STEAM Newsletter – Happy New Year!
January 18, 2022
The start of a new year is a perfect opportunity to reflect on past achievements and upcoming goals for the future.
We debuted our STEAM newsletter in February of last year and since then, we have continued to share resources to encourage STEAM learning. This year, we hope we can continue to further the collective goal of providing a million more girls with STEM learning opportunities and transform the communities we live in for a better tomorrow.
To learn more about Million Girls Moonshot and their vision, you can visit their website.
In This Newsletter:
Equity and Inclusion
Explore this month’s resources from MGM pertaining to equity and inclusion:
- Math Equity Toolkit: This tool kit layers professional development into “Strides” that educators can take along a path to equitable education. Topics include Dismantling Racism in Mathematics Instruction and Creating Conditions to Thrive
- The Importance of Equity in STEM Education: The National Inventors Hall of Fame discusses identifying and delimiting implicit biases, and increasing cultural awareness.
Engineering Mindsets
MGM’s second transformative practice is Engineering Mindsets. See how you can foster an engineering mindset in the classroom with the following resources:
- Math Lessons Go Better With Engineering: This blog describes how math is an integral part of engineering. An engineering parachute design challenge offers examples of how students practice math as they measure various aspects of their design and calculate their final evaluation scores.
- STEM Educators Academy Activity Toolkit from ExpandED Schools: This Activity Toolkit offers hybrid learning engineering design challenges, STEM facilitation skill builder videos, and engineering design activities categorized by content areas.
STEM Transitions, Handoffs, and Coordination
Explore these resources from MGM’s fourth transformative practice:
- Brokering Youth Pathways: A Toolkit for Connecting Youth to Future Opportunity from the Hive Research Network: This toolkit shares ways in which various out-of-school educators and professionals have approached the challenge of brokering. We provide a framework, practice briefs and reports that focus on a particular issue or challenge and provide concrete examples, as well as illustrate how our partners worked through designing new brokering routines in partnership with our research team.
ACRES January Cohort: Asking Purposeful Questions
January 19, February 9, March 2, 9, 16, 2022; 3:30 - 5:00pm PST
Questions are the beginning of a path towards discovery, imagination, and STEM exploration. How can we help youth expand and clarify their thinking and develop their reasoning through the questions we ask them? This module is designed for educators who have some experience facilitating STEM learning and would like to grow in their practice within a supportive group of other educators.
Parent and Family Resources
- Engaging Families in Mathematics Education Toolkit: Families are a child’s first educator and this role does not halt on day one of school. Families lay the foundation for future educational success. Researchers have identified four best practices for engaging families effectively in mathematics education.
- Community Math Night Facilitators’ Toolkit: The Appalachia Regional Education Laboratory (REL) developed this toolkit to help K–5 elementary school educators plan and implement the Community Math Night program to engage families in interactive math activities, build positive math attitudes, and create a community of educators, students, families, and other caring adults to support math learning. The toolkit includes planning and organizational resources, relevant research, and step-by-step instructions and printable materials for the interactive activities.
Activities for Programs
Share the following STEM activities with programs and families for additional STEM learning in your community:
- Take Flight: Using everyday materials, youth engineer a glider that can fly straight for 15 feet.
- Keep Your Cool! Design Your Own Cooler Challenge: Youth design a cooler that will keep a bottle of water cool using the engineering design process. They test their prototype and graph their results to determine the effectiveness of the solution.
Mizzen by Mott
The Mizzen By Mott app delivers inspiring and engaging activities that spark learning in young people. Supported by the Mott Foundation, Mizzen is available at no cost to afterschool professionals! Encourage partners to download the Mizzen By Mott app to access STEM activities at your finger-touch!
Featured Activities & Playlists
- Playlist: STEM Activities for K-5th Grade in Small Groups – This playlist is a great mix of engineering and science activities that are easy and fun for small groups of students.
- Playlist: Science Notebooks for 3rd – 12th Grade – Keeping a notebook can help your students think and act like scientists and engineers. Sample these easy-to-implement strategies and lessons to bring science notebooking into your program.
- Module: S.INQ Up Earth and Space for 6-8th Grade – Earth and Space is an inquiry and exploration-based curriculum that uses hands-on activities focused on the relationships between the earth, the solar system, and human impacts on our global environment.
Check Out CAN’s Other Newsletters!
Access the CAN newsletter archives to view past newsletters today! You may be interested in some of our other newsletters as well: