In this video segment adapted from ZOOM, cast members are challenged to design protective headgear for a water balloon using what they know about the properties of the materials available.

This wiki page describes the DIY Design Challenge Activity used during ISKME's Teacher Academy.

Design a DIY Project for students that meets the following design principles:
The design must meet a need for their school community.
The design must use collaboration between teacher, student, and community.
The design must be multidisciplinary.
The design must use low cost and/or no cost materials.

Group examples are included.

The Green Design Challenge is to brainstorm, prototype and present a design idea for a social entrepreneurship project focusing on green design that meets the design principles. Photo examples from ISKME's Teacher Innovation Workshop are included.

This wiki page documents the Design Process Workshop ISKME facilitated at the Roadtrip Nation offices in Costa Mesa, CA on February 18, 2011. Storytelling, design thinking, improv, brainstorming, and prototyping were used to design for the Design Challenge:
How might we create more teacher engagement with the Roadtrip Nation Experience?

This wiki page documents the STEAM Design Challenge Activity ISKME facilitated during the SLANT Summer Institute at San Francisco Unified School District July 19-23, 2010.
Participants designed prototypes for an arts integration project for students and posted their ideas on the wiki.

This wiki page documents the Sun Curve Design Challenge, inspired by the "Sun Curve" aquaponic garden sculpture to challenge teachers and students to produce new OER materials and incorporate green design thinking into the classroom.

This wiki page describes ISKME's Teachers as Makers Professional Development Academy.
A two day professional development teacher training for the Maker inside each of us. We will explore how Maker-Teacher collaboration can facilitate innovation in the classroom. The Makers’ Projects are points of inspiration for Teachers as they experience DIY inquiry and design. Teachers will have time to brainstorm, create, reflect, and share how their experiences at Maker Faire and with Make Teacher Academy can translate into their teaching using online resources and collaborative tools.
This page includes links, activities, photos, video, and group presentations from the Academy.

The Online Science-athon offers elementary and middle-grade students opportunities to discover the science in their daily lives. Presented as challenges, the Science-athon asks students to investigate their world in ways that are engaging and fun, easy for teachers to incorporate into their teaching, and instructive. Students doing Catching Sunshine decide on a container -- tin can, cardboard box, plastic bucket, paper bag, or similar object -- to use as a solar collector. Then they determine how to maximize the amount of sunshine the collector catches by figuring out how to point it, what colors and textures to use on the inside surfaces, and how to insulate it. Reviewing scientific information helps students improve the effectiveness of their collector designs and make predictions about the ones they think will catch the most sunshine. On Catching Sunshine Day, students collect and record data to share with other students doing the challenge. Analysis of their data and data collected by others allows participants to formulate explanations, to check these explanations against scientific knowledge and the explanations and experiences of others, and to put their ideas to practical use.

The Online Science-athon offers elementary and middle-grade students opportunities to discover the science in their daily lives. Presented as challenges, the Science-athon asks students to investigate their world in ways that are engaging and fun, easy for teachers to incorporate into their teaching, and instructive. Students doing the Chocolate Melt decide on a container-tin can, cardboard box, plastic bucket, paper bag, or similar object-to use as a solar cooker. Then they consider how to melt a refrigerated standard-size milk chocolate chip that has been placed on the end of a toothpick inside the cooker in as short a time as possible. This includes figuring out how to reshape the container so that the heat from the sun is concentrated on the chocolate chip, deciding what colors and textures to use for lining inside surfaces and insulating the cooker, examining where to put the chocolate chip, and identifying how to point the cooker at the sun. Reviewing scientific information helps students improve the effectiveness of their cooker designs and make predictions about the ones they think will cook the most rapidly. On Chocolate Melting Day, students collect and record data to share with other students doing the challenge.

The Online Science-athon offers elementary and middle-grade students opportunities to discover the science in their daily lives. Presented as challenges, the Science-athon asks students to investigate their world in ways that are engaging and fun, easy for teachers to incorporate into their teaching, and instructive. Students doing the Marble Roll select a strip of material that is 61 cm (24 inches) in length to use as a ramp. Then they determine how to maximize the distance their marble rolls across a flat surface by doing such things as experimenting with side or center guides, smoothing surfaces, changing the angle of the ramp, altering its shape, modifying the place where the ramp and ground meet, trying different ramp lengths or widths, and releasing the marble from different spots on the ramp. Reviewing scientific information helps participants improve the effectiveness of their ramp designs and make predictions about which marbles will roll the greatest distance. On Marble Roll Day, students collect and record data to share with other students doing the challenge. Analysis of their data and data collected by others allows participants to formulate explanations and to check these explanations against scientific knowledge and the explanations and experiences of others.

This wiki page documents the activities, articles, links, and resources used, as well as the teacher created Open Educational Resources (OER) during the SLANT Institute.
On July 19-23, 2010 San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), in collaboration with the California Academy of Sciences, the de Young Museum, 826 Valencia, KQED, ISKME, and the Exploratorium launched the Science, Literacy, Arts iNtegration in the Twenty-first century (SLANT) Summer Institute for Pre-k through 8th Grade Teachers to explore and investigate science and art integration. Participants received resources to use in the classroom and on field trips as they plan lessons with grade level colleagues.