This project creates four half-year units in two subject areas, Force and Motion and Energy Transformations, for two grade bands, K-2 and 3-5. Engineering design, the construction of toys, and problem based learning are the bases of scientific concept development. The curriculum is being published online at the City Technology website and in print form by Science Source. The materials are very simple, mostly available in typical schools. Other materials are being made available as kits through Science Source. The project also does research on student learning as it develops the products. Additional products include concept inventories for the units, assessments, and materials for the professional development of teachers. Pilot and field tests are planned to occur in 17 elementary schools in Nashville, New York, Los Angeles, Washington DC, and Las Vegas. Teachers carrying out these tests receive 40 hours of professional development.
This project was designed to develop materials that promote integration of engineering, science, math and literacy in the elementary grades, and to support the use of these materials. In the course of the curriculum activities, children design, make, and test their own devices. These include cardboard mechanisms that animate stories; paper pop-ups; gravity-, elastic-, and electric-powered cars; and electrified mystery boxes and dioramas. Through these activities, students develop an understanding of systems, models, constraints, tradeoffs and redesign, which are core concepts in engineering. Physics concepts include force, motion, energy, electricity, friction and gravity; and math is widely used in measurement and data analysis. The project has advanced knowledge through the following features: Focus on underrepresented populations: A major goal of the project was to make engineering accessible to diverse populations. The teaching materials are very inexpensive, and do not rely on any permanent equipment or maintenance. Nearly all of the schools in which the materials were developed, pilot- and field-tested serve largely low-income underrepresented-minority populations in Central Brooklyn; the Watts, West Adams and Eagle Rock districts of Los Angeles; and two rural Northern Minnesota districts with substantial Native American (Ojibwe) populations. Developmental appropriateness for grades Pre-K-5: Few elementary engineering education programs exist in the US. This project not only focused on these grades, but was closely attentive to child development and was supported by a cognitive research program. Focus on engineering design, troubleshooting and redesign: The design projects are open-ended, and therefore designed to leave wide room for variations and error. The devices often don’t work as expected, or don’t work at all. Students then have to identify the problems, make conjectures about underlying causes, and then test these conjectures by using them to predict how design changes will address the issues. Focus on concepts of systems, modeling, measurement, data analysis, and cause-and-effect relationships: Each unit develops methods of understanding and representing the designs as systems, which can be represented by making models. Students test their devices by making measurements, analyze their data to look for possible causes of failure, and use these inferences as a basis for redesign. Integration among curriculum components. The project has developed the following components in parallel, as part of an integrated whole: teacher and student materials, strategies for professional development, assessment instruments and classroom supplies. Integration among subject areas: Because it requires open-ended project work, engineering is situated as a focus for subject area integration. The curriculum and professional development materials were designed to integrate math, science, literacy, and art. Collaboration between university STEM faculty and elementary teachers: The expertise of classroom teachers is often overlooked by curriculum and professional developers. The project drew upon these resources, by engaging a core group of 12 NYC elementary teachers as co-designers of curriculum and professional development, conference presenters and co-authors. This core teacher group continues to meet regularly. The project is widely recognized as one of the few efforts of its kind nationally (NAE, 2009, 74; Kolodner, 2014). Project personnel, including both university faculty and elementary teachers, have conducted at least four workshops at each of the past five NSTA Annual Meetings, and have two workshops scheduled at the 2015 NCTM Annual Meeting. Teachers from the core group have presented twice each at the National Association for the Education of young Children (NAEYC), the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), and the Annual Meeting of the National Art Education Association (NAEA). Invited talks and workshops by teachers and project staff have taken place at the Texas A&M Environmental Sciences Summer Institute and the Virginia Children’s Engineering Convention. For the past two years, the New York City Department of Education has underwritten teacher workshops and classroom implementation by approximately 50 teachers each year. Research outcomes have been presented at national meetings of the American Educational Research Association (AERA), American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) and National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST).
