"Human Impacts on Our Climate" outlines a journey that will steer your students toward authentic problem solving while grounding them in integrated STEM disciplines. Like the other volumes in the series, this book is designed to meet the growing need to infuse real-world learning into K-12 classrooms. This interdisciplinary, three-lesson…

REL Southeast developed this facilitator's guide on the topic of mathematical problem solving for use in professional learning community (PLC) settings. The facilitator's guide is a set of professional development materials designed to supplement the What Works Clearinghouse practice guide, Improving Mathematical Problem Solving in Grades 4…

Emperor penguins, the largest of all the penguin species, attain heights of nearly four feet and weigh up to 99 pounds. Many students are not motivated to learn mathematics when textbook examples contain largely nonexistent contexts or when the math is not used to solve significant problems found in real life. This article's project explores how…

Anne Roche and Doug Clarke discuss the importance of developing students' persistence in relation to problem solving during the use of challenging tasks. They provide a useful list of strategies that teachers can use to encourage persistence amongst their students.

Instructional tips help educators carry out recommendations contained in IES Educator's Practice Guides. The tips translate these recommendations into actionable approaches that educators can try in their classrooms. These tips are based on a practice guide authored by Sybilla Beckmann, Mark Driscoll, Megan Franke, Patricia Herzig, Asha Jitendra,…

Instructional tips help educators carry out recommendations contained in IES Educator's Practice Guides. This summary describes the research evidence that supports the use of the instructional tips in classrooms and is based on a practice guide authored by Sybilla Beckmann, Mark Driscoll, Megan Franke, Patricia Herzig, Asha Jitendra, Kenneth R.…

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) publishes practice guides in education to bring the best available evidence and expertise to bear on current challenges in education. Authors of practice guides combine their expertise with the findings of rigorous research, when available, to develop specific recommendations for addressing these…

Using an approach based on a Harvard study that found "when the whole body is involved, the number of brain cells brought to the learning activity doubles," the author offers over one hundred kinesthetic activities for classroom use. Activities are organized by content area, include directions for number of players, objective, and…

This activity to meet the basic literacy goals of sixth-grade students shows how to incorporate language arts into the classroom while introducing the principles of technology. Includes a design brief with evaluation rubric. (JOW)

Shares detailed episodes of children's work in repeatedly partitioning geometric shapes to highlight the process of recursion, which can lead to a deeper understanding of imagination and beauty in children's mathematics. (MKR)

Describes how the author used many versions of the Cinderella story as a springboard for a variety of activities in her sixth-grade class, including discussion of fairy tale elements, aspects of story structure, summarizing, and problem-solving activities. (SR)

Discusses examples of the detailed explanations that students offered in response to a written, open-ended geometry task, especially the ways in which students communicated their knowledge. Illustrates how different students may select different methods of communication such as using text, diagrams, or mathematical symbols to display their…

Describes establishing and running a credit union in a sixth-grade classroom. By establishing a classroom credit union, students can develop independence in solving real problems and model situations that occur in the real world to solve similar problems. (ASK)

Outlines a social studies lesson plan that follows the Problem Based Learning model. Provides the lesson goal, questions for students, instructions for teachers and students, instructional materials, Internet resources for student research, preparation hints for teachers, and reflective learning questions for students at the end of the project.…

Provides examples of student work on a problem which shows that students solve problems in several different ways. Discusses challenges to the teacher that might result from problems such as these. (ASK)