The Relation Between Spatial Language During Informal Learning and Children’s STEM-Related School Readiness Scores

Young children’s interest in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) can develop through everyday experiences; often in science-related informal settings and museums. Verdine et al. found that parental spatial language is important in creating a foundation in STEM learning. The relation between children’s school readiness scores, informal play at home, and spatial language use during caregiver-child play with an open-ended block task was examined. The first hypothesis was that families who use more spatial language during informal block play will report playing more with the spatial, STEM-related toys at home, which may be related to school readiness scores. The second hypothesis was that there will be a link between spatial language and STEM-related school readiness scores in which families who use more spatial language will have children who score higher in school readiness. The third hypothesis was that over the course of the school year, school readiness will increase during the children’s enrollment in the Head Start program based on previous results by Kachuro et al. The quantity of spatial language was determined using transcripts of the videos of the dyads’ interactions. School readiness was conducted through an observational assessment that was performed at the beginning and end of the program. At home play was measured through caregivers’ self-report on a questionnaire. The sample consisted of 23 children (12 females) who participated with their parent (12 females) and were recruited at Family Engagement events held monthly at the Sciencenter for families enrolled in Head Start. A correlational analysis along with descriptive statistics will be presented between school readiness scores, play questionnaire, and spatial language analysis. Finally, we will examine measured variables for emerging sex differences.https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_2021/1012/thumbnail.jp

A Head Start in Science: Parent-child interactions and children’s science process skills

Supporting early STEM learning in children is important in formal and informal settings, especially for underrepresented families. Head Start partnered with the Sciencenter to engage parents and children in STEM related activities once a month during free Family Engagement Night. It was hypothesized that children’s school readiness was related to the amount of science-process language used between parents and children. Children’s school readiness scores were evaluated throughout the academic year. Science process language was categorized into observations, predictions, categorization, math and measurements, and spatial. It was found that school readiness scores were correlated with math related conversation but not science and technology, rs\u3e .53, ps\u3c .05. Gender differences were also found in overall STEM related conversation, F(1,21)=13.27, p\u3c .05, ��2=.43. Future studies will evaluate the significance between gender differences on STEM related assessments and parent-child interactions during Family Engagement Night.https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_spring2020/1037/thumbnail.jp

Experimental Group Differences in Children’s Bracing Ability

Science education research investigates young children’s understanding of materials in technological settings linking the concept of matter to tangible properties such as weight or heaviness. Children’s comprehension of elements enables them to support and reinforce the structural stability of towers when presented with wobbly structures. Young children understand the relationships between the properties of materials, stability, and bracing during construction. Sixty-eight families (M child age = 5.5 years) were recruited at the entrance of the Skyline building construction exhibit at a children’s museum and were randomly assigned to two conditions. This consisted of the demonstration group (experimental group) and the non-demonstration group (the control group). Children were then tasked with strengthening a wobbly structure of a skyscraper or a bridge, first with their parents followed by the second task to be completed independently. We will analyze the effect of the cross-bracing demonstration on children\u27s building behavior in an engineering exhibit. We will discuss the ratio of functional to total pieces used, such as cross-braces or triangle pieces. We predict that children who received the cross-bracing demonstration will exhibit greater success at properly using functional pieces to create a stable structure compared to children in the control group.https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_2021/1097/thumbnail.jp

Gender Differences in Children’s Prior Play Experiences as a Predictor of Success in Engineering Tasks

Studies have shown that female student’s science and mathematical achievements are consistent with those of their male peers. Nevertheless, women are dramatically underrepresented in STEM professions, with women making up just 12 percent of working engineers. Since it has been found that early exposure to STEM concepts and practice leads to later success in the field, it is important that we understand the differences in engineering skills and levels of interest in young children. This study examines gender differences between young children in multiple measured variables of building tasks at an engineering exhibit in a museum. The sample consists of 68 families, child M age = (5.5 years). In this study researchers asked children to fix a wobbly skyscraper or bridge, and also asked parents to complete a questionnaire regarding their child’s play interests. Children’s attempts at fixing the structures were coded from videotape records at the museum. It is hypothesized that parents will report male children having greater prior experience and interest with engineering games than females, which may predict greater success in the building tasks. We will report results on potential gender differences in children’s prior play experiences and interest as a predictor of success in these building tasks.https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_2021/1100/thumbnail.jp

Gut CD4+ T cell phenotypes are a continuum molded by microbes, not by TH archetypes

CD4 effector lymphocytes (T ) are traditionally classified by the cytokines they produce. To determine the states that T cells actually adopt in frontline tissues in vivo, we applied single-cell transcriptome and chromatin analyses to colonic T cells in germ-free or conventional mice or in mice after challenge with a range of phenotypically biasing microbes. Unexpected subsets were marked by the expression of the interferon (IFN) signature or myeloid-specific transcripts, but transcriptome or chromatin structure could not resolve discrete clusters fitting classic helper T cell (T ) subsets. At baseline or at different times of infection, transcripts encoding cytokines or proteins commonly used as T markers were distributed in a polarized continuum, which was functionally validated. Clones derived from single progenitors gave rise to both IFN-γ- and interleukin (IL)-17-producing cells. Most of the transcriptional variance was tied to the infecting agent, independent of the cytokines produced, and chromatin variance primarily reflected activities of activator protein (AP)-1 and IFN-regulatory factor (IRF) transcription factor (TF) families, not the canonical subset master regulators T-bet, GATA3 or RORγ. + eff eff eff H

ImmGen at 15

International audienc