Evidence Framework for Innovation and Excellence in Education

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched its ENGAGE research program to focus on the development of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) skills and social-emotional learning in a learning-game setting for early elementary-level students. DARPA usually focuses on the development of advanced technology and hardware for the military, but has teamed with the President’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to work on STEM education because it is such an important national priority.

With funding from the ENGAGE program, UCLA‘s Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Testing (CRESST) is partnering with the game development firm Intific to teach 5- and 6-year-olds fundamental physics concepts and principles. These are generally force and motion; specifically, they are concepts drawn from the National Academy of Sciences Framework for K-12 Science Education that are targeted to fifth-grade students (e.g., friction and velocity). READ MORE

Fourth-grade teachers at Oakville Elementary School use a reading program that calls for 90 minutes of literacy instruction a day, with students rotating between using a reading software program, working with the teacher in a small group, and doing silent sustained reading, each for 30 minutes.

One of the school’s fourth-grade teachers, Ms. Griffin, looks at the student and class reports generated by the reading software every week. These reports give her a detailed view of the reading subskills that each student has mastered, attempted, and still not reached and a whole-class view of where her students stand. READ MORE