The city of Flint, Michigan switched its water source in April, 2014, and, to reduce costs, anti-corrosion agents were omitted from water treatment. Consequently, lead leached into pipes, contaminating the water supply and exposing Flint's children to lead well beyond safety standards. The event became known as the Water Crisis, and now dominates…

Teaching STEM concepts to today's high school students has been challenging. Span of attention is short. Students are glued to their electronic devices. They cannot appreciate the abstract method of teaching, meaning covering concepts followed by solving problems from a textbook. Research has shown that students become excited and motivated to…

This study brings together the research focused on science education through project-based learning (PBL). This learning project was carried out in a rural learning community and an attempt was made to adapt to the natural resources of the area by organizing educational outings, experimental activities, and encouraging the participation of…

Loss of 7 weeks of organic chemistry laboratory work, including 3-4 weeks that would have been used for a CURE, prompted the creation of a literature review project in which students investigated synthetic routes to drug molecules of molecular weight 180 g/mol or less. The students wrote a 5-10 page paper and then made videotaped presentations…

Generation Z has graduated and in some cases is still in college according to Seemiller and Grace (2016), who define the generation range from 1995-2010. A defining characteristic of Generation Z is that they grew up with technology. They are so involved or comfortable with technology that they "expect" it. Parents lament the lack of…

The paper documents the final project in an undergraduate seminar on multilingualism at the University of Toronto from a pedagogical perspective. The multimodal and multimedia project -- centered on the idea of a fictitious festival of popular music, the Mondovision Song Contest -- uses the genre of pseudo-documentary as a channel for…

Project-based learning (PBL) approaches seek to challenge the grammar of schooling by providing opportunities for students to: (1) explore meaningful questions using multiple disciplinary lenses; (2) read, interpret, and produce a wide range of texts as they engage in disciplinary inquiry; and (3) develop and use a range of social-emotional skills…

Despite the dramatic increase in the number of graphic novels created and published, and the growing popularity of graphic novels among students, some teachers think that certain sexual and violent imagery in graphic novels renders them unsuitable for teaching (Weiner, 2003). Additionally, the lack of cultural diversity and the depiction of…

In this article, the authors discuss how incorporating traveling sketchbooks into their preservice art education and high school classrooms allowed students' situated knowledge to cross the boundaries of age and location. They begin with an overview of the evolution of sketchbook use in art education and the emergence of traveling sketchbooks.…

Disciplinary activity in science is tool-mediated, and instructional designers often build in opportunities for students to use the conceptual and material tools of the discipline as they engage in activity. When this activity takes place in schools, students and teachers may modify or reject disciplinary tools to fit the goals of schooling. We…

This paper reports on a case study of the Agile Kanban project methodology, which while growing in popularity, has had far less analysis on its usefulness in the classroom as compared to other frameworks such as Agile Scrum. Our study provides insight into why the Kanban methodology is useful by mapping student comments about the methodology to…

Purpose: This paper aims to provide insights for educators seeking to enact culturally responsive-sustaining education and research in the midst of the COVID-19 global pandemic. The authors examine what happened when the community-based Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) initiative they engaged with traditionally marginalized high school…

This article presents a case study of the integration of the Internet of Things (IoT) in high-school biology project-based learning. The study's main goal was to conduct an in-depth, qualitative examination of the students' experiences and the development of their skills over the course of this project. The following research questions were…

Drawing on the work of Lee Shulman, this article reviews literature exploring the concept of signasture pedagogies, which are described as having have surface, deep and implicit structures. These structures are complex and changing; concerned with habits of head, hand and heart. Emerging from professional education and now being explored in STEM…

Previous studies suggest a strong correlation between exposure to hands-on STEM programs and positive attitudes toward and experience with STEM subject matter amongst, middle, high school, and university students. However, there has been little research on the impact of hands-on STEM projects on Title I (socioeconomically disadvantaged) elementary…