Monthly Newsletter – July 2021

What NASA calls, “ … the single greatest technological achievement of all time,” happened 52 years ago this week. Tuesday, July 20th, was National Moon Day, celebrating the 1969 Apollo 11 landing and man’s first steps on the moon. This month, with STEM Education Works’ strong ties to Purdue University — the university producing the most astronauts outside of U.S. military academies — we are taking you to the moon with book recommendations, activities, and 3D prints! We are going back to the moon, after all, so you might want to brush up on your moon knowledge.

A little more on Purdue’s significance to our discoveries on the moon, nearly ⅓ of all U.S. space flights have included a Purdue graduate, and 11 missions have included multiple Purdue grads! The astronauts include Neil Armstrong, Scott Tingle, and Gene Cernan, the most recent astronaut to walk on the moon.

Our Latest Blog Posts

• Data Literacy in the K-5 Classroom
• How Career Connections Benefit STEM Students
• Pecha Kucha – The 7-minute Professional Development

Free Moon-Themed Activities You’ll Love

Book About the Moon

• The Moon Seems to Change by Dr. Franklyn M. Branley, and Barbara & Ed Emberley
• I Am the Moon by Rebecca & James McDonald
• If You Decide To Go To The Moon by Faith McNulty and Steven Kellogg
• Mousetronaut: Based on a (Partially) True Story by Mark Kelly and C. F. Payne

K-5 Curriculum for littleBits, Sphero, and 3D Printing

Our Foundations of Design and Innovation curriculum is equipped with a scaffolded design to allow teachers to be flexible and meet the individual needs of students as they learn hands-on at their own pace. Each book contains four units and is divided into beginner, intermediate, and advanced. This allows the curriculum to be adapted to both the student’s level of experience and their knowledge of the technology. With our curriculum, students will:

• Learn the basics of specific technologies and how to use them
• Understand the role of technology in their lives and the world
• Gain experience with new technology to prepare them for future careers
• Collaborate with peers to create and explore
• Solve real-world problems across all subject areas
• Build social-emotional learning and other soft skills
• Be inspired to continue their STEM journey

Here is the crosswalk subject matrix of the littleBits curriculum. You can view all three crosswalk matrices (with two more – micro:bit and Glowforge – coming soon!) and learn more on our website.

Upcoming Events

Thanks to Purdue Extension, 4-H, and IN-MaC, starting July 30th and running until the end of August, we will be at the Indiana State Fair! We are setting up a STEM Design and Innovation Studio at the Mac Reynolds Barn at the Indiana State Fairgrounds in Indianapolis. Drive Spheros through a corn maze, laser cut earrings with the Glowforge, build a car with Legos, or see some more of our equipment up-close and personal!

Cool Things We’ve Been Making

Using the STEM technologies we have, like the Glowforge Pro and the Sindoh 3DWOX 1, we have been making a lot of cool and unique things. We usually post them on social media, so give us a follow! Here are a few:

(Moon) STEM Champions to Follow

• Twitter: NASA Moon – NASA’s official account about Earth’s Moon. Shares updates on lunar science and exploration.
• Twitter: National Science Foundation – Articles and research about science and links to relevant programs.
• Instagram: International Space Station – Behind the scenes pictures and videos of the space station and missions, plus all the space-related things they’re working on.