My I-Image:
This strip of images was taken on our cohort's field trip to the Museum of Science & Industry. The images and quotes capture my vision of bringing together my students and their families to become serious stakeholders in each student's journey through exploring middle school STEM. To me, this is important because women and minorities continue to be underrepresented in STEM careers, yet STEM careers are the fastest growing and highest paying fields.. This impacts the future of our entire democratic society! The images that I chose to highlight my Imagine-IT project show that the astronauts who will eventually explore new worlds, such as Mars, are now exploring STEM somewhere in middle school classrooms. Inspiration for my students, and their parents, can be taken from previous pioneers such as Mae Jemison, who was the first female African American space shuttle mission commander, and she was also a graduate of Chicago's Whitney Young High School. Please check out a recent New York Times article "Getting Women and Minorities into STEM Fields" that highlights this further at: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/16/opinion/getting-women-and-minorities-into-stem-fields.html?_r=0
Below is my I-Video that catches the essence of my plan for my Imagine-IT BIG Idea. The video was created using Youtube video editing software and slides made from Google Presentation. The video shows my commitment to increasing parent involvement in my students' journey into exploring STEM, despite our school having to deal with extreme poverty as we serve the highest percentage of students whose families reside in homeless shelters of any Chicago Public School. This mission is supported by President Obama and notable African American astrophysicist, Neil daGreese Tyson, who reminds us of the important role that parents played in students who do end up succeeding in STEM. Tyson states that parents need to stay engaged with their child's education no matter what one's social economic status is.My I-Video shows numerous STEM community partnerships and supports that I took part in establishing to help get our students more engaged in STEM. I envision more or my students seeking STEM as an option for higher education and careers once my Imagine-IT takes off this school year and beyond! The video concludes with a short but sweet quote by Mae Jemison. Please check it out for yourself!
After this tedious process of putting together this video, despite the fact that it's rather short, I am so excited to now have the opportunity to share video presentations with my students as an alternative means for them to use technology to express their own passions for learning through STEM!
After this tedious process of putting together this video, despite the fact that it's rather short, I am so excited to now have the opportunity to share video presentations with my students as an alternative means for them to use technology to express their own passions for learning through STEM!