This lesson provides guidance for students to create and practice a presentation about design challenge results that they developed in the previous unit lessons and how to present it to the school administration.

Through six lesson/activity sets, students learn about the functioning of sensors, both human and robotic. In the activities, student groups use LEGO MINDSTORMS(TM) NXT robots and components to study human senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch) in more detail than in previous units in the series. They also learn about the human made rotation, touch, sound, light and ultrasonic sensors. "Stimulus-sensor-coordinator-effector-response" pathways are used to describe the processes as well as similarities between human/animal and robotic equivalent sensory systems. The important concept of sensors converting/transducing signals is emphasized. Through assorted engineering design challenges, students program the LEGO robots to respond to input from various LEGO sensors. The overall framework reinforces the theme of the human body as a system with sensors that is, from an engineering perspective. PowerPoint® presentations, quizzes and worksheets are provided throughout the unit.

In this design challenge lesson, students examine their school food system and develop an investigation about food waste in order to know what should change.

Do you have coffee filters, masking tape, and some bendy straws handy? Grab those and a few more supplies from your kitchen and you're ready to start thinking like an engineer.

Engineers create and use new materials, as well as new combinations of existing materials to design innovative new products and technologies—all based upon the chemical and physical properties of given substances. In this activity, students act as materials engineers as they learn about and use chemical and physical properties including tessellated geometric designs and shape to build better smartphone cases. Guided by the steps of the engineering design process, they analyze various materials and substances for their properties, design/test/improve a prototype model, and create a dot plot of their prototype testing results.

Through four lessons and four hands-on associated activities, this unit provides a way to teach the overarching concept of energy as it relates to both kinetic and potential energy. Within these topics, students are exposed to gravitational potential, spring potential, the Carnot engine, temperature scales and simple magnets. During the module, students apply these scientific concepts to solve the following engineering challenge: "The rising price of gasoline has many effects on the US economy and the environment. You have been contracted by an engineering firm to help design a physical energy storage system for a new hybrid vehicle for Nissan. How would you go about solving this problem? What information would you consider to be important to know? You will create a small prototype of your design idea and make a sales pitch to Nissan at the end of the unit." This module is built around the Legacy Cycle, a format that incorporates findings from educational research on how people best learn. This module is written for a first-year algebra-based physics class, though it could easily be modified for conceptual physics.

In conjunction with Connected Educator Month throughout October, 2014 ISKME and KQED are launching the Connected Educator Challenge, an opportunity for Connected Educators to share what they are currently doing in their work and envision the future of what being a Connected Educator will look like. Connected Educators are invited to make and share media in response to the prompt below:

Show us your vision for your future as a Connected Educator. Where do you hope to be in the future as a Connected Educator? What will your learning environment look like? How will your students be connected? What kinds of activity will you and your students be engaged in? How will you and your students meet the challenge of an increasingly interconnected world?
Show us your vision for the future as a Connected Educator. Where do you hope to be in the future as a Connected Educator?

Participants collaborate in ISKME's OER Design Lab at Maker Faire to brainstorm, prototype, and present new ideas for teaching and learning. Each participant creates an Open Educational Resource (OER) that will be shared on OER Commons and with teachers during the Maker Faire follow up Teachers as Makers Academy.

Maker Faire participants collaborate in ISKME's Design Lab, using digital stories and salvaged materials to design an innovative school of the future. The Design Lab features Makers Mauro ffortisimo Di Nucci's deconstructed piano and INKA Biospheric Systems' Vertical Garden; as well as Student and Teacher project examples that integrate art, science, sustainability, and green design inspire the creation of shareable open-source learning resources. This wiki page showcases photos and video from the Design Lab, open educational resources for teachers, and a step by step guide through the design process.

Activities, resources, photos and videos from ISKME's two day professional development teacher training that explores Open Educational Resources (OER) and Maker-Teacher collaborations to facilitate innovation in the classroom. The Makers’ projects are points of inspiration for Teachers while they engage in design-thinking activities to create, remix, and share OER Projects with online collaborative tools.

Activities, resources, photos and videos from ISKME's two day professional development teacher training that explores Open Educational Resources (OER) and Maker-Teacher collaborations to facilitate innovation in the classroom. The Makers’ projects are points of inspiration for Teachers while they engage in design-thinking activities to create, remix, and share OER Projects with online collaborative tools.

Participants collaborate in ISKME's Teachers as Makers Remix Lab at Maker Faire to brainstorm, prototype, present, and document new ideas for teaching and learning. Each participant remixes an Open Educational Resource (OER) that will be shared on OER Commons.

Participants collaborate in ISKME's Teachers as Makers Remix Lab at Ed Lab Santiago, Chile to brainstorm, prototype, present, and document new ideas for teaching and learning. Each participant remixes an Open Educational Resource (OER) that will be shared on OER Commons.

This wiki page describes the goals and tenents of improv, as well as four different improv activities (Name Gesture Circle, Yellow Ball, Vacations, and Thank You) used in ISKME's Professional Development Teacher Academy: Teachers as Makers June 15-16 2010 at San Mateo County Office of Education.

Student teams design, build and test small-sized gliders to maximize flight distance and an aerodynamic ratio, applying their knowledge of fluid dynamics to its role in flight. Students experience the entire engineering design process, from brainstorming to CAD (or by hand) drafting, including researching (physics of aerodynamics and glider components that take advantage of that science), creating materials lists, constructing, testing and evaluating—all within constraints (works with a launcher, budget limitation, maximizing flight distance to mass ratio), and concluding with a summary final report. Numerous handouts and rubrics are provided.

Acting as if they are biomedical engineers, students design and print 3D prototypes of pressure sensors that measure the pressure of the eyes of people diagnosed with glaucoma. After completing the tasks within the associated lesson, students conduct research on pressure gauges, apply their understanding of radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology and its components, iterate their designs to make improvements, and use 3D software to design and print 3D prototypes. After successful 3D printing, teams present their models to their peers. If a 3D printer is not available, use alternate fabrication materials such as modeling clay, or end the activity once the designs are complete.

This course provides an overview of and introduction to the fundamentals of aeronautics, using the history of aviation as a story line. The course uses examples from the very beginning of aviation (the Montgolfier brothers' balloon flight in 1783 and the Wright brothers' heavier-than-air flight in 1903) and continues all the way through to the current Airbus A380 and future aircraft. This trajectory will start with a general introduction to aeronautics, to be followed by a closer look at aerodynamics and flight performance.

Lectures are frequently accompanied by related exercises and demonstrations. The course also incorporates (design) challenges/competitions, based on the knowledge obtained through the lectures.

Diet and exercise are important keys to good health.  This is a design challenge that is part of a unit that I teach in STEM class on health.  Prior to this activity, students explore the CDCs top causes of death with a focus on nutrition, and conduct a study with a focus on MyPlate.  This design challenge helps transition into the exercise component.Students will apply the Engineering Design Process (EDP) to design, test, analyze, and improve a pedometer using micro:bit.

This is a STEM design challenge using micro:bits technology to assist students with developing their understanding of force, motion, and conservation of energy. Energy is important for life. Without the principle of energy and its conservation we would not be having this conversation. The students need to understand that energy is not lost but changed into other forms that may or may not be able to be reused with our current technologies. Energy use and reuse is a big part of the UN initiative and many of the goals for a sustainable long-term future of the Anthropocene Epoch. Whenever we work on a science topic, we need ELA. The students need to be able to read, write and speak to pass their claims, evidence, and reasoning on to their peers and others. Technology has become an everyday necessity.

The student engineers will design and build a new water filtration system for an overpopulated, poverty-stricken community that is drinking contaminated water from wells, rivers or springs not treated by municipal water systems. Students will be involved in planning, designing, building, collaborating, calculating, budgeting, analyzing, and reflecting on a real-world design challenge. This lesson was created as part of the 2016 NASA STEM Standards of Practice Project, a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.