Tag: Education

November 8th is National STEM Day and Microsoft is excited to help you and your students celebrate! National STEM Day was founded in 2015 to encourage students to pursue careers in the fast-growing fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Celebrated on November 8th each year, it is an opportunity to introduce students to passions and careers they might not otherwise know exist. Fun fact: November 8th isn’t a randomly chosen day, Nov8 is a numeronym, pronounced: “innovate.”

Whether you want to explore an immersive learning experience with Minecraft: Education Edition or provide opportunities for students to innovate and solve real issues locally and globally in the Imagine Cup, Microsoft can help you inspire your students to embrace STEM.

Representation and encouragement matter

Historically, women and people of color are vastly underrepresented in STEM careers. Girls Who Code and Logitech found that teachers had the second greatest influence (50%) in helping people pursue a technology career, only after a family member or friend (60%). Incorporating STEM opportunities into classroom instruction and highlighting diversity in STEM fields can make a difference in access for all.   

A fast-growing and ever-changing field

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a 10.8% increase in STEM fields between 2021 and 2031, where non-STEM occupations are only projected to grow by 4.9%. As a result, qualified STEM careers will be in high demand. STEM presents a vast number of exciting opportunities for students to blend their passions with their future careers. Those who love the outdoors may be interested in environmental engineering, working to preserve waterways, or wildlife. If students are interested in the effects of climate on weather patterns they could become meteorologists or storm chasers!

Microsoft can support those future skills now by giving students access to tools they’ll need to pursue these careers. For example, students who love video games can begin their journey in MakeCode Arcade and develop skills to help them pursue a future career in game design.

Embracing STEM in the classroom

STEM is very hands-on, accessible, and engaging. It can be incorporated into any subject or classroom because it’s more than a subject area, it’s an invaluable mindset. Approaching learning from a STEM lens fosters curiosity, creativity, problem-solving, and critical thinking that can be applied to any content area making cross-curricular connections endless.

Educator Opportunities

Microsoft is committed to supporting educators by providing a variety of entry points for embracing STEM regardless of previous experience. The Learn Educator Center offers free learning pathways, modules, and resources to help you grow professionally and innovate your classroom.  

On Learn the Hacking STEM collection is a curated group of standards-based middle school lessons written by educators for educators. They are inquiry and project-based activities that help students visualize data across science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) curriculum in exciting ways.

Student Opportunities

Engaging in STEM encourages students to explore, collaborate, and innovate their ideas. What is more fun than finding a new solution to a real problem? Students use peer and real-world feedback to improve their process, design, or solution, helping them develop important skills for their futures.

Students can utilize Learn Student Hub to explore STEM careers or learn new skills to support their interest in STEM. They can learn valuable skills for free like GitHub Student Developer, Visual Studio Code or even become a Microsoft Learn Student Ambassador! They can also earn Microsoft Certifications that start with foundational skills, then additional topics are covered ranging from Azure to AI, to data analytics and cybersecurity, preparing them for the future.

Developing sustainable solutions with Minecraft Education Edition

John Dewey High School in Brooklyn, New York, was already incorporating projects that linked students with their local community and the natural environment. So, when the school decided to do a cleanup of Coney Island Creek, they immediately saw an opportunity to create a STEM collaborative. They reached out to the Minecraft Club which were already working on a sustainable urban design challenge.

“We have embraced tools like Minecraft in the classroom that help build the skills needed for young people to thrive: to express their ideas, learn confidently, and explore issues that matter to them and their communities.” – Heather Adelle, Principal, John Dewey High School

Learn how John Dewey HS and the NYCDOE are inspiring sustainability education and building career pathways in the green economy with tools like Minecraft. 

Minecraft Education Edition supports STEM skills like creative problem-solving, collaboration, and critical thinking in an immersive digital environment. Using Minecraft, John Dewey’s students were able to recreate the estuary environment and develop innovative solutions to environmental problems like pollution that threaten the oyster reefs in Brooklyn.

Microsoft makes it easy to get started using Minecraft Education Edition in the classroom. We offer training for educators from the basics of getting started to more focused content, including coding, computer science, and esports. Minecraft also provides over 600 standards-aligned ready-to-use lessons and worlds to explore.

Use these free training modules on Learn to get started.

Solving real-world issues with a global community

Microsoft supports students in their quest to create innovative solutions for impact with their annual global technology and innovation competition for students, the Imagine Cup. Over the past 21 years, more than 2 million student competitors have signed up to build and learn together, make a difference in their communities, and innovate for impact. Last year’s winner, the V Bionic team, created ExoHeal, an exoskeleton aimed at providing rehabilitation to patients with hand paralysis by effectively retraining and recovering their motor functions. Their device is 30% more effective than existing devices and solved the problems lacking in the already existent rehabilitation devices by being more precise, portable, quick, and responsive. 

The goal of Imagine Cup is to empower every student on the planet to achieve more. Young developers are invited to submit their original technology solutions utilizing Microsoft Azure for a chance to win cash, prizes, and mentoring. All students need is a passion for making positive change. Once they form an Imagine cup team, Microsoft provides training on creating a successful project for a hackathon or competition. Microsoft also provides $100 USD cloud credit and free downloadable developer tools for their project with Azure for Students.

When student teams compete in the Imagine Cup, they become part of a worldwide community of like-minded students and mentors. Encourage interested students to register as a team for the 2023 Imagine Cup now until December 2023 or inspire your students while watching the Imagine Cup World Championship in May 2023! 

Integrating STEM into the classroom can be an engaging and easy way to help students develop skills and mindsets for college and career readiness. Innovate the classroom using Microsoft’s exciting resources and opportunities for STEM teaching and learning

The world needs dyslexic thinking, an approach to problem solving, assessing information, and learning. Research tells us that dyslexic thinkers have the exact skills needed for the workplace of today. The Value of Dyslexia report points out that new roles and enhanced tasks will be created across industries that closely match the strengths of dyslexic thinking. These strengths often include:

• Leadership and social influence
• Creativity
• Complex problem-solving
• Analytical thinking
• Emotional intelligence

This is why we have partnered with global charity Made By Dyslexia to help every educator identify, support, and empower every learner with dyslexia.

In honor of Dyslexia Awareness Month, alongside our partner Made by Dyslexia, New York City Mayor, Eric Adams, and The NYC Department of Education, we are excited to celebrate dyslexic thinking with some important announcements.

100,000 teachers trained

Thanks to Mayor Eric Adams and his team, New York City (NYC) is leading the world in harnessing the limitless potential of dyslexic thinking in every school. Today they celebrate all their teachers being trained in dyslexia, in less than 6 months. Understanding that dyslexic thinking skills—creativity and inventiveness—are fundamental to the fabric of the future, NYC is the first city in the world to train every educator to spot, support, and empower every learner with dyslexia.

Teachers can learn more about dyslexia awareness and teaching using free and engaging self-paced online training on Microsoft Learn. These training modules, used to train all 100,000 NYC teachers, feature dyslexia experts from world-leading schools and offer tried and true methodologies that work for dyslexic learners. NYC’s program for schools also includes structured literacy, dyslexia screening, and dyslexia specialist support pilots.

“We’ve known how to support dyslexia for decades, and we’ve known that without support these children enter a spiral of failure, but nothing has been done. There, however, is a very simple solution to this big problem; we need to train all teachers to spot, support and empower dyslexic students who are in every classroom, around the world. And we need to do it at speed… just like New York City.” -Kate Griggs, CEO & Founder of Made By Dyslexia

Learn Dyslexia campaign

There are more than 7 billion people on earth and 1 in 5 of them are dyslexic. While their skills are recognized by the World Economic Forum as the skills every workplace needs, many of these skills are not spotted or supported in schools. Findings in Made By Dyslexia’s new report, “The School Report”  reveal that over half of schools globally fail to understand dyslexic challenges. Also, only 1 in 10 teachers has a good understanding of dyslexic strengths, leaving 80% of learners with dyslexia with support that is average, poor, or non-existent. This is why Made by Dyslexia is launching their Learn Dyslexia campaign.

Following the success of NYC, this campaign calls for every school globally to give teachers a “day for dyslexia”—time to skill-up using the free dyslexia training on Microsoft Learn. This online training is comprised of multiple modules which cover dyslexia awareness, dyslexia teaching, and most recently added dyslexia and technology.

In the Dyslexia Awareness training module, learn how to spot, support, and empower learners with dyslexia in the classroom:

The Dyslexia Teaching training module provides strategies to transform teaching and learning:

And finally, the newest module Dyslexia and Technology offers opportunities to explore tech tools to support learners through building on their strengths, as well as supportive technology to mitigate challenges learners with dyslexia often face.

See what teachers are saying about the dyslexia training available on Microsoft Learn:

• “It is so outstanding! Ticks all the boxes—keeps your attention, factually strong, easy to digest and most importantly incredibly effective.”
• “The training opened my eyes to a whole new way of teaching. It’s also opened our eyes to those children who potentially may have been struggling but we haven’t yet noticed.”
• “It’s really deepened my understanding of dyslexia. How many intertwining elements there are—it’s not just the reading and the writing.”
• “The Dyslexia Awareness training is great for all teachers, whether they are newly qualified, nearly qualified or highly experienced.”

Read our customer stories to learn more about how Microsoft Education solutions support and help learners with dyslexia thrive.

The World Dyslexia Assembly 2023

The World Dyslexia Assembly 2023, a global celebration of Dyslexic Thinking, will take place at New York City’s David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center on April 3, 2023. This Assembly will feature engaging programming and speakers across industries including spies, space scientists, star athletes, and other special guests.  

“New York is where creative legacies are made. It’s where big ideas come together and synthesize into something unstoppable. So where better to stage our next World Dyslexia Assembly – our unparalleled social movement and event series, which is building the ultimate alliance of game-changers across the globe.” -Kate Griggs, CEO & Founder of Made By Dyslexia

Begin your Learn Dyslexia journey today

Join us and Made By Dyslexia in creating a more inclusive world that embraces those who think differently.

Start your Learn Dyslexia journey with the free, online dyslexia training on Microsoft Learn and exploring Made By Dyslexia’s resources for teachers.

With challenges facing classrooms worldwide, it’s essential to find new ways to engage and inspire young people to take an active role in developing leadership skills. Educators and families can support students as they learn how to make a positive change in their communities. In celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, Minecraft: Education Edition offers a chance to have some fun along the way.

“Minecraft is one of the games that we encourage our kids to play because they can explore, learn, and collaborate with other friends. We saw the opportunity to showcase real-world Hispanic heroes utilizing one of the world’s most popular games—and one in which my children love to play—to reach a new generation of leaders.” – Antonio Tijerino, President and CEO of the Hispanic Heritage Foundation

Minecraft Education has partnered with the Hispanic Heritage Foundation to create LatinExplorers: A Hispanic Heritage Journey! We have turned Latino leaders into Minecraft characters to inspire, guide, and equip young people to become changemakers in an immersive learning experience.

Helping students understand the importance of humanitarianism  

Players will explore the actions of impactful Latino leaders through three powerful game narratives about climate, community, and creativity. Taking what they’ve learned into the outside world, students can build leadership skills, becoming bolder and more innovative problem solvers.

With the recent hurricanes that have devastated communities in Puerto Rico and Florida, the learning experience takes on an especially critical opportunity to connect passion to action. In the Culture and Care section, young learners explore a community that has been decimated by a hurricane and needs help. Players work together with a Minecraft character based on real-life Dr. Joe Greer, a Cuban physician and advocate for health equity, to help the citizens build temporary shelters to help protect against the sun and rain. Players will then deliver supplies and basic necessities to the local community. Humanitarian aid is important because it provides life-saving assistance to people affected by conflicts, disasters, and poverty. Teachers can connect current events and gameplay to help students better understand humanitarianism efforts and to think about how they can help those in need today.

In-game Hispanic representation  

The game will also share the Hispanic culture with the entire world to create a more understanding, collaborative, and unified global community by embracing diversity, identity, and inclusion. One of the most important drivers in LatinExplorers is creating an opportunity within Minecraft for players to see themselves in the game. Parents and teachers have shared the pride that students feel when seeing their culture in the game and NPCs that share their language and customs. Other parents have identified the topics raised in the game as critical to the Hispanic community.

“When a video game addresses social determinants of health and other challenges that Latinos face in this country, you know that a lot of thought was put into it.” – Lucia Zegarra, healthcare provider and parent

Meet the game characters based on real-life Latino leaders  

In the game, players meet characters based on Latino leaders who are doing extraordinary things in climate science, community services, and the creative arts. Through their effort and commitment, they are inspiring a new generation of leaders in the Hispanic community.

Dr. Eligio Garcia Serrano works to preserve the monarch butterfly and address climate change. Students can celebrate the Day of the Dead in Michoacán, Mexico, helping to create an ofrenda. Players can follow Dr. Serrano to explore the local Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, and to learn why the monarchs are so important to the local culture and what actions are being taken to preserve them.

Dr. Pedro Jose Greer is a physician who helps the homeless and demonstrates care and humanitarianism. Players work to deliver critical supplies and basic necessities alongside Dr. Greer to a town recently hit by a hurricane. Students can also help build a temporary shelter and coordinate the community’s emergency response.

Yehimi Cambron is a muralist/artists/activist focusing on social justice through creativity. Yehimi will introduce the art area of the in-game learning hub so students can explore available activities. Players can use their journey and observations to creatively explore their feelings and find their own voice.

Expand your lessons with game-based learning with Minecraft  

LatinExplorers is available for free in both Minecraft: Education Edition and Bedrock via the Minecraft Marketplace in 29 languages. If you don’t have Minecraft Education Edition, download a free trial today. You can also learn about licensing options that are available.

To help teachers create a lesson plan, LatinExplorers comes with an educator guide. It includes other activities for workforce development, a slide deck, a family toolkit to make sure everyone can participate, and a facilitator guide. Young learners will also learn about pathways to tech fields! Find everything you need to teach with LatinExplorers here. 

To get started, check out the new 1-hour Microsoft Learn Minecraft 101 training to learn the basics.

Now that the school year has begun, it’s important to have the right tools that can help you create a quality learning environment for students as well as educators. With these new Microsoft Teams features, you can better understand the well-being of educators, connect with parents and guardians to help manage student learning progress, and use various tools from the integration with our partner app, Kami.

Create Reflect check-ins in staff teams

Social and emotional learning is not only important for students, but for educators as well. Teachers that have higher levels of social emotional knowledge may have a better chance of creating effective learning strategies and keeping their students engaged. However, very little training is provided to support teacher’s social emotional learning growth.

Recently, we’ve updated Reflect in Microsoft Teams to appear as a featured tab in each of your classes, and now you can create Reflect check-ins for staff teams. By providing educators opportunities to check-in with themselves and take the temperature of your school ecosystem, school leaders can build a culture of trust and growth so voices can be heard.

How to create a staff check-in

To create a Reflect staff check-in you must be a team owner. Simply click on Reflect in the general channel of your staff team, select a question from the gallery based on CASEL core competencies, and create space for personal and community growth through reflection.

Explore the check-in questions using the categories, then select a question.

This new feature is available now, so take the time to learn how to create your first staff check-in or Class Notebook check-in today.

Parent Connection for Teams mobile is now available

We understand the importance of keeping parents/guardians involved with their child’s school progress. This not only helps motivate the student to do better in school, but also allows teachers and parents to understand areas of improvement and cater to the students’ best interests. To keep this line of parent-teacher communication open wherever you are, Parent Connection is now available in the Microsoft Teams mobile app. You can find the Parent Connection app within an individual class team along with the other apps enabled for your class (Assignments and grades, Class Notebook, and Insights).

You can use the Teams desktop or mobile app to send messages to parents/guardians for any status updates of their child.

Reach out to parents/guardians with Teams chat in mobile.

Learn more information about Parent Connection in Microsoft Teams so you can stay informed about your child’s school performance.

Introducing a new partner app in Teams: Kami

We’re excited to announce Kami’s new Microsoft Teams integration allowing teachers to gain access to more than 40 tools and features in addition to their existing learning resources and curriculum.

With this integration, you’ll be able to do these tasks in Teams:

• Create Kami assignments
• Create a shared Kami file inside of a team
• Provide rich feedback for your students
• Effortlessly grade and return assignments
• Sync your feedback or grading annotations in real-time
• Auto-save files with your OneDrive

Annotate, collaborate, and asses with Kami—the-all-in-one learning platform. Learn how to use Kami with Microsoft Teams today. 

Watch the video to learn how to create and work with Kami assignments in Microsoft Teams. 

Who can use Kami’s Microsoft Teams integration?

This feature is available to users with a Kami Teacher, School, or District Plan. Schools or districts using Microsoft Teams can request a free domain-wide Kami trial to see if these tools fit your school environment.

Want to know what Teams can do for your classroom?

To get an interactive demo of how Teams can work in your classroom or to watch videos to help you and your students get started using Teams, visit the Educator Center to find Microsoft Teams product guides. This digital learning hub provides educators with a wide selection of learning paths and training modules to help you grow and better manage your classrooms.

In these challenging times, closing learning gaps and helping students catch up are top of mind for educators working to accelerate learning. But where does student well-being fit in with this? There’s a strong case to be made for focusing more heavily on assessing and addressing student emotional wellness. After all, helping students build confidence and gain self-awareness skills can drive positive learning outcomes and benefit them throughout their lives.

The latest accelerate learning paper, “Prioritizing and Supporting Student Well-being,” calls attention to the importance of well-being and highlights the built-in capabilities of the Reflect tool in Microsoft Teams. This tool can help build students’ emotional vocabulary to deepen their empathy, provide teachers with the opportunity to gauge their students’ well-being, and give schools more thorough data to identify and address student needs at scale.  

Before diving into how edtech tools like Reflect can support well-being, it’s important to understand the relationship between emotions and learning. In the booklet “The Nature of Learning, Using Research to Inspire Practice,” which is part of a project from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the authors state that one of the seven fundamentals of learning is that emotions are the gatekeepers of learning¹. The reason for this is that emotion and cognition work together in the brain to guide learning. Positive emotions encourage recall and understanding, and negative emotions can disrupt it. That’s why it’s more important now than ever to focus on students’ social and emotional development and wellness.

“If we really want all students to leave school having developed certain academic, social, personal, and cultural capacities, we need to think really carefully about whether we as educators are creating the types of experiences that we know from research will help develop those capacities.”— Dr. Dave Paunesku, Senior Behavioral Scientist at Stanford University

Many factors have contributed to students feeling negative emotions over the past few years, and there is much discussion among educators about how to best support students and create positive learning environments. In Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s annual Educator Confidence Report, 72% of educators reported that accommodating students’ well-being needs was their largest concern, and 82% said they believed that an integrated, detailed well-being program would positively impact students². Additionally, according to a 2021 report from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, more than 90% of parents support programs that encourage students to acquire and practice life skills such as goal setting, problem solving, and self-confidence³—all elements that contribute to positive well-being. Perhaps the most compelling evidence to integrate social-emotional skills and well-being checks into learning environments is that the nonprofit Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL)—a longtime leader in the social emotional learning (SEL) movement—reports that students who’ve completed SEL programs gain 11 percentile points in core academic areas⁴.

This data makes it clear that embedding social emotional education into curricula, while regularly evaluating students’ progress and emotional state, has significant wide-ranging benefits for students.  

Integrating well-being checks into daily routines 

There are many everyday moments that can be transformational for students. This includes moments when they have the opportunity to self-reflect, build and demonstrate empathy skills for their peers, and to learn to engage with the world meaningfully. Building check-ins into regular routines can help students recognize and name emotions, becoming “reflectors” of their own emotional lives and developing their capacity to learn and grow with intention. Regular check-ins can also help teachers assess their class’s comfort with subject matter, to see where students may need more support. And since things can change quickly, it’s a good idea for teachers to use opportunities as they arise throughout a school day to “take the temperature” of their students.

Of course, for such check-ins to be effective and fit naturally into the day, it’s helpful to have a clear, easy way to send and receive communications. Ideally integrated directly into learning tools that students and teachers already use. It’s important for students to be able to see how their responses change over time so they can track their own growth, and for educators to be able to evaluate where additional support or intervention might be needed to help students grow.

Reflect in Microsoft Teams for Education is built directly into the digital learning hub that unites assessments, communication, and collaboration. To help students visualize their feelings, there are “Feelings Monsters” that depict more than 50 emotions. Students can use these to understand their emotions and communicate with their teachers. And in addition to helping students name different moods, these visualizations also help start conversations about what causes pleasant and unpleasant feelings, how they affect learning, and how to navigate them. 

Individual emotions can be infectious and can drive the tone in a classroom, which can change as moods shift, similar to an ever-changing “thermostat.” Educators can use Reflect to gain information that helps them guide the tone of their class, and turn the energy up or down. With regular check-ins, teachers can respect and respond to the unique emotional lives of their students. Helping young people have insights into their emotional state can lead to increases in student leadership skills, student voice, and greater agency.⁵

Comparing well-being check-in tools 

To evaluate the ease-of-use and effectiveness of Reflect check-ins, the authors of “Prioritizing and Supporting Student Well-being” reviewed the process for educators to create a Reflect check-in. The authors also reviewed the process for students to respond, and for either students or educators to review responses in Teams. Next, they evaluated the equivalent Google Classroom solutions. And since Google does not have a built-in well-being tool similar to Reflect, the authors reviewed the process over two applications: Google Forms and Google Classroom. (Note: Google does not have a comparable tool that provides well-being data to educators or students as Reflect and Insights does.)

The results of the review were clear. They showed that Microsoft Reflect was more effective, easier to use, and a more comprehensive tool for checking in on student well-being, helping students understand and express their emotions and providing educators with clear and actionable analysis of aggregated results. With built-in applications like Reflect, educators can better understand the needs of all students, review data to inform decision-making, and help students improve their academic performance.

Want to learn more about how Microsoft 365 Education solutions can assist educators with understanding students’ well-being? Read “Prioritizing and Supporting Student Well-being” and be sure to check out the other papers in the series so far:

The next paper in the series will highlight read-aloud applications that support literacy, so look for that coming soon!

¹ The Nature of Learning, Using Research to Inspire Practice | OECD

² 7th Annual Educator Confidence Report | Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

³ How to Sell SEL | Thomas B. Fordham Institute

⁴ What Does the Research Say? | CASEL

⁵ When Social Emotional Learning is Misused | Education Week