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Iowa second grade students have a great time engaging with Storytime STEM-packs. Their passionate teacher creatively implements the activities and adds extensions, challenging her kids to make connections across content areas. Storytime STEM-packs have arrived: The kids have fun unpacking the boxes, looking forward to using all the cool materials in them.  On the Construction Site - The Story: Children are getting into the story, practicing their active listening skills.  On the Construction Site - Explore: Children act as engineers as they consider available materials and agree on a plan to build a house for the bear family.​  On the...

  Educators across Iowa are combining Storytime STEM-packs with Bee-Bot to develop STEM and computer science skills in PreK-2 students via children's literature. In an initiative funded by the Iowa Governor’s STEM Advisory Council and their STEM Scale Up Program to enhance the STEM skills of Iowa students, Iowa educators apply for grants to purchase Storytime STEM-Packs for their classes and libraries. Terrapin partners with Storytime STEM-packs to include-Bots in Storytime STEM Adventures.  Storytime STEM-packs are based on a popular children's book and contain all the materials needed for a variety of STEM activities to bring the story to life. Using the storybook as context,...

Storytime STEM-packs named as part of Iowa's STEM Scale-Up program Storytime STEM-packs was chosen from over 100 applicants to be one of thirteen STEM providers awarded this distinction in Iowa. In making selections for the 2021 menu, trained expert reviewers weighed evidence of effect, diversity impact, cost benefit ratio, sustainability, Iowa Core alignment and more.  For the full press release see here.  The Iowa STEM Council made a total of 730 Storytime STEM-pack awards, providing a customized collection of Storytime STEM-packs™ specifically targeting PK-2 mathematics, science, engineering design, and computer science concepts. During July and August 2021, Storytime STEM-packs conducted...

Are your students having trouble with “basic  facts”? After months of practicing facts, do you still witness them using a count all strategy to find a sum or product? Are you having trouble helping your students develop grade-level fluency standards? If so, this initial blog post from the Allegheny Intermediate Unit’s Math & Science Collaborative might help. There are a number of proven strategies for developing fluency with arithmetic operations. One of these strategies is gameplay!  Yes, you read that correctly.  Playing games can actually help students develop fluency with mathematical operations.  Many of us know that it is important...