SDE AL image Use PBL to Accelerate STEM Skills During Summer Learning!  AMSTI image                                                                                          

Welcome Educators of Alabama! 

AMSTI and the Alabama State Department of Education is providing Defined Learning for Summer Learning at no cost to all public schools in Alabama! 

We are excited to help you create an engaging STEM integrated environment for your students that will empower them to work on their literacy and numeracy knowledge and build skills necessary to thrive in college, careers, and life! 

What Resources do you have access to?

All K-12 public school teachers in Alabama have access to the resource below: 

  • Defined Learning (Grades K-12): The Defined Learning platform includes the online curriculum elements you need to integrate STEM and implement high-quality PBL : career-focused videos to set the stage for the project, a library of standards-aligned performance tasks, research resources, editable rubrics, and more!

Why Project-Based Learning? 

 

GET STARTED

Getting Started with Defined Learning:

For a brief 2-minute video of Defined Learning, click here. 

Defined Learning overview video for Alabama Educators-CLICK HERE!

Getting started tutorial videos!


Example Defined Learning Performance Tasks by Grade Band

lemonad

MATH Grades K-2: Entrepreneur: Lemonade Stand. In this task, students will learn about managing their own businesses. They will practice adding, subtracting, and making changes to run their own Lemonade Stand. As the manager of their own business, the students will have the opportunity to create a budget and price & change chart. 

In Units: Money, Data & Time

aquarium

MATH/SCIENCE Grades 3-5: Aquarium Designer.  In this Math/Science task, students are asked to play the role of a structural engineer whose team of marine biologists and zoologists enter a contest to design the best new aquarium. As structural engineers, the students will have the opportunity to create a design blueprint, and a prototype and prepare a presentation to share the design.

 In Units: Ecosystems: Environments and Organisms 

Tiny house image

MATH/SCIENCE Grades 6-8: Architect: Tiny House, In this math/science task, students will create a scaled floor plan of a tiny house and calculate the square footage of the rooms as well as create a 3D model from their floor plan and determine the square footage needed for materials like siding, carpet, etc.

In Units: Geometry

engineer

MATH SCIENCE Grades 9-12: Structural Engineer: Roller Coaster Design. This math/science task is focused on helping students understand how roller coasters conserve energy and convert energy from one form to another. In the tasks, the students will play the role of a structural engineer and they will have the opportunity to create a sketch of the design, a computer-generated graph of your roller coaster, and a persuasive presentation of their proposal. 

In Units: Energy, Math/Science

Example Computer Science Tasks by Grade Band

biomedical
computer science 1

COMPUTER SCIENCE (GR. 3-5): Biomedical Engineer Bionic Pets. A main focus of this task is Innovative Design. These standards focus on areas associated with Knowledge Construction, Innovative Design, Computational Thinking, and Creative Communication.

In Units: Innovative Design

COMPUTER SCIENCE (Gr. 9-12): Smart Home Design. In this computer science task, students research embedded computing systems to build an understanding of their functions.

In Units: Computing Systems

 

How do I get Access?:

If you have any questions please contact Julie Moreth-julie_moreth@definedlearning.com