Explore the vast range of titles available.

\"A \"Sci-Book\" or \"Science Notebook\" serves as an essential companion to the science curriculum supplement, STEPS to STEM. As students learn key concepts in the seven \"big ideas\" in this program (Electricity & Magnetism; Air & Flight; Water & Weather; Plants & Animals; Earth & Space; Matter & Motion; Light & Sound), they record their ideas, plans, and evidence. There is ample space for students to keep track of their observations and findings, as well as a section to reflect upon the use of \"Science and Engineering Practices\" as set forth in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Using a science notebook is reflective of the behavior of scientists. One of the pillars of the Nature of Science is that scientists must document their work to publish their research results; it is a necessary part of the scientific enterprise. This is important because STEPS to STEM is a program for young scientists who learn within a community of scientists. Helping students to think and act like scientists is a critical feature of this program. Students learn that they need to keep a written record if they are to successfully share their discoveries and curiosities with their classmates and with the teacher. Teachers should also model writing in science to help instill a sense of purpose and pride in using and maintaining a Sci-Book. Lastly, students' documentation can serve as a valuable form of authentic assessment; teachers can utilize Sci-Books to monitor the learning process and the development of science skills.\" -- Publisher's description.

Precollege engineering teachers bring unique backgrounds to their teaching practice. Many follow nontraditional routes to teaching engineering, often coming from teaching other subjects or careers in other fields. Among the many variations influencing engineering teaching practices is pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). This multiple case study explores the PCK of five middle school engineering teachers implementing the same middle school engineering curriculum, STEM innovation and design (STEM-ID). STEM-ID engages students in contextualized challenges that incorporate foundational mathematics and science and advanced manufacturing tools such as computer-aided design and 3D printing while introducing engineering concepts such as pneumatics, aeronautics, and robotics. Drawing on observation and interview data collected over two semester-long implementations of STEM-ID, the study addresses the research question regarding what variations in PCK are evident among engineering teachers with different professional backgrounds and levels of experience. Five teachers were purposively selected from a larger group of teachers implementing the curriculum because they represent a range of professional backgrounds. The study utilizes the Refined Consensus Model of PCK to investigate connections between teacher backgrounds, personal PCK (pPCK), the personalized professional knowledge held by teachers, and enacted PCK (ePCK), the knowledge teachers draw on to engage in pedagogical reasoning while planning, teaching, and reflecting on their practice. Observation and interview data were triangulated to develop narrative case summaries, followed by cross-case analysis to identify patterns and themes across teachers. Findings describe how teachers’ backgrounds translated into diverse forms of pPCK that informed pedagogical moves and decisions teachers made as they implemented the curriculum (ePCK). Regardless of the previous subject taught (math, science, or English language arts), teachers routinely drew upon their pPCK in other subjects as they facilitated the engineering design process. In addition to contributing to the field’s understanding of engineering teachers’ PCK, these findings hold implications for the recruitment, retention, and professional development of engineering teachers.

Background Teacher self‐efficacy has received attention because of its direct relationship with teachers' classroom behaviors. Since engineering has been increasingly introduced in K‐12 (precollege) education, development of an instrument to measure teachers' self‐efficacy in the context of teaching engineering has been needed. Purpose (Hypothesis) This study reports the development and validation of the Teaching Engineering Self‐Efficacy Scale (TESS) for K‐12 teachers. Design/Method The items for the TESS were constructed through a comprehensive review of the literature regarding K‐12 engineering education, the development of teachers' self‐efficacy instruments in STEM areas, and K‐12 teachers' reflections on integrating engineering into their classrooms. During the content and face validity process, we used structural equation modeling to identify and confirm the factor structure of the TESS, and used item‐analyses for reliability evidence. Results With data from 434 teachers in 19 states, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses using structural equation modeling resulted in the TESS consisting of 23 items loading across four factors: engineering pedagogical content knowledge, engineering engagement, engineering disciplinary self‐efficacy, and outcome expectancy. Cronbach's α ranged from 0.89 to 0.96 and exhibited high internal consistency reliability coefficients for the TESS. Conclusions Teacher self‐efficacy is a situation‐specific construct because teachers' efficacy beliefs depend on the content area and teaching environment. Use of the TESS, as an instrument tailored for the engineering teaching context, can contribute to the literature on K‐12 engineering education and improve the teaching of precollege engineering.

In response to a desire to strengthen the economy, educational settings are emphasizing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) curriculum and programs. Yet, because of the narrow approach to STEM, educational leaders continue to call for a more balanced approach to teaching and learning, which includes the arts, design, and humanities. This desire created space for science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) education, a transdisciplinary approach that focuses on problem-solving. STEAM-based curricula and STEAM-themed schools are appearing all over the globe. This growing national and global attention to STEAM provides an opportunity for teacher education to explore the ways in which teachers implement STEAM practices, examining the successes and challenges, and how teachers are beginning to make sense of this innovative teaching practice. The purpose of this paper is to examine the implementation of STEAM teaching practices in science and math middle school classrooms, in hopes to provide research-based evidence on this emerging topic to guide teacher educators.

Next Generation Science Standards identifies the science all K-12 students should know. These new standards are based on the National Research Council's A Framework for K-12 Science Education . The National Research Council, the National Science Teachers Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and Achieve have partnered to create standards through a collaborative state-led process. The standards are rich in content and practice and arranged in a coherent manner across disciplines and grades to provide all students an internationally benchmarked science education. The print version of Next Generation Science Standards complements the nextgenscience.org website and: Provides an authoritative offline reference to the standards when creating lesson plans Arranged by grade level and by core discipline, making information quick and easy to find Printed in full color with a lay-flat spiral binding Allows for bookmarking, highlighting, and annotating

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of engineering design-based instruction (EDBI) on 7th grade students’ nature of engineering (NOE) views. Quantitative research to evaluate students’ NOE views was operated through a questionnaire which is “Views for Nature of Engineering-Elementary School Version (VNOE-E)” as pre- and post-test. Moreover, quantitative data results were supported by analyzing change on students’ NOE views qualitatively. The sample of the present study was 41 students of 7th grade in a public middle school. While 24 students were taught with engineering design-based instruction (EDBI) in the experimental group, 17 students were taught with curriculum-based instruction (CBI) in the comparison group. According to the result of the one-way ANCOVA (analysis of covariance), the students’ NOE views were significantly affected by EDBI. Moreover, the positive effect of the EDBI on the students’ views for various NOE aspects was affirmed by the results of qualitative data in the study.

In non-English-speaking countries, students learning EFL (English as a Foreign Language) without a “real” learning environment mostly shows poor English-learning performance. In order to improve the English-learning effectiveness of EFL students, we propose the use of augmented reality (AR) to support situational classroom learning and conduct teaching experiments for situational English learning. The purpose of this study is to examine whether the learning performance of EFL students can be enhanced using augmented reality within a situational context. The learning performance of the experimental student group is validated by means of the attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction (ARCS) model. According to statistical analysis, the experimental teaching method is much more effective than that of the control group (i.e., the traditional teaching method). The learning performance of the experimental group students is obviously enhanced and the feedback of using AR by EFL students is positive. The experimental results reveal that (1) students can concentrate more on the practice of speaking English as a foreign language; (2) the real-life AR scenarios enhanced student confidence in learning English; and (3) applying AR teaching materials in situational context classes can provide near real-life scenarios and improve the learning satisfaction of students.

Recent education reforms highlight the importance of engineering design as a tool to improve student science learning in this new view of K-12 science education. However, little research has investigated the thought processes students use while engaging in the highly complex activity of design. Therefore, building on theories of productive thinking, we analyzed 6th grade students’ design conversations through the following research question: How do 6th grade students employ different modes of thinking when solving a design-based challenge in a science unit? Through a qualitative and descriptive case-study approach using Gallagher and Aschner’s (Merrill-Palmer Q Behav Dev 9(3):183–194, 1963) analytical framework for productive thinking, our results indicate students employ a variety of modes of thinking as they engage in design conversations in a science-based design unit. While students planned their initial design, they employed Cognitive Memory, Divergent Thinking, and Evaluative Thinking. This is not surprising since students need to recall scientific facts and hypothesize as they begin to justify their design decisions. As students finalized design decisions and communicated this design to the client, they employed more higher order modes of thinking, since they evaluated and justified their design decisions. These findings provide insights into effective teaching strategies for higher productivity and conceptual performance.

Proportional reasoning is a crosscutting concept identified as necessary for student success in upper-level mathematics as well as science, technology, and engineering. Research on middle-grade mathematics learning shows that students tend to develop stronger understandings of mathematical concepts when they learn through constructionist real-world projects that are relevant and meaningful to them. In this qualitative exploratory research study, we developed and implemented a Challenge-Based Learning through Making project for a middle school engineering class to investigate how students demonstrate their understanding of proportional reasoning through designing and making physical and digital artifacts, mentored by industry experts, and within the context of a school makerspace. Our findings showed that students accurately represented their understanding of proportionality through their digital artifacts more than any other modality available, contrasting previous findings in the relevant literature. Findings regarding the integration of professional technology for digital 3D modeling, mentorship of industry experts, and the prevalence of mathematical estimation in digital modeling provide avenues for further research vis-a-vis the role of expert mentorship in middle school STEM design challenges and mathematical estimation in spatial reasoning for design. Implications for the practice and the field of STEM learning are discussed.

Artificial intelligence research on creative design has led to Structure-Behavior-Function (SBF) models that emphasize functions as abstractions for organizing understanding of physical systems. Empirical studies on understanding complex systems suggest that novice understanding is shallow, typically focusing on their visible structures and showing minimal understanding of their functions and invisible causal behaviors. In this paper, we describe an interactive learning environment called ACT (for Aquarium Construction Toolkit) in which middle-school students construct SBF models of complex systems as a vehicle for gaining a deeper understanding of how such systems work. We report on the use of ACT in middle-school science classrooms for stimulating, scaffolding, and supporting SBF thinking about aquarium systems as examples of complex systems. We present preliminary data indicating that SBF thinking, facilitated in part by the ACT tool, leads to enhanced understanding of the behaviors and functions of aquaria.