As a fresh batch of students began the school year, I shared with them previous projects I did with students in connection with space travel. They were intrigued and asked me if there were similar projects we could do. While searching for a program, I came across the International Reading Association (IRA), the International Literacy Day, and the partnership with NASA presenting the “Lift Off to Literacy” program for students. I read about Kjell Lindgren saying “Books have paved my path to space.” I realized this wasn’t exactly what the students asked for, but I could use 60-for-60 challenge as a jumping-off point for daily experiments and projects with a bigger goal of getting my students to read in non-traditional forms they wouldn’t dread.
With my Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) students (grades 6-8) I presented news articles related to daily curriculum topics. The students loved the opportunity to see the information and content in such a way that it wasn’t just classroom reading material (like a textbook). I often gave them a prompt to discuss or write an answer on our blog account prior to being shown the article of the day.
For example, we discussed rockets and space travel when I found a current article that Einstein’s Theory of Time Dilation had been verified. I asked the students to answer these questions prior to reading: “Would you want to travel to another planet, galaxy, solar system or star? Would you mind if someone you loved went without you?” After reading the article, we revisited their initial responses and many students said they changed their minds. Talk about conversation!
Here is some of the pre-writing:
“I would want to travel to another planet, galaxy, and solar system or star because you never know what’s out there, and I wanna see space! I love space it’s so pretty.”
“I would not like to travel to another planet. Many other places in the galaxy are dangerous. I would definitely mind (if someone I loved went), especially since they would probably never come back. I would probably miss them.”
Typical responses from middle school students, but then I had this one:
“No, I can't live without the people I love, I just couldn't go anywhere without them. Besides, it takes hundreds and thousands of years to travel to another galaxy or star, unless you travel as fast as a beam of light.”
These students had never heard of Einstein’s Theory of Dilation. Once we read the article, they all wanted to know if they could change their answers. The students talked about this article for days.
Each day is an experience of anticipation and excitement for the students and me. I can’t wait to introduce them to ideas, theories, concepts, inventions, innovations, and inventors in a way that isn’t a long, drawn-out story or lecture. I can use this to inspire the kids to read professional articles and documents on their own time. They often come in with articles scribbled in their engineering notebooks or on a tattered piece of paper asking if I will share that article immediately. And if they think I have forgotten to present the daily article, I am immediately hounded and reminded we need to do it. There can be no deviation in the game plan. The date, objective, mind puzzle, and “The Article.” It is forbidden that we should go in any other order. They also make sure that I assign reading articles for the weekend on our blog or that I make up the weekend days on Monday by doing an extra-long article or two articles. I am truly amazed, awed, and humbled by their hunger for this reading, writing, and discussion medium of just 60 seconds.
On one morning I planned to share an article about 3D printers which falls under every STEM category. The article was about cars being created with a 3D printer and I was fairly certain they had limited knowledge of this area. The first group of students burst into my room yelling “Did you see the 3D printer on the student morning news?” I had not, so they filled me in. It was the similar story to what I was going to present just in video format. We went on to read the article I had already selected. And these two events, occurring within 30 minutes of each other, lit a fire in their imaginations.
The first questions from them were centered on: “Why can’t we build our solutions and prototypes using one of those 3D printer things?” which led us in to the economics and financial ramifications of 3D printers, which led to “When can we get one?” They started researching the logistics and size requirements for the amount of space available in my room. The next day I found an article about a young boy who was given a prosthetic hand that resembled Iron Man’s hand. That article set off another round of “we can fix…” and then a technology assessment of 3D printers on the environment, economics, ethics, social, culture, and politics. These two days found me hard stretched to get my daily lesson in so I made a promise I would write grants to see if we can get one. I have been writing a grant about once a week.
In these 60 seconds I also like to note sometimes our history books and documents fail to give credit where credit is due. Many of the articles I present speak about these injustices and inspire many of what I consider underrepresented groups to be inspired, including women in technology. An example from the article is Ana Lovelace. After reading the article the students’ immediate response was “Did she have an engineering notebook?” or “Did she file for a patent?” or “Wasn’t that copyright infringement when they used her idea without giving her credit?” I was overwhelmed. I thought I was giving them the opportunity to see that females are often overlooked for their contributions and yes, they were indignant on that front, but they were mortified she didn’t have the social, cultural or technical clout to back up her work. All of this came from reading 60 seconds of a book review article.
I honestly did not realize what a difference just one or two minutes could make in the lives of these students. At first I was afraid the students would have already heard about the subject in the articles I was presenting through television, but quickly found the articles I utilize aren’t always mainstream or that the way an article is presented makes it totally interesting to them. Stumbling on the 60-for-60 challenge was serendipity at its best.
Thelma Kastl is a STEM educator at West Wilkes Middle School in North Carolina where she teaches grades 6-8. She holds a bachelor's in Technology Education from the Appalachian State University and a master's in Instructional Technology from Appalachian State University. She is North Carolina’s First Wind Senator. She has additional degrees and certifications in electronics, psychology and environmental studies and has taught Project Lead the Way engineering courses at Duke University and Seattle University. She has also taught technology education courses at Appalachian State University and Electronics at Wilkes Community College. She was Ashe County Career Center and Ashe County High School Teacher of the Year, in addition to the International Technology Education and Engineering Educators Associations Teacher of the Year and received Program of the Year. She can be contacted at kastlt@wilkes.k12.nc.us or technology.kastl@gmail.com.