Designing a STEMx activity that uses CPS- Preliminary Considerations

1. Designing STEMx Activities that
use CPS
Points to Consider

2. Design the Activity around a Topic from
the Curriculum
With every teacher across the world trying hard to maintain a pace
that allows completing the curriculum requirements along with
creating engaging learning experiences, make sure your activity is
not just useful and interesting but also based on a topic from your
curriculum.

3. Connect the Activity Challenge to a
Real-World Application
Think of a Challenge that has a real-life application. For Example,
Designing a solar cooker will familiarize students with many real life
applications of scientific concepts. This will enable them to
recognize and appreciate the ‘utility’ of learning.

4. Choose the Right Challenge
• Open-ended questions work well for the CPS process
Example: How might we design a solar-cooker that is cost-effective
and durable?
• Questions which have only one right answer will not benefit from
the CPS process
Example: What is the atomic configuration of silicon?
If the challenge is complex, open-ended and requires a novel
solution, CPS can be used as a model.

5. Integrate the Activity in your Lesson
Plan
The CPS process has clearly defined steps. When developing your
Lesson Plan choose a format that complements the use of the CPS
process. Try to align the lesson components with the steps of the
CPS process.

6. Keep the Activity Design Flexible
While it is important to follow all the steps of the CPS process, you
can be flexible regarding the which steps to use for your activity.
For example, if you are offering your students a clearly defined
challenge to solve, they can be asked to skip the ‘Explore the
Challenge’ stage and start with ‘Generate Ideas’.

7. Allow Choice in the Use of Tools
▫
Encourage the students to use the tools they like. Interest
builds from choice and autonomy. Involving the learners in
taking charge of their learning experience will win their
willing participating and make the activity exciting for them.
▫
CPS steps are tool independent – you can use any tools that
you find appropriate to a particular step.
▫
Promote the use of online technology tools as it is well known
that interaction with ICT provides learners with novel ways of
dealing with a task.

8. Make Learning Come
Alive