Published January 5, 2018
Asked to explain how their students’ science test scores
could be statistically significantly higher than those of their
peers, two Pitsco STEM Expeditions® pilot program teachers
provided nearly identical responses.
Students who learn by doing as part of the engaging
engineering design process built into every Expedition, the
teachers said, better retain what they learn and understand the
content more fully, naturally resulting in higher science test scores.
Teacher Michelle Smith at Tucker Creek Middle School in
Havelock, NC, saw her sixth- and seventh-grade Expeditions
students score 20.1 percent higher on the 2016-17 Measure
of Academic Progress (MAP) science test than a control group
did at a nearby middle school.
Likewise, eighth graders at Pittsburg (KS) Community
Middle School who completed the Expeditions as part of
a blended science program showed a significant difference in growth in MAP science and reading than did the virtual comparison group.
These statistically significant results at the two schools were
reported in December 2017 by the Friday Institute for Educational
Innovation at North Carolina State University’s College of
Education. According to the Friday Institute’s executive
summary in the Pitsco Education 2016-17 Pilot Study Report,
“Students in these analysis clusters tended to show more
academic growth in science when compared to their peers in a
comparison group or when compared to the national median.”
Smith was excited to hear about her students’ MAP
science scores but not surprised at the stellar results. “I think
the results are directly related to the amount of student
engagement with the content,” she said. “Students know
from the beginning of the Expeditions that they will be using
the scientific principles they are taught to solve the lesson
Essential Question, which is an engineering design challenge.
Because they know that the information will be immediately
valuable to them in designing their solution, they pay more
attention and get more involved from the very start.”
When students pay more attention and become immersed
in their activities, improved retention naturally occurs, said
PCMS STEM Expeditions teacher Caleb Boulware. Not only did
his students outperform the virtual comparison group, but they also far exceeded the goal of
100 percent
growth on MAP
performance with
an average growth
rate of 178 percent
among all the school’s
eighth graders during the
course of the school year.
“What shocked me was a lot of times when I
used to give a test to the kids they’d pass it, but if you gave it two
weeks later they forgot it,” Boulware said. “With the Expeditions,
the way they’re doing things hands on, the fact of doing it,
building it, designing something from start to finish, seeing it get
done, and then interpreting it and pulling it into everyday life,
that’s how to make it relevant. . . . I could give them a posttest
and go into another Expedition and come back a month later
and give the same posttest, and they still know it.”
Boulware and PCMS’s other eighth-grade science teacher
taught an equal amount of whole-class STEM Expeditions and
traditional physical science instruction, always with the aim of
meeting national standards through their combined approach.
Back in North Carolina, Smith touted the “effective
teaching components” found in the STEM Expeditions
framework. “There is video instruction, interactive learning
activities, demonstration and practice, designing, creating,
testing, analyzing, and improving. Students can work with
partners, small groups, or even individually. I am a firm
believer that in order to provide opportunities for all students
to be successful, you have to present them with many
opportunities to interact with and master the material.”
Smith and Boulware had the benefit of experiencing Pitsco’s
Modules program prior to using whole-class Expeditions, and
both are excited to now have “the best of both worlds.”
“With several different Module topics going at the same
time, I felt like I was out of touch with my students’ learning,”
Smith explained. “STEM Expeditions have given me all of the
great lessons, activities and resources, instructional videos,
and engaging topics of the STEM Modules, and they have
allowed me to get back in tune with how my students are
learning and developing.”