What an appropriate time to celebrate the NSTA Conference with a tribute to an awesome collection of STEM resources! For those not familiar with STEM education, imagine the power in combining Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math into a program that brings cross curricular understanding with real world application. Those familiar with Daniel Pink even understand the importance of a fine arts contribution to STEM. Now combine the outstanding and first rate resources of Siemens Corporation and Discovery Education. Welcome to a posting that highlights a great web site based on STEM, PBL, and 21st Century education! Don't miss any part of this posting, including the conclusion which includes what may be the best free professional development opportunity for STEM educators this summer! As always feel free to follow me on twitter at (@mjgormans) and I will be sure to follow you back and we can learn from one another! You are also invited to visit my 21centuryedtech Wiki! Please enjoy and share this post with others! Have a great week! - Mike
"a suite of free online learning games that encourage middle school to early high school-age youth to explore careers in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).
Unlike many efforts to get kids excited about STEM, these games connect directly to their passions, abilities, and sense of identity, exposing them to the breadth and variety of STEM-based professions and allowing them to explore the potential pathways to these interesting careers."
PBS Teachers is a wonderful site with lots of resources and supplemental material for teachers to use with students. This particular link will take you directly to the STEM education resource center: Professional Development and the focus on this page is Global Climate Change Modules from PBS and NASA. However, if you look at the top of the page you can choose a specific grade band and then within that there are various content areas that can be chosen. Looks like a very interesting site with lots of resources to select from.
"This workspace was created for educators to share and categorize livebinders by subject, grade-level, and whatever else makes sense. Please feel free to add binders, pages, and new sections." General topics include: web 2.0, special needs, tutorials, ePortfolios, STEM projects, and more.
"Are you ready to solve the challenges of space?
Join the RealWorld-InWorld NASA Engineering Design Challenge!
This is a unique education initiative that targets students in grades 9-12 and encourages them to explore and build skills essential for successful careers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) through two phases of project-based learning and team competition"
Created through a grant from the Department of Education, we have teamed up to produce terrific videos bringing Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) principals to life in a fun educational experience.
These videos are targeted to middle school students. The first X-Stream Science episodes along with lesson plans for students and teachers are available to view and download on this web site at no cost."
From basic math to precalculus, Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 helps you visualize and see mathematical concepts as you've never seen them before.
With the Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 free download, you get:
* A full-featured graphing calculator
* The Formulas and Equations Library
* The Triangle Solver
* The Unit Conversion tool
* Ink handwriting support
The company has released its latest version of Mathematics as a free download. The upgrade includes ink handwriting support and a full-featured grqphic calculator. It is designed to help middle and high school students learn to solve equations step by step while it provides an overview of fundamental STEM concepts.
A collection of interactive lessons for Math and Science on Place Value, Number Lines, Order Whole Numbers, Estimate Whole Numbers, Integers, Expanded Notation, Roots & Stems, Plant Cells, Photosynthesis, Plants With Seeds, Gymnosperms, Angiosperms, Flowers, Plants Without Seeds, Mosses & Ferns, Plant Adaptions, The Kindoms of Life
Lessonwriter creates lesson plans and instructional materials for teaching English language skills from any reading passage.
* Copy & paste any text you choose into LessonWriter.
* LessonWriter analyzes text for vocabulary, grammar and usage, pronunciation, and word roots and stems.
* Then, LessonWriter writes a lesson plan and a lesson that teaches the skills you chose in the context of the passage - automatically.
"Discovery Education, Sanford Health and WebMD teamed up to create a new program called fit 4 the classroom, an extension of the fit initiative designed to educate, motivate, and inspire children of all ages to live a healthy lifestyle. You will find a series of elementary lesson plans with engaging activities and videos that can tie into your math, science and other subjects and demonstrate the importance of a balanced daily life."
"This K-6 program is designed to promote science literacy in elementary schools through free hands-on science activities and supporting videos. Access fun activities and enter to win a school-wide science assembly! "
Thinking Blocks is a suite of learning tools designed to help students solve math word problems accurately and efficiently. Using brightly colored blocks, students model mathematical relationships and identify known and unknown quantities. The model provides students with a powerful image that organizes information and simplifies the problem solving process. By modeling increasingly complex word problems, students develop strong reasoning skills which will facilitate the transition from arithmetic to algebra.
Lab Out Loud is a podcast, hosted by two science teachers, that discusses science news and science education by interviewing leading scientists, researchers, science writers and other important figures in the field.