Pinecrest Academy South Charter School
AdvancED STEM Certification
Indicator 1.7
Self-Assessment Rating: 4
Pinecrest Academy South ensures that teachers from across grade levels comprise the STEM Committee. These kindergarten through fifth grade teachers are the STEM leaders for their respective grade level team and serve as liaisons for their grade level. The STEM Committee meets each month to plan and discuss school-wide
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New during the 2018-2019 school year, the fifth grade level teachers worked collaboratively on a themed STEM project throughout each of the disciplines (Math, Science, and Language/Reading) to address a current issue (i.e. oil spills). Teachers in this particular grade level joined forces to gather additional resources that enhanced the instruction on this specific topic and to plan for culminating projects that reflect the learning acquired by each student. Through this, the teachers planned and arranged for a STEM Pep Rally to motivate and give an overview of the thematic unit.
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At Pinecrest Academy South, we plan to sustain the strength of our STEM learning experiences by continuing data analysis, planning for the interdisciplinary integration of STEM within grade level teams and through the STEM committee.
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STEM related activities and learning experiences. Additionally, the STEM committee leaders discuss various instructional strategies they can implement in their classrooms, review data, review student work, share best practices, and plan for school-wide STEM events such as the Science Fair Night, STEM showcases, SECME, Math competitions, Fairchild Garden Challenges, Robotics Competitions, Green Team challenges, and Family STEM Night.
The PAC STEM Committee during STEM Family Night:
Star Wars Theme.
STEM Committee members at the sign-in table during our Science Fair Night.
In addition, all grade levels have a weekly common planning time to facilitate collaboration of STEM learning practices. Once a month, we ask that each grade level team submit a record of minutes addressing concerns (i.e. materials needed, timeframes, etc.) The administrative team reviews and provides feedback to each grade level.
One of our areas for growth would be to plan for lessons that allows both STEM teachers and non-STEM teachers to collaborate and create thematic lessons that are relevant to local problems and issues. To improve in this area, we plan to have professional learning time allotted during the teacher planning days prior to the start of the 2019-2020 school year focusing on STEM integration. Additionally, we understand that at times it is difficult to plan for these STEM units with one hour of planning. Our goal for the next school year is to allocate a two-hour window opportunity for each grade level to plan for STEM.
Professional development with all teachers planning for STEM lessons using the AdvancED indicators.
The Agenda below is for the STEM Committee meeting that took place October 2018.
Below are two examples of two separate grade levels' planning time minutes.