Putting the E in STEM with Online Curriculum from NASA

This week, I am preparing for a workshop I’m delivering next week for “The Magic of i-STEM Summer Institute”, a state-wide conference coordinated by the State Department of Education, Idaho Professional-Technical Education, educators, businesses, and industry.  The goal of the conference is to support science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education in grades Kindergarten through 12th grade and my workshop, entitled “Putting the E in STEM”, will introduce teachers to the engineering design process as a way to facilitate critical thinking and learning in STEM.

In this workshop, I’ll use the curriculum developed by the NASA Education team at Goddard Space Center called NASA’s BEST Students, which was recently converted into an online resource by Learning.com.  (BEST stands for Beginning Engineering Science and Technology)  The NASA’s BEST Students program was designed to teach students the Engineering Design Process, which is a series of steps engineers use for problem solving.

I’m excited to deliver this hands-on workshop for STEM teachers in Idaho, but even more excited at the opportunity to get this wonderful resource in the hands of K-8 teachers everywhere.  If you are interested in receiving a license to the NASA’s BEST students curriculum from Learning.com, please visit the FREE TEACHER ACCOUNT page to request an account.  If you have any questions at all about how to implement this or any other STEM curriculum in your classroom or school, please don’t hesitate to contact me.  I am always happy to provide insight into how to best integrate the STEM subjects to improve student engagement and prepare them for the careers and college requirements in the 21st century.