Nanotechnology STEM program via research experience for high school teachers

The number of undergraduates entering computer science has declined in recent years. This is paralleled by a drop in the number of high school students taking the CS AP exam and the number of high schools offering computer science courses. The declines come at a time when career opportunities in CS continue to grow and computer science graduates are seen as crucial in building a globally competitive workforce for the 21st century. Efforts aimed at reversing the declining interest in computer science include curriculum revisions at the undergraduate level at many institutions, a re-design of computer science AP courses [1], and the inclusion of computational thinking into disciplines outside computer science [3].This panel discusses four projects of computer science researchers collaborating with high school teachers on integrating computing and computational thinking into their courses. The majority of the high school teachers involved is teaching science and math courses. They are teaching a diverse group of talented and college-bound students. The goal of all projects is to integrate computing into disciplines represented in the high school curriculum and to raise the awareness of computer science as an exciting and intellectually rewarding field.This panel will outline recent and on-going activities and interaction with high school teachers. Each panelist will describe how he/she got involved and the nature of the interaction. The panelists will talk about their individual projects, outline their visions for future interactions, and how their effort can be replicated by others. The session will briefly describe NSF's RET program which provided teacher support for three of the four projects. The session will then be opened for discussion; the audience will be encouraged to ask questions and contribute additional ideas for the inclusion of computational thinking in high school courses.

The GK-12 sensors! program is a collaborative effort between the University of Maine (UM) and Maine high schools. The program is focused on sensor technology, which is a high profile research area at UM. Sensors, which cover many engineering and science disciplines, have been integrated into high school courses such as chemistry, physics, mathematics, computer science and also civics. It is anticipated that students' exposure to sensors will encourage them to follow career paths in science and engineering. The program, which is completing year two, has had a significant impact on a number of Maine high schools, high school teachers and students, and UM graduate students. The program operation, accomplishments and activities are presented with plans for the program's future.

In this work, examples from educational programs targeted at high school students and teachers were implemented. The aims of this paper were both to enhance their understanding of how electronics technology works by an intuitive, rather than a mathematical approach, and to raise consciousness of and interest in electronics technology while demonstrating the relevancy of high school course subjects by showing their application to real-world electronics. Some suggestions on how the results of current research can be used for the same purposes were also offered.

another. Both, however, avoid the underlying issues.' In reply to Dr. Buchwalter one might be tempted to say that the high school teacher is largely to blame for the condition which she bemoans. The colleges have often quite justifiably despaired of the product passed on to them by the high schools. But that would be saying that the high school teacher is a free agent in his approach to methods and content of the high school course, which, of course, he is not. Aside from the constant interference of principals, school boards and educationists who tell him what, and what not to teach, whom to promote and practically never whom not to promote, he is also caught in the muddled situation of high schools in general which, because of increasingly higher compulsory age limits and lack of clear-cut divisions into academic and vocational schools, must usually take all comers and deny their teaching staffs the right to select those students who could best profit from academic

What are the most common motives invoked by 9th graders when asked about their plans to take (or not) more mathematics courses during high school? How do beliefs about math course-taking affect students’ actual planning? To what extent is planning of math course-taking associated with high school students’ socio-demographic backgrounds? The study employs data from the High School Longitudinal Survey of 2009 to examine the issue of persistence in math course-taking during high school. The study shows that almost two-thirds of 9th graders plan to do math during all their high school years, although intentions to persist in math vary across racial and especially socioeconomic backgrounds. The study also demonstrates the importance of belief constructs such as math identity, internal motivation toward math learning and math utility on math course-taking planning. A better understanding of students’ motives to engage in high school math may help develop classroom practices that emphasize the long-term benefits of math learning.

ObjectiveThis article explores the value of hosting a grassroots neuroscience workshop that facilitates near-peer engagement between year-one medical students and local Brain Bee finalists (high school students). Near-peer mentoring is a formal relationship in which more academically advanced students guide immediate junior students. We hypothesized that similar activities have teaching, learning, and psychosocial benefits for all and can be easily replicated.ActivityThe Grenada National Brain Bee Challenge was launched in 2009 as a competition for high school students. Annually, there are at least 100 high school students registering to participate in the national challenge. In 2018, a grassroots neuroscience symposium, a local initiative, was created to prepare high school students who participated in the preliminary rounds for the final local and International Brain Bee competition. Traditionally, it is hosted annually by faculty at St. George's University School of Medicine (SOM). However, in 2022, the symposium was hosted by medical students. The symposium is designed as an eight-hour tutorial one-day session. The students rotate between facilitators as small group teams during each teaching hour. There are icebreakers, content presentations, and neuroanatomy skills stations. The medical students demonstrate expertise in neuroscience content and other aspects of professional competence. The activity was also designed to offer students of diversified backgrounds the opportunity to affect their educational pathways through role modeling, mirroring, and mentorship. Was this change beneficial to both sets of students (medical and high school)?Results and discussionWe aim to determine the value of the near-peer relationship between the local 2022 Brain Bee finalists (high school students) (n=28) and university (medical) students (n=11). Participants were surveyed about their experience. Data were de-identified and grouped according to common themes. A thematic analysis was conducted on the data retrieved from the literature review. Data suggest that both high school and university (medical) students report benefits after participating in near-peer engagement at a grassroots neuroscience symposium. In this teaching model, the medical students are the more experienced instructors and transfer their knowledge and skills about the field to the high school students. The medical students have an opportunity to consolidate their personal learning and give back to the Grenadian community. While informal teaching occurs often, this type of near-peer engagement with students from the community helps medical students develop both personal and professional skills such as confidence, knowledge, and respect. This grassroots initiative is easily replicated in a medical curriculum. The major benefits experienced by the high school student participants (of various socioeconomic backgrounds) were access to educational resources. The symposium requires active engagement, fosters a sense of belonging, and promotes interest in pursuing careers in health, research, academia, and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).ConclusionParticipating high school students of various genders and socioeconomic backgrounds gained equal access to educational resources and may select careers in health-related sciences. Participating medical students developed knowledge and teaching skills and engaged in a service-learning opportunity.

This research paper examines the implications of neoclassical economic theory and behavioral economic nudges on high school teachers' grading policies and the motivation and academic achievement of students. I further develop the literature in education economics to investigate various grading policies chosen by teachers and the impact on student motivation and educational outcomes. I highlight teacher preferences which include a traditional grading policy or five-point system, using the letters A-E/F. On the other hand, students prefer grading systems that evaluate what they are learning, allow for effort-based achievement, and consider classroom participation, as opposed to homework and exam scores alone. I examine the benefits and detriments of different grading policies within my high school, Menlo-Atherton High School including traditional grading, standards-based grading (SBG) and pass-fail grading. First, I review the current literature and analyze the major differences between the approaches of neoclassical versus behavioral economics including nudges. Specifically, I examine factors that contribute to a student’s academic achievement and review the literature on grading. Second, I focus on student behavior and motivation that help to incentivize greater academic achievement. Third, I interview several teachers to characterize their grading policy and overall student motivation. Last, I compare the student and teacher findings and the associated behavior and motivation. Overall, my findings and analysis appear to support directionally that a new educational policy focused on a standards-based grading (SBG) policy combined with various behavioral nudges impact student decisions, motivate high school students, and improve educational outcomes.

The purpose of this study was to examine the mathematics ability and efficacy of Florida preservice agricultural education teachers. Results indicated that the preservice teachers were not proficient in solving agricultural mathematics problems. On the other hand, the preservice teachers were efficacious in personal teaching efficacy and personal mathematics efficacy, and moderately efficacious in their mathematics teaching efficacy. Additionally, the associations between mathematics ability and mathematics coursework suggest that preservice teachers that completed an advanced mathematics course in high school and/or college scored higher on the mathematics assessment than preservice teachers that completed a basic or intermediate mathematics course in high school and/or college. However, only a small percentage of the preservice teachers completed an advanced mathematics course in high school and/or college. Based on the data collected in this study, the teacher education program at the University of Florida may need to further evaluate its mathematics coursework requirements.

P96 Evaluation of the Effect of an Online Dual Enrollment Nutrition Course for College and High School Students

The aim of this paper was to clarify the characteristics of the evaluation of high school students’ free compositions by high school teachers and university students who are teacher-candidates. This was done by analyzing a comparison of the results of analytic and holistic rating scales. In addition, information about their consciousness regarding the evaluation and instruction of free compositions was obtained with the help of a questionnaire. The pedagogical implications were explored with the help of the analyses and the questionnaire. In recent years, free compositions in English (for example, explaining a particular situation and arguing for or against a statement) have been increasingly required in university entrance examinations in Japan. Such kinds of activities are also required in situations of actual communication. Moreover, the renewed course of study (Ministry of Education, 1999) has been conducted in high schools since the academic year of 2003. The overall objective of the course of study is to develop students’ practical communication abilities such as expressing their own ideas through written English. To satisfy these requirements, the chances of instructing students on free compositions in high school classrooms will be increased. In such a situation, it is important to obtain information on how teachers and teacher-candidates instruct and evaluate students’ free compositions. The survey consisted of several analyses of the teachers’ and teacher-candidates’ evaluation data, and a questionnaire concerning their consciousness of the evaluation and instruction of free compositions. The raters who evaluated high school students’ free compositions were 10 high school teachers from a national high school and two public high schools and 6 university students who belonged to a teacher-training course in a national university and had experience with practical teaching. First, the raters evaluated 40 compositions written by 20 high school students who belonged to the first and the second grade of a national high school in the Chugoku region in Japan (all the 20 students wrote two kinds of compositions). The evaluations were carried out using holistic rating scales and two kinds of analytic rating scales. In this survey, two subscales given by Ishida and Mori (1985), that is, the objective holistic rating scale (How good do you think the composition is?) and the subjective holistic rating scale (How do you personally like the composition?) were adopted as holistic rating scales. At the same time, two kinds of rating scales, that is, Jacobs, Zinkgraf, Wormuth, Hartfiel, and Hughey’s (1981) ESL Composition Profile and National Institute for Educational Policy Research’s (2002) kantenbetsu-hyoka (it means an analytic rating), were adopted as analytic rating scales. The following two points were discussed on the basis of a comparison of the result of the evaluation of the holistic and analytic rating scales using descriptive statistics, Pearson’s product-moment correlation coefficients, and Cronbach’s alpha coefficients: 1) To clarify the characteristics of the evaluations performed by the teachers and teacher-candidates, and 2) To examine the reliability and the validity of the kantenbetsu-hyoka scale. From the results, it appeared that the teachers’ evaluations were consistent within and beyond the rating scales, while those performed by the university students who were teacher-candidates were slightly inconsistent within and beyond the rating scales. At the same time, it also appeared that the validity of the kantenbetsu-hyoka scale was not higher than that of the other scales. Second, an open-ended questionnaire, which included two parameters, was given to the same raters. The first question was what they regarded as being of greatest importance while instructing students on free compositions, and the second was what they regarded as being of greatest importance when they evaluated them. The following point was discussed on the basis of the questionnaire: 3) To obtain information on the consciousness of teachers and teacher-candidates concerning the evaluation of and instruction on free compositions. From the results of the questionnaire, it appeared that teachers were more sensitive to the conditions of high school students than the university students who were teacher-candidates. These results led to the pedagogical implications as follows: 1) The validity of the kantenbetsu-hyoka scale was not higher than the other scales; therefore, it would be better to use it in combination with other scales, 2) It would be better for teachers to carefully consider each parameter of the analytic rating scales, in order to make good use of the merits of the scale, and 3) It would be better for university students who are teacher-candidates to have more opportunities of evaluating high school students’ compositions and of instructing them on writing compositions, before they become teachers. 本研究では、複数の評価尺度を組み合わせることで、教員と大学生による高校生の自由英作文評価の実態が調査された。総合的評価尺度として「客観的総合評価」と「主観的総合評価」が、分析的評価尺度としてESL Composition Profileと「観点別評価」が使用された。調査では、10名の教員と6名の大学生が、20名の高校生によって書かれた40編の自由英作文を評価した。評価結果を記述統計量、信頼性係数、相関係数から分析することで、教員の評価は大学生の評価よりも一貫性が高いことが示された。また「観点別評価」の信頼性と妥当性も議論され、妥当性がやや低かったことが示された。同時に、自由記述の質問紙による指導と評価の意識調査も行われ、教員は大学生よりも指導現場に根ざした意識を有していることが確認された。これらの結果に対する考察が行われ、そこから教員と大学生の双方に対する教育的示唆が示された。

实践教学是以培养学生实践能力为目的，与理论教学相辅相成的一种教学模式。本文对实践教学的类型和特征分别展开了分析，其类型包括课堂实践教学、校园实践教学、校外实践教学，其特征包括：实践性、主体性、生活性、创新性、时效性。根据当前中学思想政治课实践教学的理论研究，论述了针对中学思想政治实践课实践教学现状，开展中学思想政治课实践教学研究的目的和意义。同时，对于中学思想政治课实践教学存在缺少理论指导、教育理念偏差、缺乏经验借鉴、实践教学的实施、组织困难等问题，提出解决这些问题的几点建议和对策：加强实践教学的理论研究；提高中学思想政治课实践教学的重视程度；借鉴国内外好的实践教学经验；完善中学实践教学的长效机制。 Practical teaching is a kind of teaching mode which is complementary to theoretical teaching aiming at cultivating students’ practical ability. In this paper, the types and characteristics of the practice teaching are analyzed; its types include classroom practice teaching, practice teaching in campus, and practice teaching in society. And its features include: Practicality, subjectivity, cha-racteristics of life, innovation, and timeliness. According to the theoretical research of the practical teaching of ideological and political courses in high school, this paper shows the present situation of practical teaching in high school and discusses the purpose and significance of the practice teaching of ideological and political courses in high school. At the same time, there are some problems about the practice teaching of ideological and political courses in middle school, such as lack of theoretical guidance, deviation of education idea, lack of experience reference, the difficulties of the practice teaching implementation and organization and so on. So some suggestions and countermeasures are given: To strengthen the theoretical study of teaching practice; to pay more attention to political lesson practice teaching in the high school; to draw lessons from domestic and international good practice teaching experience; to improve the long-term mechanism of the practice teaching in the high school.

We use two administrative data sets to examine the correlates of (a) taking the high school courses needed for university science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) programs and (b) applying to and registering in such programs. Staying on the STEM path during high school depends most importantly on math and science grades at each level. Factors such as gender, immigration status, and average neighbourhood income play relatively smaller roles. These two sets of factors play similar roles in the transition to university STEM programs. These results raise challenging questions of what lies behind the differences in critical factors among high school students.

This work is related to the Project “Encouraging Girls in Science, Engineering and Information Technology” that is underway at the University of Caxias do Sul. This project aims to involve elementary and high school teachers and students in discussions related to formal education, which can enable them to experience teaching activities and processes that explore the experimentation, and to disseminated in the society the knowledge and technological applications used by the Sciences and Engineering. Based on the planning of a teacher training course for the project's five co-running schools, hands-on workshops, a Science and Astronomy Club, Science and Technology Fairs, Mathematical Olympics, Chats with Scientists and Engineers, and Science at the Movie Theater are being carried out. The results already obtained show that, the way the activities are being promoted, it is possible to contribute to the scientific and technological development and innovation of the country by encouraging the participation and training of girls and women for careers in the Exact Sciences, Engineering and Information Technology; contribute to the insertion of more and better female elementary and high school students in the scientific and technological fields, as well as to reduce the impact of gender inequalities on the career choices of elementary and high school students.

The adolescent age group plays a vital role in tackling the pandemic, one of which is in high school and college students. Through the Remaja Bergerak webinar with the theme of COVID-19, it is hoped that it will increase the knowledge of high school and college students in Indonesia regarding the epidemiology of COVID-19 cases and the COVID-19 vaccine. The purpose of this study was to compare the COVID-19 knowledge level between high school and college students. This type of research is a cross-sectional study with a pretest-posttest design. The first group consisted of 262 high school students and the second group consisted of 301 college students who have then compared the pretest and posttest scores. As a result, the high school student pretest scores were higher than the college student, but it was not significant (p>0.05). Likewise, in the posttest result, it was shown that the high school student experienced a higher score than the college student, but it was not significant (p>0.05). In conclusion, there was no difference in knowledge level in both high school and college students, but there was an increase in knowledge of each group.

Much research has been done on the first quarantine period in 2020, however little is known for what it concerns distance learning in Italian schools with Slovene as language of instruction. No extensive research explored teachers’ and students’ perceptions of this distance learning period, nor analyzed their opinion about positive and negative aspects of online learning, especially those related to the teaching material in Slovene language, which should address the Italian program. The present article presents the analysis of online semi-structured interviews that involved 15 high school teachers and 15 students who teach or attend Italian high schools with Slovene as teaching language, and it aims to answer these questions. We found that teachers and students preferred face-to-face classes, since they faced several issues connected with distance learning, such as a lack of interaction during distance learning, technology and connection problem, health issues and psychological distress. High school teachers and students faced less problems than those reported by primary schools’ pupils and teachers, since they are older and more independent than primary school pupils. High school students did also communicate through several social applications and peers might have helped them to overcome the language obstacles.