Strategy 1:
Make STEM real and meaningful by engaging girls in activities that draw on their interests, knowledge, skills, culture, and lived experiences. This helps girls develop a STEM identity and increases their sense of belonging in STEM. (Boucher et al., 2017; Sammet et al., 2016; Bonner & Dornerich, 2016; Erete et al., 2016; Stewart-Gardiner et al., 2013; Civil, 2016; Verdin et al., 2016; Cervantes-Soon, 2016). |
Tips
- Ask girls about their backgrounds, interests, and community to better understand how to connect STEM to their lives, or have girls choose the topics they want to explore.
- Create experiences that allow girls to explore issues or topics they care about and that impact their lives, families, or communities to help girls see the relevancy of STEM.
- Include posters, materials, and examples that reference girls’ communities and experiences; for instance, posters of STEM professionals who mirror the girls.
- Allow time for reflection throughout the activity. You might ask girls to write in a journal or talk with each other about connections to their lives.
PLC Activities
- Devise and discuss strategies to connect your course materials to students’ real-world problems and issues, and implement one strategy in your classroom. For example, use the “Entry/Exit Ticket” activity to find out real-world problems and/or community issues that students want to address (e.g. improving the lives of people with disabilities, access to clean water, city issues like transportation, air pollution, overcrowding) . The “Entry/Exit Ticket” is a question (or prompt) that students respond to on a piece of paper, digital discussion forum like “Blackboard”, or a flashcard. For an “entry ticket” students write down their thoughts during the first 5 minutes of the class and cards are collected. For an “exit ticket”, students write down their thoughts during the last 5 minutes of the class and cards are collected. Then adapt your next class to what students are thinking about.
- How would you use other dialogic methods like “Think-Pair-Share” to connect students’ issues to your course materials? What are other ways to create and organize STEM experiences that are relevant to students’ lives? Discuss with your PLC.
- Explore the opportunities below to make more clear connections to girls lives and discuss obstacles you see in bringing these into your curriculum or settings:
Resources to engage indigenous students:
More resources to make STEM relevant to students
Additional Resources
Diffenbaugh, M. (November 16, 2014). Tips and tools for involving students in lesson planning and content delivery. EdSurge.
O'Brien, T. (2010). Brain-powered science: Teaching and learning with discrepant events. National Science Teachers Association Press. Arlington, VA.
Prince, M. &Felder, R. (March/April 2007). The many faces of inductive teaching and learning.Journal of College Science Teaching, 36(5), 14-20.
Huitt, W. (2005, April). Academic learning time. Educational Psychology Interactive. Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University. (Though some of the sources are a bit dated, the interactives and tables show an alarmingly small amount of time in the typical students' experience for truly engaged meaningful learning each day.)
O'Brien, T. (2010). Brain-powered science: Teaching and learning with discrepant events. National Science Teachers Association Press. Arlington, VA.
Prince, M. &Felder, R. (March/April 2007). The many faces of inductive teaching and learning.Journal of College Science Teaching, 36(5), 14-20.
Huitt, W. (2005, April). Academic learning time. Educational Psychology Interactive. Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University. (Though some of the sources are a bit dated, the interactives and tables show an alarmingly small amount of time in the typical students' experience for truly engaged meaningful learning each day.)