This application addresses broad Challenge Area (12) Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education (STEM) and specific Challenge Topic 12-ES-101: Materials Development for Environmental Health curriculum. The WGBH Educational Foundation proposes to produce, assemble, and disseminate a multimedia collection of purpose-built resources to assist K-12 teachers and students to engage deeply with issues of environmental health. Developed for featured posting on WGBH's Teachers'Domain digital library site (www.teachersdomain.org), these videos and supporting materials will be drawn primarily from such PBS television programs as NOVA, Frontline, Nature, and Arthur. They will be customized and contextualized for age-appropriate understanding, easy access, and classroom accessibility, correlated to national and state- specific curriculum standards, and shared, free-of-charge, with educators throughout the world. We will also integrate these resources within a series of online professional development courses to be offered through the PBS TeacherLine service, higher education institutions, and other distribution channels. The overarching goal of the proposed project is to enhance understanding of environmental health issues among teachers and students from Kindergarten through Grade 12. Toward such ends, we will produce engaging, rich-media-based materials to assist in both learning and teaching this content, providing tools and strategies for integrating these topics within ongoing classes across the curriculum as well as within pre-service and in-service training programs. By using the Teachers'Domain platform, we are assured of extensive and widespread reach - this digital library has already received over 18 million site visits since its launch several years ago and currently has 360,000 registered users from 179 countries (including 67% of the public schools in the U.S.). Usage continues to grow rapidly as knowledge of its availability expands - average monthly visits total approximately 700,000, with the rate of cumulative visits doubling every 6-7 months. A distinguished team of scientists, developers, and educators will be assembled for this initiative. Complementing the core Teachers'Domain production team at WGBH will be environmental health experts from the Boston Public Health Commission (led by Margaret Reid) and the NIH/NIEHS Centers for Environmental Health at the Harvard School of Public Health (led by Ann Backus) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (led by Dr. Karen Vandiver), as well as doctors and scientists from the Boston Medical Center and practicing teachers from local communities throughout the state. The Principal Investigator will beTed Sicker, Senior Executive Producer at WGBH and Director of the Teachers'Domain program since its inception. Publice Health Relevance: The relevance of the proposed materials development project is described below. The full Program Narrative is presented on the PHS 398 Research Plan section of this proposal. We expect this project to have significant and lasting impact on K-12 educators, as the proposed products - a digital library collection of purpose built, rich-media resources targeting environmental health science issues and a series of companion online professional development course modules - will serve both to increase their own understanding of related content and to build their capacity for integrating this information within ongoing curricular activities, from Kindergarten through Grade 12. As a result, better informed students and teachers will not only be empowered to avoid adverse environmental exposures, but also helped to become knowledgable citizens who can assess and affect important public health issues.
SF 424 (R&R) Teachers'Domain: Environmental Health Section 7 -- Narrative The relevance of the proposed materials development project is described below. The full Program Narrative is presented on the PHS 398 Research Plan section of this proposal. We expect this project to have significant and lasting impact on K-12 educators, as the proposed products - a digital library collection of purpose built, rich-media resources targeting environmental health science issues and a series of companion online professional development course modules - will serve both to increase their own understanding of related content and to build their capacity for integrating this information within ongoing curricular activities, from Kindergarten through Grade 12. As a result, better informed students and teachers will not only be empowered to avoid adverse environmental exposures, but also helped to become knowledgable citizens who can assess and affect important public health issues.
