Oil Spill! Connecting STEM activities to real world problems

I recently had another opportunity to observe a science program in an after school setting, this time at Greenleaf Elementary School in Oakland, CA.  The rising fifth graders have an hour and a half of STEM programming after lunch every afternoon, and the day I visited they did an activity about cleaning up oil in the ocean.  They worked with trays filled a few inches with water, feathers, straws, cotton balls and sponges.

I think it's especially challenging to lead activities like this, where the materials you have to work with are analogies of what really happens in the real world.  I was impressed with the ways the facilitator drew connections between the activity they were doing and what happens in the real world.

The facilitator started the activity by asking the kids what they already knew about oil spills.  I was struck by how many hands went in the air, and details the kids knew including the catastrophic spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

The group discussed what kinds of engineers help solve the environmental problems caused by oil spills - chemical and environmental engineers.

In groups, the kids examined their 'oceans' of water, with oil floating on top.  They discussed and wrote observations in their science notebooks.

The facilitator introduced some terms and definitions and then passed out materials the kids would use to try to clean up the oil.

As kids formulated their plans for working together to get the oil off the feathers and out of the 'ocean', the facilitator passed around photos of actual oil spills and the effects they have on wildlife.  Then it was time to work together to figure out how to use materials to clean up the oil.

During the discussion after the activity, the kids all said that they enjoyed this activity even though it was very difficult to get all the oil out of the water and off of the feathers.  

In order to help kids make connections between the science activities we do after school and science in the real world, here are some things we see quality programs doing:

• Ask kids what they already know about related issues
• Show kids pictures, news articles or videos
• Introduce kids to a scientist who works on the problem in the field
• Take a field trip
• Participate in a citizen science project to help a scientist conduct a study on a related issue

Let us know some ways that your after school science program connects kids to real world science!

Building Effective Community Partnerships for Science After School Part II: Finding STEM Resources in Your Community

This is the second part in a two-part series on Building Effective Community Partnerships for Science After School, a workshop we recently hosted at the Up Your Game conference. Read Part I on Including Science Volunteers in Afterschool Programs for more information.

In the second half of our workshop on partnerships for afterschool science, our panel of speakers focused on finding and using community resources. Our first speaker, Leslie Lowes, is an informal education specialist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). NASA has a great many resources available for supporting informal science education (as well as lots of resources for in-school learning), and Leslie helped us navigate where to find them.

NASA has a number of education centers around the country--if you live nearby, contact your center to find out about the availability of public tours. The education centers may also have a representative available from NASA's Speakers Bureau (a great way to find scientists with public communication skills!) or a chapter of the Solar System Ambassadors program, a national program of volunteers that specialize in JPL's work.

NASA also offers customizable curriculum just for out-of-school learning. For elementary school students, the Out of School to Outer Space program offers 15 hours of NASA/solar system science and engineering activities, including teacher training and ongoing support. This program is designed to get 4th and 5th graders "thinking like a scientist." The Space School Musical program, featuring downloadable videos, songs, and a guide to putting on a space-themed musical production, gets kids excited about STEM through song and dance.

For middle school students, NASA focuses on developing science skills through programs like the Summer of Innovation. Programs for high school students are geared toward research and preparation for STEM careers through internships and innovation challenges, like the Real World In World engineering challenge.

Not everyone is close to a NASA center, but many people have a museum or science center in their community. Katie Levedahl, Director of Out-of-School Programs for the California Academy of Sciences joined the panel to talk about how to partner with science centers and museums to bring STEM content to afterschool environments. Katie highlighted the Careers in Science (CiS) program, a multi-year internship program for high school students. CiS interns, along with an Academy scientist, bring science activities to afterschool programs in their communities. Because the interns often come from the communities they visit, they become role models for the afterschool program students. Because museum workers are science content experts, they can be great sources of high-quality STEM activities. Katie talked about other ways that afterschool programs can partner with science museums, including:

• Using the museum as a field trip site
• Connecting with older youth programs (like CiS) to find science mentors for afterschool youth
• Obtaining curriculum and activities from museums, or bringing museum scientist-educators into your program to facilitate activities

For the last presentation, I spoke about the many different resources available through the Coalition for Science After School. In particular, I highlighted our members and the National After School Science Directory as being great places to find local partnerships or connect with programs outside of your immediate area. I also highlighted our Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter pages as being great places to connect with resources, funding streams, events, professional development opportunities, research, and more. These tools are free and easily customizable to your needs.

For the final half hour of the workshop, we engaged in networking and a white-board brainstorming session to identify what individual programs actually need to facilitate STEM partnerships. We ended with a productive conversation on goals and next steps for the workshop participants.

For more information about the workshop--as well a starter kit for getting STEM in your afterschool program--visit Gabrielle Lyon's post on the Project Exploration blog.

Many thanks again to our wonderful speakers and engaged participants, and a special thank you to the California AfterSchool Network and Time Warner Cable for helping to make this workshop a reality.

Math Curriculum Resources

Math is highly interconnected to science, technology and engineering. Math skills like working through equations are essential to working in a lab, designing a computer program, and designing a bridge. Practicing math also helps learners build up their abstract thinking skills and Not only is working through different equations essential to researching in a lab, creating a computer program, or building a bridge. 

What are some math curriculum resources that teach students math skills in an innovative, engaging way? Tell us in the comments or email us at info {at} afterschoolscience {dot} org.

Check out the Science After School Consumers Guide!

Have you seen the Science After School Consumers Guide? The Guide grew out of early discussions amongst Coalition founding members about the need to have a guide to the high-quality, hands-on science content that is available for use in out-of-school time settings. The Lawrence Hall of Science spearheaded a project to find those resources, and conducted a review with the support of the SEDL National Center for Quality Afterschool. 

After an open-nomination period, submissions were reviewed for various indications of quality and categorized by grade, target audience, cost, and subject. Users can search for curricula, activity kits, instructor guides, and web sites that offer appropriate content for learning science on out-of-school time. Real educators from across the country rate and review the resources, and can submit new resources that they think are missing from the Guide.

In addition, the Science After School Consumers Guide partnered with the folks at the Science and Math Informal Learning Educators (SMILE) Pathway (which we profiled here last October) to feature free sample projects and activities from many of the resources listed in the Guide. Check out the bar on the right side of each resource's page to see the activities featured on howtosmile.org (such as here, on the Fetch! page).

For more information on high-quality science curriculum, check out the Coalition's Afterschool Science Activities and Curricula page.

Have you learned How to SMILE?

There's a great new way to find fun science and math activities--and to share your own! Howtosmile.org has just launched as a place where educators in non-school settings--like zoos, museums, and afterschool programs--can communicate and share their STEM activities. As of this writing, there's already over 1000 different science and math activities posted! 


Here's how it works. Once users create an account, they can post guides to their favorite projects. This includes a description, time, materials cost, and subjects addressed, among other things. Other users can post comments on their experience with the activity and even try to tweak it. Activities can be added to user-generated lists to create collections of similar activities, and users can earn badges and points based on their participation.

"SMILE" stands for Science and Math Informal Learning Educators, but howtosmile.org can be used as a resource in lots of settings by non-educators too. Many of the activities are simple enough to be done by parents and kids at home, or by non-scientists in community groups, like Girl Scout troop leaders. The interface is simple enough to use that kids could search for interesting activities on their own. It's free to join, and if you get started soon, you'll have a chance to win an iPad!

Howtosmile is a joint project of science educators and researchers from across the country, including the Lawrence Hall of Science, The Association of Science and Technology Centers (ASTC), the Children's Museum of Houston, the Exploratorium, the New York Hall of Science, the Science Museum of Minnesota, and the National Science Digital Library (NSDL). 

The Coalition for Science After School is proud to be a national partner!

Share your ideas for new science education standards with the Board on Science Education

The Board of Science Education (BOSE), part of the National Academies, has just completed a conceptual framework draft for new science education standards for K-12 students across the country. This framework will provide the basis for a project to be conducted by Achieve, an independent, bipartisan, and non-profit organization dedicated to raising school standards, improve school assessments, and increase accountability. According to the project's website, Achieve hopes to develop new K-12 educational science standards as well as influence the direction of science education across the nation. The project was conducted with the help of Achieve, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the National Science Teachers Association.

The first draft of the conceptual framework is available online, and BOSE is offering the general public the chance to provide feedback with the aim of creating a final draft by winter of this year. You can read the full draft and provide your feedback by going here and clicking on the link at the top of the page.

Education standards often guide the development of new out-of-school programs, so your contribution to the report could help shape the way that afterschool science is taught in the future!

Science of Cooking

Here is an article about a middle school summer science and cooking class.  I wish there were more resources on the science of cooking for kids.  At home, I use Harold McGee's On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen, which is not written for kids.  Same goes for Cooking for Engineers, a fun blog.  I mentioned some resources in a previous post, but does anyone know of others?

Summer Invention Camp

Here is some good press for "Camp Invention." These are week-long camps using materials provided by the National Inventors Hall of Fame. According to the article, they are reaching about 60,000 kids in 47 states.

Camp Invention has a sister program, Club Invention, that is designed for use in after-school programs during the regular school year. Here is a review of that program in the Consumer's Guide to Afterschool Science Resources.

The Science of Brining Your Turkey

In honor of Thanksgiving, I thought I would share this link from one of my new favorite sites, Cooking for Engineers. Michael takes readers through the science behind turkey (and other meat) brining, which is soaking in a salt solution. It is a good refresher on osmosis if you haven't taken biology in a while and a fun amount of trivia for the T-day table. FYI, brining was popular long ago as a way to make imperfect cuts of meat more tender, and it has come back into fashion as we try to be more health-conscious by eating leaner meats. (I learned that at a brining demonstration at the Culinary Institute of America.)

As it relates to work, I think it would be great to have more "science of food/cooking" programs for youth. The only afterschool product that I have found is part of the 4-H Youth Experiences in Science materials. There are several other sites, though, including this one from the Exploratorium. If you know of other ones, please share!

More enrichment, Less basic skills, part 2

Earlier this month, a report in Science stated that elementary schools spend too much time on the basic skills and not enough on enrichment. Now, a report from ACT finds that state standards are not matching up with college expectations. In the area of science, high school teachers tend to emphasize content knowledge over scientific process skills, while college faculty would prefer students with the latter. In general, colleges prefer that students have in-depth understandings of certain knowledge and skills. State standards tend to be wide rather than deep, covering the basics of many categories, but little with any depth. Links: ACT Report / USA Today coverage