Plant Seeds for STEM: Integrating STEM Thinking and Writing in INRW

Part 1: It’s in the Cards!

Organize in groups of four by working with the people behind you.

Open the traditional deck of cards, shuffle lightly, and lay 10 cards on the table. How can these be organized? Add more. Write one word on each of four green cards to explain this arrangement.

More cards

Open the SET cards and shuffle. Place 12 cards face up on the table in four columns of three:

X X X X

X X X X

X X X X

Be sure the remaining cards are well shuffled. WAIT

Object of SET

Look at what you have: color, shape, number, texture

Object: discover sets of 3 cards that have All the same color or all different All the same texture or all different All the same number of all different Watch example Identify possible sets, but don’t move cards. All agree that the 3 cards make up a set. Move cards from grouping, do not add cards Discover other possible sets

How are the two card experiences different?

Write one word on each of four yellow cards to describe the relationship of SET cards.

Looking at the cards, explain how the two card experiences relate to one another.

Question: how do you describe relationships?

If the SET cards represent STEM experiences, how does STEM challenge students?

Is STEM really different?

Linear

Concrete

Situated

Sequential

Spatial

Abstract: principle rather than example

Conditional

Simultaneous

Part II: In the Text

Materials: Readings: Lynda Barry and biology chapter Text and Task Analysis charts Orange cards

In pairs (2(s + s) OR 2(b + f)), skim the Barry article and read/look over/take an aspirin at the biology text.

Complete one text and task for the Barry and one for the biology

Write two words describing the relationship(s) of the two texts on the pink cards.

Now What?

First, understand the situation: be informed, be experienced, be deliberate.

Develop a strategy:

Think patterns

Think connections

Think applications

Basic organizational patterns?

Description (qualities or characteristics) Narrative/Process (events in a sequence) Condition Contrast/Comparison Cause/Effect Definition Illustration (general/specific) Analysis (part/whole)

Part III: Patterns

Back to the 4(b+f) Add “Steubenville”; “Thirty Eight Who Saw Murder

Didn’t’ Call the Police”; “My Lai Revisited”; “Why We Don’t Help” (one lead; all skim)

Assign articles and skim Fold paper into columns and make notes of main

points of your article (not “Why We Don’t Help” in one column

Share ideas, adding notes from other articles in the remaining two columns.

What patterns do you see? Connect to “Why We Don’t Help.”

Discussion and application

Cross-content connections for discussion, developing diagrams and writing. In which article do you find the most general

idea?

How do other articles relate to it?

Use post-it notes and blank paper to make a diagram together of points where the articles connect.

Applications to STEM

Case Study

One cause: parallel results

Focus on elements (analysis); select one as most important

Develop narratives and process charts

Develop classifications

Teaching process

Start with your textbook Identify one or two related readings and build a

collection of different texts around them. Use reading strategies independently with texts

and spatially among texts (case study; different conditions/causes)

Write journals based on organizational patterns found in the articles.

Discuss how to find materials in many places: QAR questions—good content for metacognitive journal

Discuss distinctions among texts and write about ways genre and author’s intention affect presentation of the same topic.

Possible writing

How do digital media affect the bystander effect?

What situations tend to neutralize the bystander effect?

Does bystander effect have