Brainstorm

 Ideas for PBI grant Brainstorm away here. ..

We should have a math, science, technology lab where pre-service teachers as well as current teachers could experience "hands-on" activities that would enhance their teaching. We could offer a "hands-on" training sessions in math, science, and technology. It could be a one hour course where pre-service teachers are trained in hands on methods for teaching science labs, using math manipulatives, and in using technology to provide more interactive math and science experiences. I think we often graduate teachers who never experienced hands-on methods for teaching math and/or science in their elementary or secondary experience so therefore they do not know how to offer these experiences to their students once they are in the classroom. The lab experience they get in college level science courses (my background) is not easily transferrable to the science classroom (again my experience). I assume it would be similar in math. You are taught wonderful labs, but then you do not have the same type of equipment or time so it is diffiucult if not impossible to transfer this experience. The course could focus on helping pre-service teachers accumulate a portfolio of inexpensive hands-on activities that involve science, math, and technology and are not time consuming in set up time. The science, math, technology labs should also be equipped with technology such as data collection devices like the PASCO GLX. Science in Motion has these devices but they often go unused because teachers just are not comfortable with them (my personal observation). We have to provide an educational experience for our preservice teachers which makes them comfortable teaching using demonstrations, hands on labs or manipulatives, and technologies in math and science. The handheld data collection devices are usable in teaching both math and science. They allow you to collect real data and then analyze it mathematically so they could be used to aid both math and science teachers. The experience we develop could also incorporate data sharing among our partner schools or other schools wanting to data share. This would demonstrate to our preservice teachers ways in which they can make global connections for their classrooms and incorporate that into their math/science lesssons. We could also offer a summer or weekend component for current teachers where these current classroom teachers would get a similar experience thereby making maximum usage of the science/math/technology lab.
 * R.Rogers- (just a thought) **

Black Enterprise Magazine has some wonderful articles on minorities and STEM. I've listed the links to some of the articles. 1. Women in STEM [] 2. Why we must embrace STEM [] 3. STEM spotlight [] 4. Game time []
 * Black Enterprise Links (B.J.) **

Here is the document where I took notes during our last session on campus.