Prosser Instruction

Prosser Career Education Center is staffed with educators and experts from a variety of industries. Due to the nature of a career and technical education, instructional practices naturally encompass hands-on, project-based, problem-based, and authentic learning opportunities for students to develop solutions to real-world problems.

Domain 3: Instruction is inclusive of Essential Elements that allow the Career Center to highlight exemplar instructional practices in integrated STEM. Collaboration is a critical component of the instructional practices at Prosser. The Career Center addresses 3.3 Student Instructional Work Groups through ensuring students work in synchronous groups in a variety of courses several times per week. The purpose of the group or team work is for students to collaborate in working towards a common goal. Students are held accountable for their decisions, work assignments, roles in the group, and exhibiting learned knowledge, skills, and attitudes with the collective and individual assessments that take place.

Instruction takes place in classrooms, simulated labs, and in various engagements throughout our local community. Students work and learn in precision machine shops, on construction sites, in ambulances, and across a great variety of other learning environments. No matter the training location, Prosser Career Education Center instructors implement intentional STEM learning opportunities on a daily basis. STEM learning takes place independently at times, but most often students work within collaborative groups to analyze and address real world challenges.

As mentioned in previous sections, the Career Center is uniquely designed to provide students STEM learning opportunities on a daily basis. The Essential Element of 3.5 STEM Integration expectations are exceeded in the Career Center, as all teachers implement STEM learning on a regular basis to guide students to plan for their futures in careers and higher education.

All of Prosser Career Education Center instructors have been trained in the implementation of Project-Based Learning as a STEM instructional approach and the implementation of the Professional Learning Community(PLC) Models. Instructors keep the PLC questions in mind when implementing project based learning. The PLC questions are shown in 3.1.A. Professional Learning Communities training took place in July 2021(3.1.B). Teachers and administrators attended the training and then came back to Prosser and used the train the trainer process. Other training for last year is shown in the Training document and those teachers who attended the training (3.1.C).

Prosser Career Education Center Instructors have started developing new project/problem based learning stem activities while implementing the Next Level Programs of Study and the requirements of the post secondary institutions, Ivy Tech Community College and Vincennes University, for the students to acquire dual credits(3.1.D).

Because career and technical education is so rooted in technical skill development and so closely aligned to workforce training, it is natural that STEM skills would be utilized to solve real-world challenges. It is by design that Prosser students engage with business and industry through a great number of activities, with many programs operating as a business open to the general public. The act of serving and presenting to authentic audiences helps students to develop a host of skills including employability skills related to communication, time management, decision making, collaboration and quality performance. STEM instructional activities, as evidenced in slide deck 3.2.A, are often organized within Project/Problem-Based Learning units/lessons. 100% of Prosser Career Education Center instructors have participated in related trainings with the Project/Problem-Based Learning philosophy. On the Instructional Approach Implementation spreadsheet, the roster of instructors is listed along with each month for the year 2021. Under each month, the instructors listed the frequency they implemented project/problem based learning.

In the sample HVAC lesson plan, the students will use knowledge and skills attained to maintain an air conditioning/heat pump refrigeration system using testing instruments(3.2.C). Included with this lesson plan is the rubric, directions and student finished products. This lesson is a real-world problem that they would encounter as a HVAC technician. The second lesson plan is from the Welding program. The Welding program asked the students to identify a real world problem that they wish to solve by fabricating a product. The students are given two rubrics, one for the project and one for the welds. The instructors also embed math into the lesson plan to practice math skills associated with allocation of materials for a real world project(3.2.D). Also shown, are a few curriculum map/pacing guides for some of Prosser programs which show the NLPS standards, learning targets, Blooms Taxonomy ratings, Employability Skill Standards and a column to add resources.

3.2.C HVAC Maintain an Air Conditioning/Heat Pump Refrigeration System

3.2.D Welding Lesson Plan, Embedded Math and Rubrics

3.2.D Welding Lesson Plan, Embedded Math and Rubrics

3.2.D Welding Final Projects

All students at Prosser Career Education Center work in collaborative teams at least two times per week(3.3.A). Collaboration can occur in an in-person setting or through a virtual engagement such as a Google Meet or a shared Google Doc. Members of collaborative groups work within assigned roles to analyze available information and to address challenges within a social, cultural, and functional context. The Team Contract:PBL is a template that we are implementing in the programs. This contract defines the different types of roles that the students will be using (instructors and/or students may edit roles that are more specific to the project) and the accountability of how it will be measured and recorded for each individual and the steps that will happen if the student is not being accountable(3.3.B). Of course, this contract is only used for larger group work for example a case study or a team project. In groups of only two, the group may only consist of a performer and an evaluator or the group may divide up the steps of the activity, but each group member has at least one assigned role and is held accountable by the peers and the instructor. In the lesson plans provided (3.3.C - 3.3.F), the lessons are for at least a group of two. In each lesson, the students will decide who will be the performer and the other will be the evaluator and then they will flip roles.

Additional evidence of student instructional workgroup activities are shown in items 3.3.G - 3.3.J. Each assignment requires students to collaborate with peers based upon project/intended outcomes, to perform responsibilities according to an assigned role that is critical to successful project/goal completion, and to be evaluated based upon their involvement as individuals and on the performance of their team.

3.3.C HVAC Black Iron Pipe Lesson

3.3.D Welding Project Lesson Plan

3.3.E Health Career Lesson Plan

3.3.F Landscaping Year 1 - Lesson Plan and Meeting Notes/Roles and Responsibilities

A great variety of technologies are utilized by the staff and students at Prosser Career Education Center, and the effective use of equipment is often a requirement for industry certification. The lesson structure of Proser programs allows for roughly 1/3 of instructional time to be spent in a classroom environment while 2/3 of class time is spent developing practical skills in a lab or work-based learning setting. Each week, greater than 50% of class time is spent using technologies in the classroom or lab setting (3.4.A.)

The quality of equipment and technologies available at Prosser is rarely seen in secondary training environments. This is because Prosser Career Education Center operates as a cooperative resource with the support of thirteen sending school districts. As such, Prosser is able to equip labs with equipment and technologies that would be difficult for one school district to procure and sustain on its own. For example, the Prosser Career Education Center Precision Machine shop houses millions of dollars of industry-current equipment including CNC machines, water-jet cutters, plasma cutters, etc. It is important to note that staff and students receive training in the safe and efficient operations of lab equipment. Technology support is provided as necessary by Department Chairs, the New Albany Floyd County Schools IT Department, and on-site Five Star Technologies Technician.

A short list of accessible technologies is provided here: forklift simulators, VIRTRA Firearms simulator, 3D printers, Lifepak 15 Monitor/Defibrillator, Fanuc Educational Robot Package, GoogleSuite, mannequin simulators, oscilloscopes, CAD software, SolidWorks software, Automatic Vital Sign Machines, Computerized Digital Monitors, Simulation Geriatic Mannequins, CNC machines, shop tools, and many more. Technology is also used to provide instruction. Technologies can be seen in connecting with Google Meet, Google Classroom, and shared Google Docs which they use for student learning and collaborative meetings.

95% of Prosser Career Education Center instructors implement STEM learning opportunities on a quarterly basis(3.5.B). STEM learning takes place independently at times, but most often students work within collaborative groups to analyze and address real-world challenges. Numerous program examples of STEM integration are provided as a slide deck within item 3.5.A. Prosser STEM Leadership Team support STEM integration by working with teachers to design and introduce purposeful learning activities (3.5.C, D, & E). Lastly, an overview of the implementation of STEM activity in computer programming to build a connect four program(3.5.F). The students were given the directions and rubric when the activity started and worked in groups chosen by the instructor. The students had to present their finish project in a google meet to their fellow students and the instructor. Also, each program has a pacing guide that will guide them through the curriculum and provides support to create STEM learning opportunities and strategies (3.5.G)

Career and technical education programs are offered for the purpose of advancing employability through the understanding and application of STEM competencies. Simply put, Prosser Career Education Center instructors would be unable to meet academic and workforce training objectives if they did not implement STEM learning opportunities on a daily basis. STEM education is what we do!

3.5.C Auto Technology Circuit Lesson Plan

3.5.C Auto Technology Circuit Lesson Plan

3.5.D Auto Collision Car Designer Lesson Plan

3.5.E HVAC Black Iron Pipe Lesson Plan

3.5.F. Connect Four Project

3.5.G Pacing Guides