Connected Spaces: A Technological Framework for Fostering Collaboration by Linking Novice Makers with Mentors and Peers

互联空间(C/S)项目将研究和开发一个技术工具包和设计框架，旨在将青年创造者与同行、导师和技术援助联系起来。制造商修修补补、设计、创造和发明，经常在配备了传统材料和工具以及3D打印机、电子产品、计算机设计和其他技术的制造空间与同行合作。黑人、拉丁裔和女性初中生和高中生可能很难找到成员“喜欢他们”的Maker社区。该项目旨在将STEM中代表性不足的潜在和地理分布的初中和高中制造者与同行、导师和技术援助联系起来。C/S包括两个主要的技术组件：用于提供连接和知识感知的数字仪表盘，以及用于支持协作和调试的导师投影仪。青年和本科生导师将通过大学和社区组织伙伴招募。该项目将研究，作为这些联系的结果，参与的学习者是否会提高他们作为决策者的归属感和认同感，并培养对追求STEM职业道路的兴趣。通过研究和开发过程，将直接接触到150多名参与者。项目研究成果和资源将在网上共享，并通过会议和出版物广泛传播，到达研究人员、设计师、创作者空间和教育工作者手中。C/S将设计一套数字工具，支持新手制造者、同行和导师之间有意义的合作。研究将侧重于了解C/S支持的互动与学生对STEM的知识和兴趣之间的关系。通过开发C/S及其在具有不同人口的社区中的图书馆、社区和大学创作者空间的推广，项目研究旨在回答以下首要问题：1)通过将初中生作为分布式创作者社区连接起来，初学者和高中生之间可以支持哪些形式的社交互动和协作构建？2)通过互联空间与同龄人、促进者和导师互动后，学习者对STEM职业的看法和追求他们的愿望如何改变？该项目将使用定量和定性方法收集数据，并对这些数据进行多层次的分析。衡量这种情况发生的程度将需要记录具体种类的互动和协作，并评估这些互动在多大程度上是有效和有意义的。该项目由学生和教师创新技术体验计划(ITEST)资助，该计划支持建立对实践、计划要素、背景和过程的理解的项目，这些项目有助于提高学生对科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)以及信息和通信技术(ICT)职业的知识和兴趣。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Connected Spaces (C/S) project will research and develop a technological toolkit and design framework designed to connect youth makers with peers, mentors, and technical assistance. Makers tinker, design, create and invent, often working with peers in makerspaces equipped with traditional materials and tools as well as with 3-D printers, electronics, computer design and other technologies. Black, Latinx, and female middle and high school learners may struggle to find maker communities that have members "like them." The project is designed to connect prospective and geographically distributed middle and high school makers who are underrepresented in STEM with peers, mentors, and technical assistance. C/S includes two primary technological components: a digital dashboard for providing connection and knowledge awareness, and the Mentor Projector for supporting collaboration and debugging. Youth and undergraduate mentors will be recruited through university and community organization partners. The project will research whether, as a result of these connections, participating learners will improve their sense of belonging and identity as makers and develop increased interest in pursuing STEM career pathways. Through the research and development process, over 150 participants will be reached directly. Project research findings and resources will be shared online and disseminated widely through conferences and in publications reaching researchers, designers, makerspaces, and educators. C/S will design a set of digital tools that support meaningful collaborations between novice makers, peers, and mentors. Research will focus on understand the relationship between the interactions supported by C/S and students’ knowledge and interest in STEM. Through the development C/S and its rollout across library, community, and university makerspaces in communities with diverse populations, project research aims to answer the following overarching questions: 1) What forms of social interactions and collaborative construction between novice makers can be supported by connecting middle and high school students as a distributed community of makers? 2) How do learners’ perceptions of STEM careers and their desire to pursue them change after interacting with peers, facilitators, and mentors through Connected Spaces? The project will collect data using quantitative and qualitative methods and analyze this data across multiple levels of interaction. Measuring the degree to which this occurs will require documenting the specific kinds of interactions and collaborations as well as evaluating the degree to which these interactions are productive and meaningful. This project is funded by the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program, which supports projects that build understandings of practices, program elements, contexts and processes contributing to increasing students' knowledge and interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and information and communication technology (ICT) careers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.