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.

This is a problem-based learning (PBL) group jigsaw activity. The scenario is:
Students are employees of a unit of the United Nations responsible for coordinating disaster relief after a major disaster (the 2004 Asian Earthquake and Tsunami) occurs. The agency needs to understand the situation in each country so that it can coordinate the work of various governments and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) working in the affected area.

Students are divided into Expert Groups (related to academic specialties such as Economics, Medicine, Political Science, Earth Science, etc.) and spend several days researching their topics. Students are then reassigned to one of seven or eight Country Groups, based on the countries most affected by the disaster. Each country group needs someone representing each expert group. In the scenario, these groups correspond to task forces that must determine what the situation is in each country and try to assess the current need for international assistance.

Students research their country, using internet resources, especially the CIA World Factbook and ReliefWeb, the information coordination website of the United Nations. At a large-group roundtable discussion, each group presents what it has found about its assigned country. As a final product, each student writes an individual report summarizing findings and making recommendations for disaster assistance.

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At this point in the unit, students have learned about Pascal's law, Archimedes' principle, Bernoulli's principle, and why above-ground storage tanks are of major concern in the Houston Ship Channel and other coastal areas. In this culminating activity, student groups act as engineering design teams to derive equations to determine the stability of specific above-ground storage tank scenarios with given tank specifications and liquid contents. With their floatation analyses completed and the stability determined, students analyze the tank stability in specific storm conditions. Then, teams are challenged to come up with improved storage tank designs to make them less vulnerable to uplift, displacement and buckling in storm conditions. Teams present their analyses and design ideas in short class presentations.

As diseases become stronger in nature, currently available antibiotics are no longer strong enough to suppress and cure said diseases. Therefore, what factors contribute to diseases becoming resistant to drugs and what public policies should be developed around them?  In this problem-based learning module, students will work with partners or in groups to first assess the increasing problem of drug-resistant diseases and the toll they are taking on the American public. Additionally, students will work to investigate what hospitals and lawmakers are doing to address this problem. Once students understand and are familiar with the current state of affairs, they will then work to further understand and research exactly why this issue needs to be brought to the attention of the general public, in order to promote change to current hospital procedures and policies. Further, students will determine the current political climate and support (or lack thereof) for policy, and will analyze the interest in keeping, changing or removing said policies altogether. Once the group has a full understanding, students will then work to determine their position on the issues surrounding antibiotic resistant diseases and the policies associated with these diseases. As soon as the group reaches a consensus, students will work to research and determine a professional way in which to present their goals and objectives for curbing the issue of drug-resistant diseases.

Project Based Learning for Algebra 1 Students. Students must collect, analyze, and graph date.

Students learn about linear programming (also called linear optimization) to solve engineering design problems. As they work through a word problem as a class, they learn about the ideas of constraints, feasibility and optimization related to graphing linear equalities. Then they apply this information to solve two practice engineering design problems related to optimizing materials and cost by graphing inequalities, determining coordinates and equations from their graphs, and solving their equations. It is suggested that students conduct the associated activity, Optimizing Pencils in a Tray, before this lesson, although either order is acceptable.

This is a problem-based learning activity that guides students through a process whereby the class as a whole investigates various stakeholder perspectives on the global climate change controversy. Individual students then reflect on their own perspectives in light of what they have learned.

Antibiotics save people’s lives...and make bacteria stronger and more likely to kill us.  What is the best practice to balance these conflicting issues? In this problem-based learning module, the students will be evaluating real-life medical situations in conjunction with actual staff at those institutions and offering action plans to be ‘implemented’ there.  In order to accomplish this, the science unit will be interlocking with social studies and a language arts unit that will have them identifying target audiences and sculpting a way to present their findings.  This unit has the potential to be a full problem-based unit as well as highly interdisciplinary--it’s connected to full units in social studies and language arts which stand alone but can be fully integrated if desired.

In this problem-based learning module, students will ‘dig’ for fossils in a digital environment, using the advanced graphing techniques of line-of-best-fit and piecewise functions to look for different kinds of trends in the health of the history of the earth.  They will apply this information to their knowledge of the laws of superposition and index fossils to form a complete analysis in the historical health as well as to predict where we are going in the future.

In this problem-based learning module, students will be asked to brainstorm ideas and think innovatively both independently and collaboratively in addressing a real-world problem that is relevant to their daily lives and  health.  Are students aware of their calorie intake and how it affects their overall health? Students will investigate the calories consumed in a typical day and how much physical activity is needed to stay healthy and fit.  Students/teams will be encouraged to use the internet for research purposes in their design phase. Students will utilize various online platforms to design an infographic that can be shared with relevant individuals in the community and others in the school building

Students learn more about how muscles work and how biomedical engineers can help keep the muscular system healthy. Following the engineering design process, they create their own biomedical device to aid in the recovery of a strained bicep. They discover the importance of rest to muscle recovery and that muscles (just like engineers!) work together to achieve a common goal.

These resources are driven by the Next Generation Science Standards. In particular these activities allow students to practice various Science & Engineering Practices, such as “Constructing explanations (for science) and designing solutions (for engineering).” Considering these resources are available for a K-5 audience, we’ve only included the standards for grades 3-5. These activities are great for at-home learning and engaging students with their surroundings. 

This Force and motion Roller Coaster activity was done with my 5th grade class and they enjoyed it. It took longer than a normal science period but was a fun end of the year activity to help students stay engaged to their learning. Graphic created by Ashley Moses Author: Ashley Moses Date Added: 06/14/2021Creative Commons Attribution  Language: English  

How can you tell if harmful bacteria are in your food or water that might make you sick? What you eat or drink can be contaminated with bacteria, viruses, parasites and toxins—pathogens that can be harmful or even fatal. Students learn which contaminants have the greatest health risks and how they enter the food supply. While food supply contaminants can be identified from cultures grown in labs, bioengineers are creating technologies to make the detection of contaminated food quicker, easier and more effective.

In this online learning module, you will: 1: Understand blended learning models2: Learn to design blended learning experiences

This course will help students in a university setting to prepare for projects with a problem-based learning approach in an international environment. It will support you to define your role as a student, give guidance for being a member of an international group of students, as well as for working on a research project or with companies. This version of the course is intended for students, but also for teachers who can use the materials fully or partly in their courses. This is also why most of the materials are available for download in editable formats. The course is developed as part of the Erasmus+ project EPIC.

This course will help teachers in a university setting to prepare for projects with a problem-based learning approach in an international context. It will support you to define your role as a supervisor or tutor, give guidance for remotely supervising an international group of students as well as for working with companies on joint projects. The materials are produced as part of the Erasmus+ project EPIC.

Students learn about the role engineers and engineering play in repairing severe bone fractures. They acquire knowledge about the design and development of implant rods, pins, plates, screws and bone grafts. They learn about materials science, biocompatibility and minimally-invasive surgery.

A bungee jump involves jumping from a tall structure while connected to a large elastic cord. Design a bungee jump that is "safe" for a hard-boiled egg. Create a safety egg harness and connect it to a rubber band, which is your the "bungee cord." Finally, attach your bungee cord to a force sensor to measures the forces that push or pull your egg.

This lesson is a pre-lesson to 'Human Skeleton'. The lesson is interactive and uses PowerPoint and other embedded links to evoke students' (Teacher-Education) prior- knowledge. It uses Problem-Based Learning (PBL) as a methodology.
This lesson is expected to bring out the tenets of Constructivism, such as students working: collaboratively; as active agents; owning the learning; being interactive; exploiting their prior knowledge and their lecturer functioning as a facilitator (teacher autonomy).
This is expected to be an approach that the teachers to be may try with their pupils.