From Getting Smart, here are 12 ways to start teaching STEM

Want more STEM experiences for your students but don’t know where to start? Want to infuse art into science and boost STEAM experiences?
Before exploring how to do STEM, let’s define what it is. Everybody teaches science and math—STEM adds technology and engineering to the equation; STEAM adds art. Common elements of quality STEM learning include:
• Design-focus: using design tools and techniques to attack big problems or opportunity (challenge-based, problem-based learning).
• Active application: applying knowledge and skills to real-world situations and constructing or prototyping solutions to challenges (maker, project-based learning).
• Integration: real world problems aren’t limited to a discipline—solutions almost always draw from many fields.

1st grade science key vocabulary English/Spanish translations (space to add drawing as well).

This is a template for lessons developed by the San Francisco Unified School District SLANT Cohort. (Replace this text with a short description of your SLANT-inspired lesson. Then add learning goals, keywords, standards alignments, subjects, and grades in their respective fields.)

I have added an extension for students to explore Ekphrastic Poetry.

This is a template for lessons developed by the San Francisco Unified School District SLANT Cohort. (Replace this text with a short description of your SLANT-inspired lesson. Then add learning goals, keywords, standards alignments, subjects, and grades in their respective fields.)

Abigail Harrison as known as Astronaut Abby, STEAM education advocate and founder of The Mars Generation nonprofit talks about her career and what she thinks about the future of space travel.

On the cover of a patriotic song dedicated to Lincoln's secretary of the navy Gideon Welles Uncle Sam rides a "ram," or ironclad steam vessel, down the Mississippi River. The Library's copy of the music cover was deposited for copyright on August 22, 1863, soon after two decisive Union victories on the Mississippi: Vicksburg (July 4) and Port Hudson (July 9). Welles was responsible for ushering the Union navy into the age of ironclad steamers. Several lines of verse on the cover praise the ironclad rams as "shaking the world with rampant dismay! Iron-harnessed, steam-driven, t sweeps o'er the sea, Our American Rampart, the shield of the free!" |Entered . . . 1863 by H. Tolman & Co. . . . Mass.|Published by Henry Tolman & Co. 291 Washington St.|Signed: Green, eng. (Probably Henry F. Green or Greene).|Title appeas as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1863-11.

I wanted to make a realistic animatronic heart, and as I was developing the 3D printed mechanism I used a sock to try and get a vague idea of how the silicone skin would move once the design was finished. Since the silicone casting turned out to be quite challenging and very expensive, the sock test gave me the idea to instead use a slightly elastic fabric to make a plush heart design, which could be fitted over the 3D printed mechanism.

This project is very simple on the 3D printing/assembly/electronics side, but I'd recommend you have a little sewing experience because, as a sewing amateur, I'm not 100% confident in my patterns. A sewing machine is not necessarily required and a lot of the sewing is by hand anyway, but it would certainly be useful!

While taking a walk around their school, neighborhood, park, or nature trail, students (suggested ages 3-8) will be challenged to create a map of the 'nature treasures' they discover. Students will make thumbnail sketches and brief descriptive notes of what they observe.

This activity is adapted from "Nature's Treasure Map" (page 34) found in "Opening the World Through Nature Journaling" a curriculum by Jack Laws, that integrates science, art and writing for grade 4-8 classroom.

Artists are often particularly keen observers and precise recorders of the physical conditions of the natural world. As a result, paintings can be good resources for learning about ecology. Teachers can use this lesson to examine with students the interrelationship of geography, natural resources, and climate and their effects on daily life. It also addresses the roles students can take in caring for the environment. Students will look at paintings that represent cool temperate, warm temperate, and tropical climates.
In this lesson students will: Identify natural resources found in particular geographic areas; Discuss ways in which climate, natural resources, and geography affect daily life; Apply critical-thinking skills to consider the various choices artists have made in their representations of the natural world; Make personal connections to the theme by discussing ways they can be environmental stewards; Identify natural resources found in particular geographic areas; Discuss ways in which climate, natural resources, and geography affect daily life; Apply critical-thinking skills to consider the various choices artists have made in their representations of the natural world; Make personal connections to the theme by discussing ways they can be environmental stewards.

Grade level: graduate students, advanced undergrads, persons with analyzed research results

Course length: 1 semester, 4-6 months

Objective: This course empowers scientists to engage with their own data, each other, and the public through art. Through collective brainstorming, prototyping, and feedback from professional artists, students will create a project that expresses their own research through any artistic medium of their choice. The course typically culminates in a public art exhibition where students interact with a general audience to discuss their research, art, and what it means to be a scientist.

This booklet about teaching through art education integrates topics such as peace, tolerance and interpersonal communication as well the treatment of psychological aspects in a post conflict environment through creativity and artistic language.

This lesson can be done in two 30 mintues whole group sessions.  It could be done in a face to face setting, or used for virtual learning.  This lesson analzyes the work of Piet Mondrian while reviewing 2D shapes. 

This open textbook was created with the support of an ALG Textbook Transformation Grant. Topics include art integration, music integration, physical education / dance integration, and the theoretical foundations of arts integration in education

Find out about examples of arts integration strategies that are adaptable to a wide range of curriculum areas.

This resource is a collection of monthly at-home STEAM challenges that students in Grades K-6 can compete using objects found around the house.

This resource is a collection of monthly at-home STEAM challenges that students in Grades K-6 can compete using objects found around the house.

Novel representations and diverse perspectives can reveal new insights into complex systems, and can support rich understandings of the world. In this activity, students will identify and analyze the choices artists and scientists make when creating representations of living or non-living natural objects. This process will help students recognize the potential and place for their own articulation of how the world works. After drawing from nature, students will reflect on the process of representing information, then compare their drawings with that of a 16th-century artist. Students will consider what is included and what is excluded, and hypothesize about larger contexts and systems.

Kentucky reading teacher Ashley Judd uses augmented reality to get her students excited about learning. The PBS Digital Innovator says she has seen student engagement soar since she started using more technology in her classroom because students are already excited about using iPads and other devices. In this video, students use an augmented reality app to create an interactive memory book.

This lesson is a classroom activity where students learn to use their balance knowledge to create a beautiful mobile.

An attack on James K. Polk's attempts to undermine Winfield Scott's military efforts and reputation through his handling of the Mexican War in April 1847. Shortly after Scott's victory at Cerro Gordo, Polk dispatched State Department official Nicholas Trist to Mexico to negotiate peace with the Mexican government. The artist views the move, as did many contemporaries, as motivated by political concerns about the Whig general's presidential ambitions. Scott, on a large hill at right, offers a steaming plate of soup to departing Mexican commander Santa Anna, who rides away on horseback. (For the soup allusion see "Distinguished Military Operations," no. 1846-15). From a ravine behind Scott, Polk goads Trist as he aims a water hose at the general. The hose is fueled by a pump operated by two boys in the background. In the distance American troops engage the Mexicans on the hills near Cerro Gordo. In the upper left appears the dialogue: Scott: "General Santa Anna!! do stop and take 'a hasty plate of soup?'" Santa Anna: "I thank you, Sir, your soup's too hot-I must be off!" Polk: "Trist, take care & cool 'old Hasty's' soup, before "our friend" meets him again." Trist: "Your Excellency will pardon me, but I've tried in vain to cool 'Old Hasty's' soup." Polk: "Then put out 'Old Hasty's' fire, or "that fatal soup will burn our fingers yet!" Trist: "Your excellency would do well to send 'Old Hasty' home and give "our friend" 'Pillow' for his Comfort." The last reference was to Gen. Gideon J. Pillow, an incompetent but a favorite of Polk, whose antagonism toward Scott was public knowledge, particularly after Cerro Gordo.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Weitenkampf, p. 89.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1847-2.