Such a great story about Brian....can't wait to work together to reach these kids!!

thank, Jodi! We look forward to the same. Like adults, 7th graders have competing priorities and we love that MPACT helps them prioritize math

Good morning!

I really appreciated the time Kathryn Habib spent telling the specific story of Brian and how his engagement was transformed through this program. It is so easy for students like that (because they often are a disruptive force in the classroom) to be punished and further discouraged leading to a vicious cycle. Did you find that Brian's engagement in the traditional classroom also changed as the result of this making program? And in general, have you been able to measure the impact of this program on the student populations it's intended to reach, namely rural and BIPOC youth?

Looking forward to learning more!

This video is about a 7th grade student using our Modify a Game for the Blind module. MPACT includes 4 modules for each grade level of grades 4-7. Each has its own making topic, a math focus meeting grade-level standards, opportunities to learn computational thinking skills and spatial reasoning. As the video points out, last year we had evidence of significant learning of all three, through an assessment co-designed with SRI (evaluator) and administered to over 1000 4th and 5th graders. 

thanks for your interest again! Yes, you will find more information on the entire curriculum at that same link. In brief, each one of the modules has students create a beautiful, usable object. Some of the projects include: a bookmark (1st experience in Tinkercad) a kite, a toy for a younger child, a stamp for ink on paper, a hanging mobile for a community center (e.g.,for aged), a cube puzzle, a tangram-like puzzle, dice that work for blind and sighted people. Most activities have a focus user, but in a few for earlier grades, they make the object for themselves. 

The assessment is written, takes about 40 minutes to complete, and is multiple choice. it was administered online to classrooms full of students at the same time. The assessment was co-designed by SRI (with assessment design exoert) and our team, to ensure it was assessing the conceptual content we are addressing, and all 3 areas: math, CT, and spatial reasoning

What a powerful story by the teacher about how MPACT re-engaged Brian's math learning by inviting in his own interests and social skill set. I also loved the task of creating accessible games, which additionally invites students to consider needs that might be different from their own. Were the games "tested" by blind or visually impaired players?

This is very interesting. Did you find that having students create their own games helped you understand student thinking in a particular arena or area of thought? 

What an interesting project and I love the story of Brian and how he was able to come around to be interested in math again using his people-skill strengths.

This is an amazing project and a wonderful story of Brian! I am curious about learning more about how the learning experiences were designed and how the program was implemented (e.g., teachers' role, researchers' engagement, collaborative versus individual learning experiences). Again, great job, team!

Hi Jennifer, So glad you are getting lots of positive feedback here for your amazing work, and thank you for this list of projects: "a bookmark (1st experience in Tinkercad) a kite, a toy for a younger child, a stamp for ink on paper, a hanging mobile for a community center (e.g.,for aged), a cube puzzle, a tangram-like puzzle, dice that work for blind and sighted people. Most activities have a focus user, but in a few for earlier grades, they make the object for themselves."

What you said here about having a focus user reminds me of another project that you might want to check out: https://stemforall2022.videohall.com/presentations/2509.html They were also interested in inspiring students to imaginatively engage with the potential user, anticipating their struggles or needs. 

Great discussion here - and a great project to start with!  The MPACT team has clearly learned a lot about ways to engage a wide range of students with math in a different context than they usually experience it.  I wonder if you have some general design tips for the community, since many of us math educators have experienced the frustration that comes from seeing the disconnect between consequential uses of math and the ways many students experience the topic.  How did you make the activities engaging while making sure the math topics were still authentically embedded?  Were there particularly difficult tradeoffs that you navigated from which others could learn?

Thanks, Jennifer - I hope other visitors to this site take advantage of your experience and wisdom - this is a very helpful and insightful description.

Wonderful video!  Our organization does informal arts-based STEM/CS programming, so I find your project really interesting.  So often we get breadth but no depth when discussing outcomes, so thank you for sharing how your program leveraged Brian's assets to increase his engagement in learning mathematics!

thank you! we thought Brian's story was important, too. Most of our evaluation, however, is quantitative---and results are good so far, we are happy to say . We hope to do more qualitative research next, to supplement the evaluation. 

I love that you are essentially creating a seat at the table for each student. That is the approach we take when teaching Passion-Driven Statistics. If every student felt like they had not only a seat but a warm and welcoming seat in their mathematics classroom from elementary on I think we would see a lot less of the "checking out."

thank you! I will watch your video too. warm and welcoming seat and joyful classroom.

 Jennifer and Ken,

What a powerful video! You've made me wonder about Brian and hope that this experience has changed his future approach to challenging topics.  Good work!

Thank you Carol! It’s not easy to manage a longitudinal study in our field, but I share your question about Brian and the youth like him