The importance of STEM education is in no doubt. Science, technology (including coding), engineering and math skills are vital for our future workforce and any child who excels in one or more of these areas has a bright future.

If your child has a particular interest in STEM subjects or shows signs of special abilities or talents in them, you may be looking for additional activities outside of school to help nurture their skills. You may also be looking for classes if you are concerned about your child’s progress in any of the STEM areas.

What are your options? There are summer camps and after school programs offered by specialist providers for a start. Your child’s school may offer extracurricular programs, too. A further option is one that your child can do from home whenever it is convenient. It’s the use of a STEM e-learning platform.

This option offers your child a flexible, personalized course and access to specialist teaching without needing to leave your home.

How a good e-learning platform should work

A child’s experience of e-learning should begin with diagnostic testing. Capturing where a child’s strengths and weaknesses lie means that all online lessons can be pitched to best maximize progress from the get-go.

Diagnostic testing will follow the same format as ongoing assessments throughout the course. It will be fun, interactive and engaging. Data from regular assessments throughout your child’s e-learning course can demonstrate how much and where they are making progress from beginning to end.

This data-driven approach improves the instruction your child will receive because it helps your child’s teacher choose the correct pathway through the learning content for your child. On a good e-learning platform, your child’s assessment data should be easily visible to you, meaning you can keep an eye on their progress, too.

As for the activities your child will engage in, these will include learning videos, presentations and multiple styles of interactive activities for your child to build and strengthen new skills.

Your child will learn from completing online worksheets that give immediate feedback, and through games and quizzes. Your child can also meet their teacher online and have the opportunity for direct teaching and discussion with them.

The whole system of instruction, activity and assessment should appear on a friendly, attractive interface that’s appealing to children.

The advantages of an e-learning platform

Here are four of the most significant advantages of this style of learning.

Engagement

All parents know that children are naturally drawn to screens. They love almost any kind of online game and would happily spend hours immersed in technology. Why not put this to good use?

E-learning platforms leverage the enjoyment that children get from electronic games and activities by combining it with powerful teaching and learning opportunities. Engaging video content and gamification of learning are common features of good learning platforms. Your child is guaranteed to enjoy learning this way.

Personalization

You can pick exactly what you would like your child to learn. You’ll find many of the course options on a good platform are relatively specific.

So instead of ‘computing’, you’ll find courses on app development or coding, for example. It means your child can follow a particular interest or work on something they need special help in. It could also mean that they get more experience of something they’ve only touched on briefly at school.

The other way these are tailored to the individual child is through the exact course content. As mentioned earlier, a robust system of regular micro assessment means that your child’s learning can be personalized to suit their progress throughout the course. Two children on the same course won’t necessarily follow the same program of study for this reason.

Accessibility and flexibility

Your child can access their additional STEM learning whenever it is a good time. All they will need is an appropriate electronic device and a stable internet connection. Many students choose to access their e-learning platforms regularly after school or on weekends. However, the possibilities are endless. They could use a long journey or time spent waiting for an appointment to get stuck into some bitesize learning.

The great thing about e-learning is that it is far easier to fit into a busy schedule than any in-person class or activity. You can easily add extra-curricular STEM learning to your child’s other out-of-school interests like sports and music.

Success

Good e-learning platforms have proven track records of success. This comes from all the points above: personalization, high levels of student engagement and the flexibility of the courses are a winning formula.

e-Learning Industry cited a study by Brandon Hall Group Research that showed students retain up to 5 times more knowledge from an e-learning course compared to in-person teaching. They attribute this to the bitesize nature of the content on e-learning platforms.

5 exciting STEM courses your child can take on an e-learning platform

Coding

Your child can learn C#, HTML/CSS, Java, Python and Scratch. They could be a beginner or learn at an advanced level. Their course would be suited to their grade level and tweaked using diagnostic and regular assessment. Children are encouraged to use their preferred system to solve challenging real-world problems.

Game development

Game development e-learning courses are naturally popular with children and young people. They can use their creativity to build and test exciting gameplay.

3D designing

This practical e-learning course will also appeal to your child’s creative side. They can learn how to design meaningful 3D objects using relevant software.

Arduino

Arduino is a program that helps students develop skills in electronics. They can create circuits, from beginner level to advanced. They can go on to create exciting things like home automation and wearable devices. This will demonstrate the real-world value of their new skills.

AI-aware app development

Students can learn app development alongside AI and create fully-fledged, downloadable apps with a real-life purpose.

The rise of e-learning has opened some doors into the exciting world of STEM. These subjects are more accessible and more engaging than ever before for students of all ages. You can ignite a lifelong love of STEM in your child and help them develop skills for their future career.

Why not explore the many exciting e-learning options available further?

Maloy Burman is the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Premier Genie FZ LLC. He is responsible for driving Premier Genie into a leadership position in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) Education space in Asia, Middle East and Africa and building a solid brand value. Premier Genie is currently running 5 centers in Dubai and 5 centers in India with a goal to multiply that over the next 5 years.

Featured Image: Tima Miroshnichenko, Pexels. 

The post What a STEM E-Learning Platform Can Offer Your Child appeared first on eLearningInside News.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) released their 2015-2016 Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC) report. The government agency has been collecting data on the demographics of K-12 schools in the U.S. since 1968. It has generally been their practice to publish it every two years. The latest release provides, among other things, insight into the current demographic breakdown of STEM courses.

If equality—or at least equity—is a goal of U.S. schools, then one would hope that demographic breakdown in each class would match that of the school and the country at large. It’s unreasonable, of course, for that reality to come to fruition exactly. But still, one would hope to be close.

In the 2015-2016 school year, the racial distribution of students in order of size was the following: 49% White, 26% Hispanic or Latino, 15% Black or African American, 5% Asian, 1% American Indian or Alaskan Native, 3% two or more races, and 0.4% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander.

51% of students were male, 49% were female. The study did not provide alternative gender options.

Algebra I: The Gateway to STEM Courses

In STEM courses, white students for the most part were overrepresented. The CRDC looks at many different data points, but they have determined that Algebra I is one of the most important. As the authors write, “Algebra is often referred to as a “gatekeeper course” because it is generally considered a prerequisite for higher-level mathematics courses. Early passage of this foundational mathematics course helps prepare students for subsequent STEM coursework.”

But deciphering demographic data on Algebra I courses isn’t as easy as one might think. Depending on what school a given student goes to, he or she might have access to an Algebra course beginning at 7^th grade. Some students, however, can’t take one till 9^th grade. A significant number of high school students don’t take an algebra course until 11^th or 12^th grade. In other words, taking one’s first Algebra course is as much about progress in school as it is about access, full stop.

According to the authors, “For the 2015–16 school year, the CRDC collected data indicating that nearly 30,000 public schools in the United States served students who were enrolled in either Grade 7 or Grade 8. Of the schools with Grade 7 students enrolled, approximately 21 percent offered Algebra I classes. Of the schools with Grade 8 students enrolled, approximately 58 percent offered Algebra I.”

White students largely populated these traditionally middle school grades. Of those taking Algebra in 8^th grade, 58% were white (a full 9% above their overall representation). Of those passing their Algebra course, the gap was even wider at 64%.

In grades 9-12, that is somewhat maintained. 58% of students taking Calculus are white—the same majority as Algebra I in 8^th grade. What’s more, in Calculus classes, the number of Black and Hispanic and Latino students decreases while Asian students gain ground compared to Algebra in 8^th grade.

There’s More than Just a Silver Lining

But that is easily the biggest disparity. In other STEM courses, the demographic percentages nearly follow the overall American student population. In Biology, Physics, Chemistry, and Geometry, the proportion of students only deviates by roughly 3% at most.

There is, furthermore, a more optimistic side of the report. When it comes to the breakdown of gender, no significant disparities exist. In terms of total enrollment, male students make up 51% of high school students while 49% are female (again, no alternative gender identification was allowed). Among STEM subjects, the biggest disparity lay in Physics, where 54% of students were male and 46% were female. This suggests, at least, that forces that push women away from STEM-related careers aren’t necessarily fully at work in high school.

To learn more, such as the demographic information of English learners and students with disabilities, read the full report here.

The post White Students Take More STEM Courses, Earlier appeared first on eLearningInside News.