. Across all of these settings, these introductory activities were important for getting people comfortable, growing community, and getting people ready to engage with our programming (see Figure 6).

Figure 6

A family participant reads the “About Me, About Us” cards from all of the participants in the workshop.

 

Grounding learning in storytelling

We recognized that stories and storytelling are a universal experience (Cajete 1994) around which the community could come together, talk about themes of the day such as perseverance or learning from mistakes, and refer back to as they did their work.

We started off every workshop session with a story and used stories in different ways depending on the workshop settings. In some settings, librarians selected books that highlighted relevant concepts such as perseverance, curiosity, innovation, and learning from failure, which we could refer to later by saying, for example, “Remember how in The Most Magnificent Thing,[1] the main character keeps needing to redesign her project, too?” We also built on the Pacific Science Center’s strengths by bringing in STEM professionals from the Portal to the Public program to tell stories of “science failures,” including a family favorite in which a marine biologist’s data made no sense until eventually she realized that a snake from a nearby area was climbing out at night and eating the fish in her experiment! In our partnership with Native education programs, traditional storytellers were invited to share community stories that contained lessons about the importance of family, self-confidence, science practices, and learning from mistakes and through teaching others (Archibald 2008; see Figure 7)).

[1] This refers to Ashley Spires’s 2014 book, The Most Magnificent Thing (New York: Kids Can Press).

Figure 7

Traditional storytellers at the beginning of TechTales sessions.

 

Try something new

Once we built community through storytelling, we introduced new concepts and got families out of their comfort zones to try something new. In TechStyle Tales, families learned and practiced sewing because they would ultimately connect conductive thread to lights to tell a story. Sewing and e-textiles were ways to connect to deep expertise of families, once resulting in a mother-daughter pair teaching and reteaching each other. The daughter knew a lot about patterns and design and the mother knew about the fundamentals and technique. It became a moment to learn from each other before they also helped members from other families. Participants from multiple families would often gather around one person who had expertise in sewing to learn from them. In partnership with the Native Education Program, we also facilitated during in-school sessions the practice of integrating circuitry with beadwork from multiple Native nations’ traditions. By introducing STEM practices into beadwork, we were able to broaden what “counts” as STEM in school. In the evaluation data, when asked if the sessions helped them better understand electrical circuits, programming in Scratch, using motors and LEDs, creating loops in programming, and creating “if/else” statements in their code, the average rating for postworkshop survey statements was 4.5 out of 5, with 1 being “not at all” and 5 being “a lot.”

Define STEAM roles and identities

A key component of the workshop series was explicitly identifying STEAM roles and identities, such as computer scientist, researcher, electrical engineer, or storyteller. As facilitators, having an awareness of the roles and identities that are possible in our program helped us name them in action as we saw learners engaged in them. For example, when a child created a program that caused an LED flicker to create a campfire, the facilitator could say that they were thinking like a computer scientist. This was a powerful way for facilitators and families to make connections between their activities in our program, the professional practices associated with different roles/identities, and their everyday lives. It also makes clear that there is substantial overlap between the different roles, and made it possible to highlight practices found in multiple roles, which enabled learners to identify with roles that had previously been unfamiliar.

We used STEAM identities as a tool for in-the-moment facilitation and reflection. We closed each workshop session by asking family members what practices they used and which STEAM role(s) they identified with. We then awarded them badges as buttons or stickers (see Figure 8), representing the roles they took on that day. Ultimately, this was a powerful tool for fostering a STEM mindset. As many aspects of designing and building projects involved opportunities for families to practice 21st-century skills, learning from failure, and other elements of a STEM mindset, discussions of roles provided explicit opportunities to make aspects of STEM mindset visible for family members. We gave families a handout (Figure 9) as a tool for reflecting on how they might be thinking like artists, researchers, or electrical engineers, and to highlight overlap between roles. For example, “creative” is a characteristic in all of these roles. Through actively reflecting with facilitators and each other using these lists, participants identified new skills in themselves while directly making connections to how those skills could be applicable in the future. From the evaluation data, we could see that participants were identifying with these roles. Results indicate that when asked to rate on a scale from 1 to 5 (with 1 being “not at all” and 5 being “a lot”), family members said the workshops helped them feel like an engineer (4.61), computer scientist (4.59), and artist (4.59).

Figure 8

Badges that depict roles that family members take on during the workshop

 
Figure 9

Workshop roles and descriptions of skills for each role. Note that there is no intentional ordering of the characteristics of each role.

 

Trust the process: Building a STEM mindset between the partners

Finally, we realized that it was important to continually iterate the program to ensure that it fit community needs. This required that we develop a STEM mindset about our own work. Over time, we developed formal and informal tools to learn from failures in the workshop as an opportunity for growth.

We ended every session with a debrief including all facilitators, educators, support staff, and researchers. We always asked the same four questions (see Figure 10):

  1. Describe a high point for you today.
  2. Describe a low point for you today.
  3. Describe a snapshot of learning, including multiple ways that you saw people learning.
  4. What would you change for next time?

By deliberately looking at moments in which we saw learning, we all got better at recognizing learning as it happened. By looking at what did not go well, we created a safe space to collectively identify failure and what we could learn from it. In this way, we were able to course-correct with the same families the following week or with new families the next time. Through this group reflection, we made changes to everything from the way we presented information to the layout of the room, the tools we chose to have out, the way we offered support to participants, and the overall structure of the program—all from data we collected through our observations. By the end, we ran the program 19 times with over 65 families, and each time we were able to iterate and improve through this reflection process.

Figure 10

A completed debrief form

 

We also realized that we had taken on a STEM mindset in a more subtle way. Most of our workshop series were five sessions long. Inevitably by session four, the facilitators would slightly panic because it felt like families were so far from being finished that it seemed unfathomable that we would be ending just one session later. Over time we developed a saying: “Trust the process.” This took on two meanings. First, it was a reminder that we had done this before and we knew that families had made amazing projects in the past, so we could be confident it would happen again. The other meaning of “Trust the process” was to remind us to think about process over product. Without fail, every family told impactful stories through complex dioramas and e-textile projects. All of the facilitators were also blown away by the thought, learning, creativity, and personal and community connections that went into every project. If at the end of a series, everything in a family’s creation didn’t work perfectly, this would not be an issue as they still would have learned a lot, developed new skills, grown their STEM mindsets, and made connections to STEM careers, all while they strengthened family memories and relationships to their stories—which was more important than the end product, as intended.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the participating families in TechTales who shared their stories with us. This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under grant number DRL 1516562. Any findings or opinions expressed in this material are our own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

 

Carrie Tzou (tzouct@uw.edu) is an associate professor of science education and director of the Goodlad Institute for Educational Renewal in the School of Educational Studies at the University of Washington Bothell in Bothell, Washington. Daniel Rother (rother.daniel@gmail.com) was the Tinker Tank manager at Pacific Science Center during this project and now is the Understory program manager at the Seattle Spheres in Seattle, Washington. Ashley Braun (Ashley.braun@spl.org) is a children’s services librarian at the Seattle Public Library in Seattle, Washington. Elizabeth Starks (eestarks@uw.edu) is a research scientist with OpenSTEM Research at the University of Washington Bothell. Meixi Ng (meixi@umn.edu) is a presidential postdoctoral fellow in American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota in Mní Sota Makoce. Enrique Suárez (easuarez@umass.edu) is an assistant professor of science education in the College of Education at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in Amherst, Massachusetts. Amanda Rambayon (arambayo@fwps.org) (Turtle Mountain Chippewa) is the Native education coordinator for Federal Way Public Schools in Federal Way, Washington. Philip Bell (pbell@uw.edu) is professor of education at the University of Washington Seattle. He holds the Shauna C. Larson chair in learning sciences. Don LaBonte (don.labonte@gmail.com) is a graduate student in the Learning Sciences and Human Development department at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. Amy Twito (amy.twito@spl.org) is the informal learning program manager at the Seattle Public Library, in Seattle, Washington. Shawn Peterson (shawn@naahillahee.org) (Nuu-cha-nuulth) is youth program manager at the Na’ah Illahee Fund in Seattle, Washington. Sara Marie Ortiz (Sara.Ortiz@highlineschools.org) (Pueblo of Acoma) is a writer; Native arts, culture, and education advocate; and the program manager of the Highline Public Schools Native Education Program in Burien, Washington. Megan Bang (megan.bang@northwestern.edu) is professor of learning sciences and psychology at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

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Cajete, G. 1994. Look to the mountain: An ecology of Indigenous education. Durango, CO: Kivaki Press.

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Tzou, C.T., P. Bell, M. Bang, R. Kuver, A. Twito, and A. Braun. 2019. Building expansive family STEAM programming through participatory research. In Reconceptualizing libraries: Perspectives from the information and learning sciences, ed. V.R. Lee and A.L. Phillips, 56–77. New York: Routledge.

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Tell the story of an important event that happened in your family. Tell the story of a place that is important to your family. Tell the story of how your family or the world will change in 10 years.

Tell the story of an important event that happened in your family. Tell the story of a place that is important to your family. Tell the story of how your family or the world will change in 10 years.

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