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The Nature-Based Early Learning Conference brings professionals together to explore and promote nature-based learning for young children. Attendees include teachers, program administrators, higher education faculty, researchers, education consultants, landscape designers, and others who are committed to or interested in bringing nature, outdoor learning, and environmental education to young children’s education. The program focuses on nature-based ... Read more

Spending time in nature is essential for cognitive development. Nature play stimulates creativity and problem solving skills integral to executive function development. Children who play and spend time in nature have increased concentration and cognitive skills, including mitigation of ADHD/ADD symptoms. Findings from Research & Evaluation Spontaneous, open-ended, play in natural surroundings offer unrivaled opportunities ... Read more

This white paper examines how caregivers in the United States perceive and navigate the integration of AI into their households.

Over the past decade, there has been increased interest in the details and depth of visitors’ experiences in informal educational settings. National Science Foundation (NSF) and other agencies have funded research projects studying visitors in museums, zoos, aquaria and parks. Evaluation studies, as well, now more often examine visitor behavior and attitudes, rather than just ... Read more

Neurodiversity in STEM (ND in STEM) is seeking stories from learners with intellectual disabilities (ID) who are interested in STEM, have vocational aspirations in STEM, and/or have participated in STEM programs or enrichment opportunities. STEM education is often deprioritized for some learners, and we’re trying to find (and share) examples of where it is not… ... Read more

Each year, the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) funds projects that explore the connections between science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) and the humanities. We recently coordinated with the NEH to make these project descriptions searchable on InformalScience.org. The newly cataloged projects, funded through the Division of Public Programs, are multidisciplinary and often address ... Read more

We recently added a number of articles from the current issue of Afterschool Matters to the informalscience.org collection. Afterschool Matters is a peer-reviewed publication of the National Institute on Out-of-School Time (NIOST). The journal serves professionals who are developing, managing, and/or researching programs for youth that take place during the out-of-school time hours. Here’s a ... Read more

The newest NSF Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) solicitation is now available. The Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program seeks to advance new approaches to and evidence-based understanding of the design and development of STEM learning opportunities for the public in informal environments; provide multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences; advance innovative research ... Read more

The Center for Advancement of Informal Science Education (CAISE) convened a one-day “Edit-a-Thon” on May 25, 2016 as a follow up to the Research Meeting on Making and Learning meeting held at the Children’s Museum of  Pittsburgh on May 23 & 24.  Building on the momentum and generative discussions at the maker research meeting, participants ... Read more

Since 2010, partners at the University of Pittsburgh Center for Learning in Out of School Environments (UPCLOSE), Science Museum of Minnesota, and Visitor Studies Association, with support from the National Science Foundation, have been collaborating on the Building Informal Science Education (BISE) project. The team aims to review existing evaluation reports catalogued on informalscience.org to ... Read more

MIT Press recently published a new book on assessment in informal learning environments. Produced with support from the MacArthur Foundation, Documenting and Assessing Learning in Informal & Media-Rich Environments provides a new model called the Outcomes-by-Levels Model for Documentation and Assessment. The model identifies as least ten types of outcomes that can be assessed at ... Read more

The Citizen Science Association has launched a new open-access, peer-reviewed journal published by Ubiquity Press. Citizen Science: Theory and Practice focuses on advancing the field of citizen science by providing a venue for citizen science practitioners and researchers to share best practices in conceiving, developing, implementing, evaluating, and sustaining projects that facilitate public participation in ... Read more

Nearly two-thirds of the adult population in the United States own a smartphone (Pew Research, 2015) and three-quarters of smartphone owners regularly use location-based apps on their devices (Pew Research, 2013). Given the ubiquity of smartphones and how familiar it is to use location-based apps, it is not surprising that museums would be eager to ... Read more

The InformalScience.org calendar lists conferences, workshops, meetings, and other professional development opportunities in the informal science education field. Some conferences added this month include: World Congress of Science and Factual Producers (WCSFP) Annual Conference in Montreal, Quebec Euroscience Open Forum in Copenhagen, Denmark 2014 Cyberlearning Summit in Madison, Wisconsin STEM Education and Our Planet: Making ... Read more

The U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) has announced a new opportunity for library students, as well as those already in the profession. The Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program provides opportunities for early career research in libraries, as well as the professional development of librarians and library staff. Applications are due September ... Read more

Developing an evaluation report can be challenging. Happily, there are dedicated evaluation professionals who use their expertise to help the community produce the best reporting that they can. EvaluATE is the evaluation support center for the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education program. The center produces tools for the ATE community to help guide people through ... Read more

InformalScience.org recently launched a newly updated evaluation page designed to make evaluation resources more accessible to informal STEM learning professionals. The new page visually highlights resources to help both veterans and those new to the community develop evaluation plans and proposals, iteratively inform projects, and disseminate evaluation findings. The new evaluation tab will help you: ... Read more

The National Center for Science and Civic Engagement (NCSCE) is requesting proposals for Partnership Champions: SENCER-ISE and Professional Development Through Mentoring to Enhance Learning Environments. Partnership Champions is funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS; MG-10-15-0071-15) and is an extension of the existing SENCER-ISE (Science Education for New Civic Engagements and Responsibilities- Informal Science Education) project, which ... Read more

Whether the goal is to identify and describe trends and variation in populations, create new measures of key phenomena, or describe samples in studies aimed at identifying causal effects, description plays a critical role in the scientific process, particularly in education research. Descriptive analysis identifies patterns in data to answer questions about who, what, where, ... Read more

NSF has released a new solicitation for proposals for the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program. Full proposals are due September 5, 2017 at 5 p.m. in the submitter’s localtime. To learn more about this funding opportunity, view the complete solicitation on the NSF website. The Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers ... Read more

Science Learning+ will provide up to $14.4 million to support research into how learning happens outside the classroom, exploring the most effective practices and building the evidence base in this area. The aims are: (1) to learn more about, evaluate, and maximize the impact of informal learning experiences, and (2) to improve understanding of how ... Read more

The current issue of the Afterschool Matters journal, published by the National Institute on Out-of-School Time (NIOST), focuses entirely on STEM. Article topics include models of STEM learning in afterschool, integrating math into library programs, STEM programs for adolescent girls, public television STEM outreach resources, survey findings of characteristics of out-of-school time STEM programs, STEM ... Read more

The National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine have released a new report entitled Promising Practices for Strengthening the Regional STEM Workforce Development Ecosystem.  The report examines the ways in which universities and industries can collaborate to strengthen local STEM workforces, through strategies such as higher quality course offerings, lab activities, work-based learning programs, and more.

Informalscience.org posts funding opportunities for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education research and development on our Calendar. This month, two solicitations from the National Science Foundation were released: Discovery Research K-12 (DRK-12): The Discovery Research K-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of STEM by preK-12 students and teachers, through ... Read more

From the National Science Foundation (NSF): The Discovery Research PreK-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) by PreK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of STEM education innovations and approaches. Projects in the DRK-12 program build on fundamental research in STEM education and ... Read more