Category Archives: K-12

About or related to primary (k-12) science and engineering education. Likely of interest to teachers and administrators. Teachers may also find many of the posts we feel are of interests to students interested in science and engineering useful.

Nanoscale Universe Experience

Riding Snowflakes is a production exploring the nanoscale universe projected on digital-domes (planetariums) funded by NSF and created by RPI. A teacher’s guide provides experiments and activity-based lessons for to introduce, reinforce and expand upon key concepts presented in the show.

Generating the molecular worlds described in the screenplay entailed a wide range of challenges in statistical mechanics, molecular modeling, and simulation. To create a truly immersive portal into the nanoscale universe required simulations of a massive scale and complexity – an entirely unusual request for the chemical and biological engineers and scientists involved in the project. The creation of a believable and cinematic molecular landscape to visualize the plot twists and dramatic tension of the story posed a host of new creative challenges for the collaborating scientists. Their involvement in this work has brought about insights that will hopefully spark a breakthrough in the very real worlds of energy, environment, and health.

Engineering Education Reality TV

Engineering Education Gets Its Own Reality TV Show

The show will feature two competing teams of high school students plucked from real life and follow their progress as they design, build, and test fun yet practical machines, such as an automatic pancake maker and a motorized wagon. The eight contestants, chosen through audition, have minimal engineering experience, though for many working with technology is an after-school hobby.
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The two four-student teams will rotate their members each week of the 13-week season as they compete, building one machine per episode. The scores for each episode will be divided among the participants, and the two with the highest scores at the season’s end will compete for the grand prize: a US $10,000 college scholarship provided by the Intel Foundation.

The show premiers on Public Broadcasting Service stations across the United States during EWeek, the annual engineering week event that takes place this year from 18 to 24 February. A second season is in the early planning stage.

PBS Kids – Design Squad TV show

MIT Media Lab Releases Scratch

Scratch is a new programmable toolkit that enables kids to create their own games, animated stories, and interactive art — and share their creations with one another over the Net.

Scratch is designed especially for youth at Computer Clubhouses, an international network of after-school centers in low-income communities. The Scratch project aims to create a programming culture at Computer Clubhouses, empowering youth (ages 10-16) to express themselves fluently and creatively with new technologies.

Inspiring a New Generation of Inventors

Here is some information on a great program that I was forwarded by a blog reader. Please post your comments to the blog and feel free to suggest information for us to share using the share your ideas link on the left column. Inspiring a New Generation of Inventors

Lemelson-MIT InvenTeams is a national grants initiative of the Lemelson-MIT Program to foster inventiveness among high school students. InvenTeams composed of high school students, teachers and mentors are asked to collaboratively identify a problem that they want to solve, research the problem, and then develop a prototype invention as an in-class or extracurricular project. Grants of up to $10,000 support each team’s efforts. InvenTeams are encouraged to work with community partners, specifically the potential beneficiaries of their invention.

InvenTeams was launched in 2002 as a pilot program that awarded grants to three New England high school teams for the 2002-03 academic year. It has expanded each year since its inception, and in the fall of 2005, awarded up to 18 InvenTeams grants.

Our Science and Engineering links have some great info (though I do need to improve the organization when I get some time); we have added a link to this program to our: Science Education Link Directory. Please share your suggestions.

Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap

A Dialogue with Sarah, aged 3: in which it is shown that if your dad is a chemistry professor, asking “why” can be dangerous [the broken link was removed] by Stephen McNeil.

DAD: Why does the soap grab the dirt?
SARAH: Yes.
DAD: Because soap is a surfactant.
SARAH: Why?
DAD: Why is soap a surfactant?
SARAH: Yes.
DAD: That is an EXCELLENT question. Soap is a surfactant because it forms water-soluble micelles that trap the otherwise insoluble dirt and oil particles.

Great. I remember such discussions with Dad (Chemical Engineering professor). The only danger I saw was him getting tied of -why? (when I was older). And sometimes giving me answers the teacher didn’t like (a way of doing math problems that wasn’t the way my teacher was teaching).

Engineers Week Ideas

Ideas for engineers to use during engineering week, from the Engineering Education Service Center (on the USA engineering week):

Engineers week is a unique time that takes place every February during Presidents week. 40,000 engineers go into classrooms to promote the profession and give students a better understanding of engineering. This is our chance to show the world that engineering is an exciting career and that engineers really can do anything!

If you know of other similar activities in other countries please add a comment.

Northwest FIRST Robotics Competition

photo of FIRST robots competition

The Pacific Northwest FIRST Robotics Competition challenges teams of young people and their mentors to solve a common problem in a six-week timeframe using a standard “kit of parts” and a common set of rules.

Newport High students look to future with robotics venture by Terry Dillman:

Founded in 1989 to “inspire young people’s interest and participation in science and technology,” the not-for-profit, New Hampshire-based FIRST designs “accessible, innovative programs” to encourage students to pursue education and career opportunities in science, technology, engineering, and math, while simultaneously building self-confidence, knowledge, and life skills.
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Teams build their robots using the parts kit for the basics, and procuring other parts as needed to augment the kit and make the robot do what’s required in competition.

Engineering Education Advocate

Jolly Good Fellow by Thomas K. Grose

He thinks one reason for the decline is the way engineering is taught in the United Kingdom, with a heavy, early emphasis on theory and math. “Kids come in and they want to design and build cars, but instead they’re fed theory and hard math. And they say, ‘What the heck is this?’” Degree programs should be made more palatable and exciting early on, Sharkey says, with more hands-on learning to go along with the theoretical so students can more easily see how it relates to real-life applications. “We need to get out the idea that engineering can be creative—and then make it so. Somehow, we need to teach innovation.”

But Sharkey also realizes that few schools have either the time or the money to reshape their curricula. “So we could use a government initiative.”Sharkey also takes a more long-term view toward revitalizing engineering enrollments, noting that it’s best to capture the imagination of budding engineers when they’re as young as 10 or 11. Toward that goal, and with EPSRC funding, he runs a series of robot-control and construction competitions for children and young adults. A recent one was in Rotherham, a hardscrabble area outside Sheffield. About 2,000 inner-city kids made and took home simple cardboard robots from kits he devised that use a photoelectric sensor. Many of these kids are considered unteachable, “but to me, they seemed happy to learn. They didn’t see me as a teacher.” Moreover, constructing robots engages and entertains youngsters, which makes learning easier.

Knowledge Is Power – Teaching Math

Knowledge Is Power Program:

IM was the second charter school founded for low-income D.C. students by KIPP, the Knowledge Is Power Program. KIPP had gained a national reputation for math instruction. The KIPP leaders in D.C. had good reason to think, as they told Suben, that “we have math pretty much figured out.” Suben, 23 at the time, still thought she could do better. She told her supervisors she was going to produce her own fifth-grade math curriculum. A year later, her students achieved the largest one-year math score jump ever seen at a KIPP school (or any other school that I know of), from the 16th to the 77th percentile.

Suben said: “My primary goal as a teacher is to help my students understand the reasoning behind math rules and procedures. I have several core beliefs about this: (1) Understanding is constructed by the learner, not passively received from the teacher. (2) Understanding is built by making connections between as many strands of knowledge as possible. (3) Understanding is galvanized through communication. (4) Understanding is only valuable when you reflect on it and question it.”

The core of her method is the workbook she produced last year on the fly. It “lets students build their own notes and create their own examples. It is incredibly active learning,” she said. They were encouraged to write down the meaning of important terms and strategies they used that worked with certain kinds of problems.

State Foster Science for Future Jobs

State eager to foster young scientists for future jobs

The challenge for Massachusetts is to figure out how to inspire more youths to take the same steps. Across the region, observers from chief executives to policymakers are fretting that Massachusetts is not grooming a work force for the future. Part of that includes funneling enough young people into math, science, engineering and related professions to sustain the state’s companies and economy.
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“I think as citizens we need to have a basic literacy of principles of science and technology, and that the level of literacy needed to sift through decisions and certain public policy debates has become greater,” Mr. Schneider said. “As science is more in the public policy arena, having fundamental knowledge of basic scientific principles is key.”

I agree. Education in science and engineering is needed both to provide skilled workers for a strong economy and to provide a level of understanding for people to participate in the modern world.