Welcome to the Race to the Top Online
STEM Professional Development Courses
The Georgia Tech Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing (CEISMC), through Georgia’s Race to the Top initiative, is offering FREE Online STEM courses for middle and high school mathematics, science, and CTAE teachers! Each fall, spring and summer, Georgia teachers can take a series of courses on Project-Based Inquiry Learning, Robotics or Statistics. These courses were designed as part of the NASA Electronic Professional Development Network (ePDN) and provide an interactive, collaborative environment to improve your content and pedagogical knowledge. Participants will receive Continuing Education or Professional Learning Units from Georgia Tech for successfully completing each course. Each course requires an average of five hours per week to successfully complete the assignments.
Project-Based Inquiry Learning (PBIL)
Develop your skills in designing and using project-based inquiry learning (PBIL) to enhance conceptual understanding, critical thinking, scientific reasoning, and problem solving in standards-based classrooms. The intended audience for PBIL is Grades 6-12.
Course 1: What is Project-Based Inquiry Learning
Course Dates: Wednesday, September 26 – Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Pre-requisite: None
Application Deadline: July 31, 2012
Course 2: Creating a PBIL Experience
Course Dates: Wednesday, November 7 – Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Pre-requisite: PBIL Course 1
Course 3: Implementing Your PBIL Experience
Pre-requisite: PBIL Course 2
Course 4: Share and Evaluate Your PBIL Experience
Pre-requisite: PBIL Course 3
Robotics
Learn how to build and program LEGO Mindstorm robots and use them to promote student engagement and conceptual understanding of math, science and engineering. In this four course series, participants will be engaged in the use of online learning tools and will install the LEGO NXT Robotic Effector software on their computers to prepare them for programming the LEGO Mindstorms robot. Participants will become familiar with LEGO vocabulary and parts of the LEGO Mindstorms kit as they build structural components of a robot and use math, science, and engineering principles to design, build, test, and operate their robots. Capping off this course will be the programming of a robot to perform a specific task. Participants must have access to the LEGO Mindstorms education NXT base kit (W9797) is required throughout the course – you must have exclusive access to this kit and the associated NXT software (W900080). The intended audience for Robotics is Grades 4-12.
Course 1: Getting Started in Robotics
Course Dates: Wednesday, August 29 – Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Pre-requisite: None
Application Deadline: July 2, 2012
Course 2: Manipulators and End Effectors
Course Dates: Wednesday, October 17 – Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Pre-requisite: Robotics Course 1
Course 3: Advanced Programming and Sensors
Course Dates: Wednesday, November 28 – Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Pre-requisite: Robotics Course 2
Course 4: Grand Challenge with the NXT Robot
Course Dates: Wednesday, December 12, 2012 – Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Pre-requisite: Robotics Course 3
Statistics
Strengthen your understanding of the statistics content included in the Common Core Standards, while deepening your understanding of data analysis, sampling, and inference. Participants will become familiar with techniques for conducting surveys, and will recognize Normal distributions as well as sampling distributions and apply properties to solve problems. Participants will use online interactive applications, a graphing calculator, NASA data sets, and electronic collaborative tools as well as activities for data collection. The intended audience for Statistics is Grades 7-12.
Course 1: How to Represent & Interpret One Variable Data
Course Dates: TBD
Pre-requisite: None
Application Deadline: TBD
Course 2: Observations, Experiments and Two Variable Data
Course Dates: TBD
Pre-requisite: Statistics Course 1
Course 3: Probability
Course Dates: TBD
Pre-requisite: None
Questions?
Please contact David Barnes, Educational Outreach Coordinator II, Georgia Tech CEISMC at david.barnes@ceismc.gatech.edu