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2024 NSF ITEST PI Meeting Project Summaries
Welcome to the ITEST Project Summaries Library! These one page artifacts were created to share information and unpack project work across the three ITEST pillars 1) Innovative Use of Technology in Teaching and Learning, 2) Partnerships for Career and Workforce Preparation, and 3) Strategies for Equity in STEM Education.
We invite you to search, filter, and explore these pages—and add comments to engage with your colleagues!
Our primary goal is to enhance children's problem-solving and computational thinking (CT) skills through engaging and interactive embodied learning experiences. To achieve this, we've created a unique mixed-reality learning environment designed specifically for young children. In this innovative setting, children engage in activities where they mimic robot movements—they move forwards and backwards, and turn right or left according to predefined symbols. This interactive environment…
SUPERCHARGE is an after-school STEM program wrapping up its first year in four Chicago high schools. The goal of SUPERCHARGE is to give students experiences with STEM, specifically with robotics, automation, and green energies, that build their interest and confidence. Students attend the club for 90 minutes each week where they work through sets of activities that build skills with connections to green energies and environmental justice. Activity sets culminate in an authentic project each…
The primary goal of our project is to improve achievement and interest in mathematics of New York City Black and Latinx students in grades 1-3 to build a foundation for interest and success in future STEM careers. We are working with two Title I schools in Brooklyn, NY, where we have 12 teachers-participants teaching in ICT (large percentage of students with disabilities) and bilingual (large percentage of English language learners) classrooms. In the first year of the project, the project team…
Model Math Education (ModelME) with embedded Dream2B game is an integrated supplemental curriculum for 4th-6th grade inclusive settings. The program engages students in universally-designed problem-solving challenges rooted in authentic STEM and ICT careers. Executive function scaffolds, action adaptive nudges, and dynamic assessments are embedded throughout the game and the wrap around curriculum. The program has been used by over 15 teachers and 350 elementary and middle school students and…
The objectives of the project include:1) increase STEM and ICT career awareness by providing opportunities for teachers and students to learn about how STEM content disciplines can fully integrate technology and engineering, 2) provide professional development for STEM teachers to learn about quantum related topics and effective curricular connections, 3) provide student summer STEM camps to engage students in technology-rich STEM/QIS experiences, and 4) research a new professional development…
This project pairs autistic college mentors with autistic high school mentees in New York City to create interest-based STEAM projects. In this way, the mentors can engage with the high school students by helping with their projects, learning what they care about and who they are as people, and then give tailored advice about the high school to college transition, support services, academic courses, and extracurricular activities that align with the mentee’s strengths and interests. We use a co…
The NSF ITEST project has been a concerted effort towards integrating STEM education with art and design (STEAM) to kindle interest in plant sciences and promote career readiness in high-tech agriculture. Over the reporting year, the project engaged 108 students from six high schools, implementing a teaching module that involves collaborative teams working on plant science investigation, 3D modeling, and its applications in Augmented Virtual Reality (AVR) platforms and science communication.…
This project provides direct student learning opportunities to foster preschoolers’ spatial learning and STEM identity, particularly for underrepresented and underserved groups, by developing and researching a preschool mathematics curriculum supplement that leverages digital touch-screen tablets and Augmented Reality technologies. Spatial thinking, which includes spatial orientation, is often ignored in formal education settings during the early years. This is a significant curricular…
Over the last ten months, students in New York City schools have experienced several days of haze due to wildfires, repeated urban floods, an earthquake, and an eclipse. Between fear mongering news and social media posts, students and educators may be left with a sense of confusion, if not gloom. We posit that the use of interactive information platforms from state and national agencies (e.g., NOAA, USGS, NYSDEC) can fill an information gap in real time, favorable to student-driven inquiry,…
Artificial intelligence (AI) and its teaching in the K-12 grades has been championed as a vital need for the United States due to the technology’s future prominence in the 21st century. However, there remain several barriers including the inter- disciplinary knowledge needed and the lack of formal training or preparation for teachers to implement these topics in middle school curriculum. We present ImageSTEAM, a teacher professional development for creating lessons for middle school grades 6-8…