Project Profile

Over a two-year period, this project will offer 70 middle and high school youths activities in information technology (IT) and science, technology engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. Three interlinked studios will support the workplan. The studios include the Studio@Museum located in the heart of the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History that will provide space for engaging in and displaying hands-on activities and the Studio@Timble Technical High School that will donate staff support and space for after school activities. The Studio@Neighborhood will create mobile sets of IT experiences based on work completed at the other two studios. The various audiences for this project will be youths, parents, and out-of-school-time providers. Summer and academic year activities are included in the workplan. The project has a well-defined workplan that includes activities for IT and STEM. The curriculum is organized into sets of instructions and explorations called Cycles of IT Instruction. This approach encompasses overarching concepts with specific engagements, case studies, and other related activities that will allow youths to deeply explore existing and emerging IT and STEM phenomena. Youths will have access to digital cameras and sound automata sensors that they will use along with Cricket basics and PICOblocks programming to develop chain reactions and interactive displays for parents and other visitors to the museum, festivals, and workshops. Other activities will involve youths in distributed computing through communicating among Crickets, applying IT to biological interpretations, preparing informal demonstrations, logging and sharing data (microcontrollers and data collectors and loggers), and exploring how live animals may be used to form the basis of a technology study.