Thank you for sharing the website and presentations with us. Dr. Borasi!!

It is a door for me to see the STEM in K-12.

Thanks for the comment, Karl.  I checked out your project, and it's fascinating.  Thanks for connecting. Shared a comment on your page.

Karl, 

Thanks for sharing and I particularly agree that awareness of the accessibility of tools can be a hindrance. For example, in our spring course we introduced teachers to Tinkercad, 3-D files, and augmented reality. We spent about 45 minutes in class engaging teachers in different 3-D experiences. We had dinosaurs walking around the room, models of the Earth on a Merge Cube, and even an AR math activity with GeoGebra. The experience was exciting for teachers but it still seemed inaccessible to many of them. We transitioned from this F2F experience to an online module and required teachers to create a 3-D design. We provided a few short tutorial videos and encouraged teachers to use Tinkercad. Some teachers made augmented reality projects while others made shapes to be printed and used as a manipulative in class. The ideas teachers came up with were outstanding! For me, it was great to see teachers reflect on this experience and recognize how accessible this technology can be. Many teachers had assumed augmented reality and 3-D shapes required lots of coding knowledge. This is not the case as there are now so many tools and apps that make engaging with this technology fairly straightforward.

Hi Michael,

I love this example of iterating on the teaching and learning methods your project was using with your master teachers. I'm taking away the idea of differentiated learning here: seems like through an online module, teachers could absorb and interact with the new digital experiences at their own pace. The requirement of making a 3-D design would seem to help teachers jump right in a use the digital tools, a great way to engage so many modes of thinking and learning! In our space at Chicago Children's Museum, we are working with a different audience (children and their families) and different tech (hammers, saws, power drills), but we have seen the same deep engagement when we give our participants a clear but open-ended directive (such as "make something that rolls") and give them the time and space to engage with the tools in the space. (The best way to learn how to use a hammer is to... try and use the hammer).

And thank you and your team for your timely work on digital learning! I know I'll be digging into this more into my own work.

Thank you for watching our video and for your comment, Kim.  I just watched your video and really appreciate the work that you are doing to support student and family engagement in your space at Chicago Children's Museum.  Really interesting findings that "the design of tinkering activities can boost the amount of engineering and other STEM-related talk among children and their caregivers."  

While we did not talk about this aspect of our project (given the 3 minute limit!), one of our partners is the Rochester Museum and Science Center, and we have discussed what we as educators can learn from students' engagement in these informal learning spaces, and also what we can contribute to help making these informal spaces more robust for students' and families' STEM learning.

We will definitely be interested in following your findings and connecting to incorporate these types of experiences for students and families in our science center!

Hi Wing, and thanks for the comment. I viewed your video, and I'm intrigued with the community outreach that your team has generated for this project. Nice ties to STEM and career engagement. 

Wow, big question, Angela! And thank you for asking it.  I will also prompt my colleagues to jump in to the response to share, as they view & engage with our showcase. Successes range from new ways of thinking about practice at the intersection with digital tools and digitally-rich practices to sharing of MTF expertise with other faculty in cohort school districts.  Challenges have come to the forefront with the transition to remote / distance learning in a time of crisis, and supports we provide range from the classroom conversations, leadership seminars for the MTFs, to our Center for Learning in the Digital Age at Warner, the K-12 Digital Consoritum that emanated from collaborative work with regional school districts and the Center for Learning in the Digital Age, and the terrific work that originates from the Center for Professional Development and Education Reform - all housed within the Warner School.

Hi Angela,  Thanks for the question and I’ll chime in with some other details.  As you can imagine there have been lots of both — challenges and successes.  One of the main challenges is having teachers with varied access to technology.  Most of the districts and fellows we work with are in different places as it relates to digital conversions and other tech. in the buildings (e.g. some with makerspaces).  This made it difficult to focus on one technology or tool to spend time with, the variety kept it realistic and gave fellows lessons to learn from each other.  The practicum experience has been a key support in having fellows implement digitally-rich teaching practices.  Part of the practicum is creating a portfolio showing proficiency in key practices, like implementing a new digital resource.  The practicum spans a couple semesters and each fellow gets to work in their context and share the lessons they learned with a larger group.  In this way we try to give the fellows extended time, multiple experiences, and productive framework to approach these ideas in their unique contexts.   

Hi Angela.  Thank you for your thoughtful question!  I will add to my colleagues' responses to include another aspect of our project not shared in the video (3-minutes is short!), which is mentoring support.  Each of our fellows in this "Master Teacher Fellows" program actually has an experienced STEM teacher/project staff member as a mentor to be their thinking partner and collaborator as they work to make shifts in their instructional practices including the incorporation of technology to enhance and transform learning.

This is based on our belief that ALL of us can use a mentor/coach to continually improve our practice, no matter how long we have been teaching.  We believe this is important in supporting fellows to try new technologies for specific math and science learning goals in their classrooms.  Mentors will also support fellows in their development as teacher leaders supporting digitally-rich instruction as they work to impact not just their own classrooms, but their colleagues.

Just thought I'd share this as you asked about support for the teachers as they "on board" and try out new technologies to advance students' mathematics and science learning.

(And I am going to watch your video now! :) )

Hi Susan, I'm one of the fellows in the program so I can speak a bit to your question with regards to experiences at my own district.  Our district leadership has intentionally built capacity for effective technology integration through implementing a number of initiatives.  For example, teachers who have more experience effectively utilizing technology in their classrooms host "learning labs" several times throughout the year.  Substitute teachers are booked and teachers are given release time to observe a digitally rich lesson in a colleague's classroom.   Other times, we do a "travelling learning lab," where a substitute is booked for my classroom and I go teach a digitally rich lesson directly in a colleague's classroom.  Specific protocols for following up with colleagues post-lesson have been articulated and there is additional support available for colleagues who desire to try something new.  Additionally, our district has hosted what we call a "digifest," for the past couple of summers.  This is a series of professional development days that is hosted by teachers, for teachers.  We are all strongly encouraged to submit proposals for technology topics that we can teach and then we design a presentation that meets the needs of our peers.  It has been a lot of fun and I've enjoyed being both a participant and a presenter at our digifest days. 

Lastly, the biggest source of inspiration for teachers to try new things comes from the culture we have built.  Effectively technology usage is modeled by administrators and there is very much a culture of trust and productive risk-taking.  I have always felt freedom to try something new, knowing that no matter how it went I always was given permission to learn from the experience and "fail forward."  

   

Thanks for sharing this, Nicole! I head up a MTF program for STEM and I think I will suggest this model to my Fellows, in case they might want to try to implement it for their leadership projects next year! Great job!

I'd like to pick up on Raffaella's point about how the Fellows may have been tapped as having expertise in technology during this period of teachers providing learning experiences to students at a distance. Technologies used in the classroom setting do not always transfer easily to use at a distance. But beyond specific technologies, your Fellows have likely developed broader ways of thinking about how technology can support the learning processes in STEM. If you have any examples (antecdotally) of ways Fellows have supported their own stduents online or helped other teachers, please share.

Hello Hollyylynne,

As you suggest, we consistently work to develop mindsets around technology in service to learning. in specific, what it means to be reform-minded STEM teachers. With this as our foundation you are correct that many fellows have developed broader ways of thinking about digitally rich tech integration in STEM. One example I have is a fellow who is developing a professional learning series for New York State Master Teachers (Not Noyce fellows) to be implemented this week using Schoology toward Mastery and Completion Learning. We continue to learn about other examples as time goes on.

Thanks for the example of how one of your fellows is engaging others in a professional learning series about using Schoology. This is a nice example of a fellow transitioning to a leadership role!

I also like the overall focus on reform-minded STEM teaching. Is there a specific framework or guiding principles that you all use to connect the teachers' experiences across the 3 courses?

This is a great question and one that we continue to wrestle with, as do our fellows. A component of research that has threaded through the project is teacher led. We have had our fellows develop "Problems of Practice (PoP)" (v.1 and currently v. 2) in which they engage in an action research project. This has led to fellows gaining a better understanding of the learning that happens in their classroom and many have focused on motivation (and autonomy specifically). Covid has disrupted the v.2 PoP but we will take it up again as soon as feasible. We expect to learn a great deal about tech integration and learning outcomes from these projects from both student learning and fellow learning. 

Every phase of this project has reflection built in and we use this in our annual project evaluation. The sources come from fellows, instructors, mentors, and project leads.

Great that you built teacher research and reflection in to the project - I look forward to learning more about what you find as your program goes forward!

Thank you, Raffaella, I look forward to learning more about the outcomes of this project!

Hi Betsy,

Thank you for watching our video and for your comments.  I just watched your video and appreciate the opportunity for students to explore emerging digital tools like the use of the NASA Aeropod in support of a STEM Literacy Community of Practice.  Really interesting work.

We have also been supporting our fellows to explore digital tools that would transform their math and science instruction.  This has been a big focus of the third course in the series described in the video.  We too are working to meet fellows and districts where they are with both use and access to technology, as well as introducing new possibilities.

Exciting work in challenging times.  Thank you for watching!

Hi Monica, I am a teacher in the program and have found that there is support among the teachers in the program to encourage experimenting with technology in our classrooms. Teachers also work with mentors that help with navigating and practicing new tech. For most k-12 teachers, having opportunities to experience new technology is a major obstacle. We are encouraged in the program to dive in and experience the messiness that may arise.

Thank you for your response Diane!

Thanks for the invitation to our MTFs to join STEMtlnet.org.  I recently participated in one of the webinars organized by this group around the role teacher leaders have played in supporting their colleagues - and students - in this time of disruption, and found it very valuable.  I will be following the online discussion following that event, and I hope some of our Fellows will do the same.

Yes, thank you Joni!  We recently sent out information to our fellows about joining STEMtlnet.org as well.  Great resource to help support and sustain their work. 

In terms of taking leadership roles now, we have purposefully spent these first two years of our project focusing on fellows own beliefs, understandings, and practices related to reform-minded STEM teaching and learning.  We have felt that it is important that fellows are grounded in the "why" as they work to shift their practices and influence others.  That being said, we also, from the beginning, work to support fellows' identities as leaders/influencers of others beyond their own classroom.  This will become foregrounded in our work in the next three years as we support fellows' communication, coaching, and professional learning skills.  

In addition, many fellows are already (and have been) engaging in leadership activities in their schools (see Nicole's post above!). We are excited to see all that fellows will do to support high-quality STEM teaching in their classrooms, districts, and beyond over the next several years.

Hi Beth, I'm one of the fellows in this project so I can speak directly to my experiences with integration of school district curriculum & standards and our coursework.  I've found that so much of the work that I do in the program is DIRECTLY related to my curriculum.  For example, we redesigned two units so far - utilizing the Understanding by Design framework.  We were able to choose units that we are already teaching, so while redesigning the units was a lot of work, it was work that my students and I were able to benefit from directly.  That's the case with a lot of what we do.  In a different post, Michael referenced the "Problems of Practice," that were another assignment within the project.  This was important work where we identified something within our teaching practice that we wanted to improve (or further research) and then we engaged in a months-long research, implementation, analysis, and reflection cycle.  I found this work to be tremendously valuable and personally rewarding.

Throughout each of the courses we've taken so far, I've always come away with fresh ideas that I can try with my own students, addressing my own curriculum and standards.  Part of this is due to the structure of the courses themselves and the learning activities we engage in and part of it is the result of being a member of this highly motivated and energetic community of educators.   We all push ourselves to do better, be better.

You are right that the day-to-day expectations of teaching and learning can be overwhelming.  The many direct connections between our coursework and my teaching practice make the work we do in this program feel both relevant and rewarding.  We also have a very strong mentor-ship component in the program.  The mentor-mentee relationship has been very intentionally established and our mentors have been a tremendous support.

   

Thank you for your response Nicole!

Beth, you raise a really important questions here. In designing this project, we built on what worked (and did not work) in our previous two MTFs - and some key elements were (a) giving a clear taste to applicants of what this 5-year commitment would look like by having them participate in a mandated workshops as part of the recruiting, (b) creating a series of courses and other experiences that were directly meaningful for the Fellows, and (c) providing each Fellow with a mentor (see Cindy Callard's response earlier for more information on this point).

We continue to be amazed at what our Fellows are willing and able to take on, though, so this is another issue I'd love some of our Fellows to speak to directly. 

Thanks for your response! I would love to hear from some of the fellows. 

Hi Beth,

Like Nicole, I am also one of the fellows in the project.  The work we do translates into the classroom on a daily basis.  I echo Nicole's statements, both the Understanding by Design (UbD) and the Problem of Practice (PoP) had immediate impact and because I designed and created them, they were exactly what I wanted them to be.  I could personally align them to the district standards, as well as to what I already teach, to enhance my classroom and teaching.

As far as the teaching and learning piece, you raise a good point about teachers being overwhelmed.  I personally feel the key here is to allow each teachers to adopt at their own pace.  I once had a principal who used the phrase "Nobody likes change but a baby with a dirty diaper."  Forcing additional technologies and expectations on teachers without support will surely lead to a greater feeling of being overwhelmed.   When a teacher in district finds and uses new technology, and it's successful in terms of student engagement and learning, that tends to spread pretty quickly.  The idea is leverage that technology to make teaching and learning not only more effective, but more efficient as well.

Thank you for your response Fred!

Ideally, we designed our three courses preparing to leverage technology in STEM classrooms to be offered in a hybrid-online format.  We think this mode of delivery is ideal, because on the one hand we have from the very beginning tried to minimize face-to-face time in our program (as several of our Fellows need to drive an hour or more to come to campus), and on the other hand there are some powerful experiential learning activities we wanted to involve our Fellows in that are most suited for a face-to-face environment. 

That said, a version of one of the three courses (the second course, EDE484A) has already been offered fully online this semester for another audience, and the third course has also been taught fully online for the second half of the semester, due to COVID-19 restrictions.  Some members of our team are continuing to experiment with ways to substitute face-to-face experiences with fully online ones, and we are confident that it would be possible to offer our sequence of 3 courses fully online and still provide a very powerful experience for Fellows.

Personally, I would still find it valuable to have some component of the program to happen face-to-face, to fully take advantage of some unique learning affordances this modality offers. 

Hi Andrew, and thank you for your comment and question.  I just watched your video, and found it really interesting research and findings.  I also felt, as one of the other posts noted, that there is a strong connection to Deci and Ryan's motivation theory and relatedness/belongingness.  

While we have not focused directly on the issue of gender-related STEM stereotypes in our project, issues of equity and understanding equitable teaching practices are at the heart of our work.  For students in rural settings, English Language Learners, students with special needs, students of color, etc., this work is critical.

In addition to supporting our fellows' understandings of motivation theory and how it connects with learning, we have also grounded our fellows in important tenets of learning...one of them being that "Learning is social" and that "Knowledge is constructed in shared spaces."  This issue of belonging and that learning is social has been even more critical to consider as we teach and interact with students in fully online spaces.

Thank you again for sharing!

Hi Jennifer,

Thank you for watching our video and for your question.  In addition to Raffaella's response below related to the evaluation component of our project, we have also recently partnered with Rice University and 5 other institutions to submit a Noyce Track 4 proposal last fall.  The purpose of the project is "to study the retention and persistence of Noyce Master Teaching Fellows (MTFs) in high-need schools beyond their teaching commitment in relation to their motivation (intrinsic value and self-efficacy for teaching), leadership skills, diversity dispositions, social networks, and school-work environment."  We will actually have a comparable group of non-Noyce teachers with similar background characteristics as a control group. This will not actually include the fellows in our current project due to the timing of the two projects, but we will be following up with our previous two cohorts of Noyce Fellows, as Raffaella noted in her post.  We are hopeful that we are approved, as we would love to more systematically research the continued work of the fellows in their communities and what seemed to be particularly impactful for them from the project. Fingers crossed for funding!