When thinking of early childhood STEM, images of active, play-based design challenges, experiences with robotics/coding, or hands-on experiences with open-ended materials (e.g., balls, ramps, loose parts) often come to mind. While these are certainly images that align with developmentally appropriate early childhood STEM practices, some of the…

The Troubleshooting Portfolios approach was developed at the Olathe Northwest High School in Olathe, Kansas. This approach supports integrated STEM and "informed design" thinking and learning, in which students: (1) use design strategies effectively; (2) work creatively and collaboratively in teams; (3) make knowledge-driven decisions;…

Documentation of ideas and the engineering design process is a critical, daily component of a professional engineer's job. While patent protection is often cited as the primary rationale for documentation, it can also benefit the engineer, the team, company, and stakeholders through creating a more rigorously designed and purposeful solution.…

The pace of retail evolution has increased dramatically, with the spread of the Internet and as consumers have become more empowered by mobile phones and smart devices. This article outlines significant retail innovations that reveal how retailers and retailing have evolved in the past several decades. In the same spirit, the authors discuss how…

This work describes the educational experiences gained teaching the Senior Design I & II courses, a senior level, two-semester sequence in the Electrical Engineering (EE) program at Georgia Southern University (GSU). In particular, the authors present their experiences in using robotics as the main area to develop the capstone senior design,…

In this article, the author describes a program that he says has "made being smart cool." "FIRST" (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) Robotics has made a significant contribution toward progress in advancing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses and STEM careers with young people. "FIRST" Robotics…

This article describes an after-school program at the Horace Mann School for the Deaf (HMS), the oldest public day school for deaf students in the United States, where almost half of the student body imagined and created bridge and robotic machines. The Deaf Robotics Engineering and Math Team, or the DREAM Team club, included HMS students in…

K-12-level competitive robotics is growing in popularity around the country and worldwide. According to one of the leading organizers of these events, FIRST--For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology--250,000 students from 56 countries take part in its competitions. FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) is a yearly event the organization puts…

A summer session, math methods course for elementary teachers incorporates 30 hours of instruction that emphasizes (1) developmentally appropriate instructional strategies, (2) hierarchical levels of increasingly abstract manipulatives, (3) ongoing assessment of student learning, (4) integrated thematic instructional modules, (5) team planning and…

There is a battlefield where no quarter is given, no mercy shown, but not a single drop of blood is spilled. It is an arena that witnesses the bringing together of high-tech design and manufacture with the outpouring of brute force, under the remotely accessed command of some of today's brightest students. This is the world of battling robots, or…

As educators, the authors believe in guiding students towards the life skills, knowledge, and expertise they need to succeed in life and in the workforce of the 21st century. With that in mind, they have created a project in which students drive their own learning through creativity and collaborative work to develop an efficient product. Through…

"Engineering Challenge for the 21st Century," a weeklong teacher workshop sponsored by the National Science Foundation, uses project-based learning (PBL) to help students and teachers build science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) skills. The workshop, hosted by the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut, features the Coast…

This article describes a cooperative classroom robotics challenge named "IED Cleanup". This classroom challenge was created to incorporate a humanitarian project with the use of a robotics design system in order to remove simulated IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices) to a detonation zone within a specified amount of time. Throughout the activity,…

Robotics is a rich and exciting multidisciplinary area to study and learn about electronics and control technology. The interest in robotic devices and systems provides the technology teacher with an excellent opportunity to make many concrete connections between electronics, control technology, and computers and science, engineering, and…

Discusses artificial intelligence, robotics, natural language processing, and expert or knowledge-based systems research; examines two large expert systems, MYCIN and XCON; and reviews the resources required to build large expert systems and affordable smaller systems (intelligent job aids) for training. Expert system vendors and products are…