Let the "wild rumpus" start! Hi Paula!
I invite you all to my students' poster session tomorrow from 1:30 - 3:30. They are girls from Las Cruces who have been involved in YWiC (Young Women in Computing) and the Supercomputing Challenge.
I would like to pose the question: How do we recruit, retain and celebrate young women in C-STEM? (The C stands for Computing which involves critical thinking.)
I am hoping to be inspired and learn about ways to plan units and lessons to teach technology to K through 5th gr. students next year. I will have them for 45 min. once a week, with varying degrees of technology experience and knowledge. So I am hoping to be introduced to tools to assess (measure), grade (Google Docs that can grade for you and then send students their scores?), and communicate to their general ed. teachers and parents. And all this on the cheap, free?!, and inexpensive.
ReplyDeleteCelia,
ReplyDeleteIn hopes of providing some answer to your question about inspiring young women toward C-STEM, one idea is to provide them passionate teachers and women already in the field to talk to, visit their work, interview them (then post the interview online), and introduce them to careers in those C-STEM applicable fields. Another idea is to have them research and report on some historical women in the field, maybe even act them out in a forum for others to talk to them like their WERE that historical woman.
I hope others share their ideas. Great question!
Hi Celia!
ReplyDeleteGreat to see you and your girls at the conference today! Regarding your question about girls in C-STEM, I think TJ has some great ideas. I also think that the way society thinks about women in C-STEM careers-as reflected by our female students-needs to be influenced. My husband is a chess coach (another problem solving/critical thinking area). He has great success with female students until they reach middle school. Then they often just drop out. It's not popular, it's not cool, boys don't like girl's that beat them. Why are these things our girl's greater concerns? How can we foster a society that allows girls to pursue what they want to instead of what they are "supposed" to. I really thought that my generation would be the last to feel that way.
Paula, TJ, et al,
ReplyDeleteI think media has a big part in teen age girls view of themselves. We, as women, have 86% of the purchasing power and we need to use it to make a stand.
Having female models, mentors and passionate teachers and researching famous woman are great ideas.
I attended an inaugural meeting of the NM Girls Collaborative and Becca Galves from NMSU shared the exemplary practices to engage young women in CSTEm from The National Girls Collaborative Project. Allow me to share them:
Sponsor Student Recognition Events
Take Field trips
Implement Middle School Conferences and Workshops
Assess topics parents want to learn
Connect with parents to talk about programs and benefits
Bring up students' interests and strenghts and bring these up with family members
Have a culturally competent staff
Inform girls, "You can do this. You belong here."
Build trust and ask for input from families
Demonstrate that participant feedback is key
Be aware of challenges to parent participation and changes