Milton Huling

This publication, written for grades for grades 5-8, is designed to offer educators science content articles that support the learning of the Nature of Science as well as support reading comprehension skills. All 11 articles align with Common Core ELA Standards and are designed with text complexity in mind. Included are suggested hands-on inquiry activities that will engage students in the rigors of the scientific process. The ultimate goal behind this endeavor is to provide a resource for students to become both literate and scientifically literate.

Sure, there are lots of cool STEM activities you can use in class. But do they really help your students learn science? This book shows you how to take lessons you’re already familiar with and, through small changes, do what the title says: Design STEM lessons that are actually meaningful for teaching and learning science. You can also make sure your STEM lessons contain the content students need to learn. The book’s foundation is a conceptual framework that keeps science front and center, showing you how to embed engineering, technology, and science applications in your lessons—similar to how you would embed literacy skills in your classwork. To make it easy to use this conceptual framework, Designing Meaningful STEM Lessons provides 13 ready-to-use lessons in physical science, life science, and Earth and space science. True to the authors’ promise to be both relevant and exciting, the lessons have titles such as “Cell-fie” and “Aircraft Catapult.” All correlate with A Framework for K–12 Science Education, take a constructivist approach, and operate within the 5E instructional model. By presenting STEM as a “process and not a thing,” Designing Meaningful STEM Lessons helps you bring STEM learning to life in your classroom, easily and effectively.