DRK-12 Research and Products

Publication | While tragedy has struck an inordinate number of students in the past several years, not all areas of the country are at risk for every natural hazard all the time. To avoid having students feel like Chicken Little under a falling sky, the…
Publication | This article focused on creating virtual research experiences using digitized museum specimens.
Publication | Problem solving is a central focus of mathematics teaching and learning. If teachers are expected to support students' problem-solving development, then it reasons that teachers should also be able to solve problems aligned to grade level…
Publication | The InSTEP professional learning platform aims to support grades 6-12 teachers’ professional learning in teaching statistics and data science through a personalized online learning platform. While statistics and data analysis are included in…
Publication | The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of different data conditions on item parameter recovery and classification accuracy of three dichotomous mixture item response theory (IRT) models: the Mix1PL, Mix2PL, and Mix3PL.
Publication | The purpose of this study was to investigate fourth-grade students’ sensemaking of a word problem. Sensemaking occurs when students connect their understanding of situations with existing knowledge. We investigated students’ sensemaking through…
Publication | Immersive 360 videos are increasingly being used in pre-service teachers (PST) education. There is preliminary evidence that this technology may benefit future educators’ focus and attention to classroom settings and events. However, more…
Publication | Bioinformatics—a rapidly developing discipline that integrates mathematical and computational techniques with biological knowledge for applications in medicine, the environment, and other important aspects of life—is an example of an emerging…
Publication | Climate change, and the rise of the natural hazards that climate change brings, has been at the top of news feeds every week over the past year. Extreme events such as floods, droughts, and wildfires are expected to increase in the future. What…
Publication | In super-diverse classroom contexts, students come from varied migration channels, immigration statuses, languages, countries of origin, and religions, which contribute to new and complex social configurations of the classroom. Super-diversity…
Publication | Teachers’ professional noticing has been described as transitioning from descriptions of general pedagogy to analysis of students’ mathematical procedures and conceptual reasoning. Such a shift is described as a transition towards more student-…
Product for Educators | The CS-STEM Network offers research-based curricula created by Carnegie Mellon Robotics Academy that focus on teaching big ideas with robotics. Over 20 curriculum options provide support for LEGO, VEX, Arduino, and Virtual robot…
Publication | In this paper, we present an overview of the design research used to develop a digital collaborative environment with an embedded problem-based curriculum. We then discuss the student and teacher features of the environment that promote inquiry-…
Presentation | The CADRE Learning Series was designed to provide targeted support for STEM education researchers on topics of DRK-12 needs and interests. The learning series has covered the topics of professional development and case study design.…
Publication | Ed+gineering, an NSF-funded program, adapted hands-on robotics instruction for online delivery in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This qualitative multiple case study shares the experiences of participating education students in spring 2021…
Publication | Implemented was a 45-minute per day Primary Science IDEAS intervention in grades 1–2 integrating reading and writing within science instruction in a multi-year study conducted in 8 experimental and 9 control schools. Results found a significant…
Publication | Posterior Predictive Model Checking (PPMC) is frequently used for model fit evaluation in Bayesian Confirmatory Factor Analysis (BCFA). In standard PPMC procedures, model misfit is quantified by comparing the location of an ML-based point…
Publication | The Innovate to Mitigate project adapts crowdsourcing to support project-based STEM education, posing design challenges for secondary-school students. Students are charged with designing feasible innovative strategies to mitigate CO2 emissions…
Publication | The ability for an educational game designer to understand their audience's play styles and resulting experience is an essential tool for improving their game's design. In this paper we present a simple, reusable process using best practices for…
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Publication | Teachers experience challenges in effectively using formative assessment practices in their classrooms. In the US, only 28% of elementary teachers report using formative assessment. This study highlights the need to design resources to meet…
Publication | This review synthesizes insights from 23 NSF-funded projects, totaling $40 million, that studied mathematical and scientific argumentation in STEM education from prekindergarten (PreK) to Grade 12. The projects reported on both studies of…
Publication | Narrative as a game design feature constantly yields mixed results for learning in the literature. The purpose of this exploratory mixed-methods case study was to examine design heuristics and implications governing the role of narratives in a…
Publication | This study explores undergraduate engineering and education students’ perspectives on their interdisciplinary teams throughout the rapid transition to online learning and instruction from a face-to-face to a virtual format.
Publication | This study investigated novice mathematics teachers participating in an online teacher education course focused on covariational reasoning and understanding the behavior of functions. The analysis centered on documenting the emergence of…