Maker & STEM

Our nation’s continued economic prosperity is closely linked with student success in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Use these resources to explore the critical role STEM education plays in driving innovation, and how schools and districts can expand the capacity and diversity of tomorrow’s STEM workforce.

Afterschool Maker Spaces

Learn how to start an afterschool Maker space in your school

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Funding School Maker Spaces

Familiarize yourself with the funding options and resources that can bring “Making” to your school

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Make and Take

Discover what it takes to create projects made of affordable materials that children can bring home

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Making the Case for Making

Use this resource to share with peers, parents and administrators

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Steps to Creating an Amazing Make Space

Discover the simple steps to organizing and implementing a Maker Space

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The Maker Space Library

Learn the techniques for getting a Maker mindset going in your school, starting with the school library

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What is Design Thinking?

Learn more about the Design Thinking process and how it helps in questioning a problem, assumptions, and overall implications by re-framing the issue in fresh new ways

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What Makes a Maker Space?

Discover the basic elements for a successful Maker curriculum

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Maker Resources

See the wide-range of simple resources available to students and teachers

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Enhancing NGSS Through Makerspaces

Cross-reference the Science and Engineering Practices with the Makerspace Movement to maximize hands-on learning.

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Evaluating the Success of Your Makerspaces

Learn what makes a successful makerspace and how that success can be measured

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Reality Bytes: Virtual Reality and K-12 Education

Virtual Reality immerses students in rich worlds to free learning from the confines of a screen.

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	Parent Challenges and Solutions During COVID-19 With the right tools and the abandonment of perfection as a goal, curiosity and joy of learning can still occur with parents connected to the process like never before.	Blog
	Enhancing Sharing in Simple and Meaningful New Ways Ed-tech company Clarity Innovations worked with the Math Learning Center to create a dynamic new way to share math learning with teachers and peers.	Blog
	Reflections on Tech Use with Young Children If technology isn't "good enough" for the children of the Silicon Valley innovators who created it, how can we defend its use in schools, especially with young children?	Blog
	Augmented Vs. Virtual Reality: Which Will Transform Education? Numerous studies have shown the strengths of both virtual and augmented reality use in the classroom. But which is the best fit for today's schools?	Blog
	Using Visual Models to Spark Mathematical Discussion When I reviewed my students’ work, I noticed that only one drew a picture of their solution strategy. The rest lacked a visual context for making sense of the problem.	Blog
	Top Science Education Take-Aways from NSTA18 The National Science Teachers’ Association (NSTA) Annual Conference was an enormous success this year. Here are my main takeaways.	Blog
	STEMming the Tide: STEM Tools for All Levels of Education Utilizing hands-on curriculum is the key to inspiring our children to pursue STEM-related fields. It is vital that these lesson plans be engaging and accessible to all students.	Useful links
	Reality Bytes: Virtual Reality and K-12 Education Making learning more personalized, more relevant, and more immersive have always been the moving goal-posts of education. Digital media has helped create infinite opportunities in terms of access to dynamic content, but it’s still, for the most part, an extension of traditional learning: groups of students watching and absorbing static information with minimal interaction.	Publication
	Five Things to Know about Design Thinking Design thinking is a pretty hot topic for teachers and for schools. David Jakes has invested five years learning design and shares his five key points to consider.	Blog
	Ed-volve or Ed-perish: The Science That Will Deliver the Future It’s not news that the evolution of education technologies and models of transformed learning are moving at the speed of sound.	Blog