The purpose of this Roadmap is work on the Science and Engineering Practices—specifically engaging in argument from evidence and obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information. During this roadmap students will synthesize information from several articles about plastics and the environment and the role regulation plays in our communities. At the end of their research students are expected to write an opinion essay answering the question: Should we ban plastics?.
This opinion piece is also an opportunity for students to practice writing in Claim-Evidence-Reasoning. As an extension, students can then engage in a debate but this is optional based on time constraints and how ‘in depth’ you want this to be for your students.

Overall expect this to take several days 2 for research and synthesis, 1 to write their papers, and then additional time for debate.

Students are challenged to design a method for separating steel from aluminum based on magnetic properties as is frequently done in recycling operations. To complicate the challenge, the magnet used to separate the steel must be able to be switched off to allow for the recollection of the steel. Students must ultimately design, test, and present an effective electromagnet.

The lesson introduces the concept of a product life cycle and how it can be used as tool for the consumer to make more environmentally friendly product choices. The lesson uses the life cycle of a CD or DVD as an example to investigate the life cycle of an everyday product and examine options for reusing, recycling, or disposing of the item after its useful life. Students are introducedto pollution prevention strategies (the three Rs), how consumers can use them, and how the strategies can be incorporated at different stages of a product’s life cycle to make a product more economically and environmentally sustainable.

The goal of 3.044 is to teach cost-effective and sustainable production of solid material with a desired geometry, structure or distribution of structures, and production volume. Toward this end, it is organized around different types of phase transformations which determine the structure in various processes for making materials, in roughly increasing order of entropy change during those transformations: solid heat treatment, liquid-solid processing, fluid behavior, deformation processing, and vapor-solid processing. The course ends with several lectures that place the subject in the context of society at large.

Welcome to Promoting STEM Through Literature by the MiSTEM Network of the Northwestern Lower Michigan Region.  We are excited to build from the great work of Judy Bowling and Kerry Guiliano to bring you more STEM challenges, SEL discussion prompts, and career connections that you can use with your students.  If you are interested in learning more about the original project, please visit their website at https://www.stemandlit.com/Share your feedback and comments with us as we continue to add more books and lessons! These lessons were created in collaboration by Danelle Brostrom, Sam Walters, Danielle Humphrey, Peter Milne, Drea Weiner, and Shelly VanderMeulen with funds from a MiSTEM grant awarded by the Michigan Department of Education.

Welcome to Promoting STEM Through Literature by the MiSTEM Network of the Northwestern Lower Michigan Region.  We are excited to build from the great work of Judy Bowling and Kerry Guiliano to bring you more STEM challenges, SEL discussion prompts, and career connections that you can use with your students.  If you are interested in learning more about the original project, please visit their website at https://www.stemandlit.com/Share your feedback and comments with us as we continue to add more books and lessons! These lessons were created in collaboration by Danelle Brostrom, Sam Walters, Danielle Humphrey, Peter Milne, Drea Weiner, and Shelly VanderMeulen with funds from a MiSTEM grant awarded by the Michigan Department of Education.

Quantitative techniques for life cycle analysis of the impacts of materials extraction, processing use, and recycling; and economic analysis of materials processing, products, and markets. Student teams undertake a major case study of automobile manufacturing using the latest methods of analysis and computer-based models of materials process.