GRADE LEVELS: 9-12
SP TAB/CONTENT AREA: Choose Your Path
STUDENT PATHS OUTCOMES:
1-1: Students understand their choices of post-secondary options and careers.
IN THIS LESSON, STUDENTS WILL:
- Develop a better understanding of careers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics
- Read the Student Paths article, “What’s the big deal about STEM?”
MATERIALS:
Reproducible Activity Handout for “Why? Questions”
LESSON PROCEDURE:
1. Read article, “What’s the big deal about STEM?” and complete activities on handout (15 minutes).
Distribute Student Paths Publication and give students a few minutes to browse through the publication.
Distribute the Activity Handout and direct student attention to “What’s the big deal about STEM?” article.
Explain the following to students:
The Why? questions in this handout are designed for critical thinking about figures, data, and how we use evidence to make predictions about the future. We each try to answer these questions to the best of our ability to better develop our own critical thinking skills.
After you complete the 10 questions about the article, it is time to ask your own Why? questions.
What have you always wondered about in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics?
This will be your time to write those questions you always wondered about, and if nothing comes to mind, the task is to start writing all the questions that pique your curiosity.
Provide students time to complete the questions and write their own questions.
This is a challenging task, and the group may need encouragement. Suggest that students skip the most difficult questions and finish them last.
Encourage every student to write their own questions, whatever they may be, because this is a useful way to discover your own interests. A scientist, software developer, and mathematician all have interesting questions to answer. Many of the Why? questions will remain open for interpretation, but most importantly, the questions motivate our actions to find an answer.
Segue into activity to explore STEM-related careers by suggesting that every field and profession has overarching questions.
Conclude the lesson by instructing the students to properly close down their computers.
Encourage students to answer a few of their own questions for homework.
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