Progress 04/16/15 to 09/30/17

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience for this phase of the project was Girl Scout leaders in rural Northwest and West Central Arkansas. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?The project provided direct experience to two Master's graduate assistants in planning and conducting research and fieldwork. These experiences have enabled these two students to move forward more confidently and skillfully with their own theses projects. Additionally, this project supported a Master's graduate assistant (GA) for one month in summer 2016. The GA researched funding opportunities for this project to be taken state-wide. The state 4-H director has expressed interest in collaborating to propel this project to the state level in 4-H communities. An external consultant has also agreed to collaborate on a larger scale project grant. Both graduate and undergraduate student workers prepared and assembled kits for distribution. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The project has been recognized previously, and once all data has been collected from this group, additional results will be disseminated to communities of interest, i.e. International Textiles and Apparel Association, American Association of Family & Consumer Sciences, etc. Although the project is in its final stages, results gained from developing and designing the pilot study activities have been presented to professional associations and educators. Final data from the pre- and post-tests are currently being analyzed. Results will be disseminated through presentations to professional organizations (International Textiles and Apparel Association, American Association of Family & Consumer Sciences) and publications in peer-reviewed journals (Clothing & Textiles Research Journal & Journal of Family & Consumer Sciences). What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? Although this block grant project is ending, it is the intention of the researchers to pursue a federally funded grant to support a larger, state-wide research project.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal: Identify what was working and what was not working in the training manual and activities for the Girl Scout leaders so that revisions could be made before they began to train the troops. Three members of the research team and two graduate students participated in the training workshop. Time allocations, design elements, and materials needed for the number of girls in each troop were identified. E-textile kits were assembled based on these numbers. Once the leaders notified the researchers of their timeline, one of the researchers or graduate students met the troop for the first meeting to secure parental permission forms, parental surveys, and pre-test surveys for the girls. Goal: Investigate how well the activities succeeded in supporting girls in engaging in STEM thinking and STEM activity processes, and whether participation influenced girls' interest in STEM topics and careers. Major activities and data collected included pre and post administration of STEM Semantics and Career Interests surveys for participants in workshop. These results will be analyzed using a repeated measures analysis of variance. Significant effort was devoted to developing the projects, curriculum, and instruments for the workshop. This workshop was designed as a pilot field test and results will be used to revise, refine, and improve the e-textile activities so that they may be field tested with a larger sample in the future. A key outcome realized in the pilot study was compiling the needed information to revise, refine and improve the e-textile activities for field testing with a larger state-wide sample. The following are modifications of the projects and procedures that will be needed for the larger study. General: 1. Documented amount of time needed to organize and complete the preparations ahead of time, including how long each step takes - cutting out felt, threading needles, etc. In the larger study, kits will need to be outsourced for assembly. 2. Include the power point presentation of training in the leader kit as several of the leaders requested this to show their troops. 3. Another key outcome of the project was the compilation of initial quantitative and qualitative data for analysis. The samplesizes in the pilot are small but are expected to yield some insights and guidance for development of larger project proposal.

Publications

Progress 10/01/15 to 09/30/16

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience for this project is middle-school aged girls participating in Girl Scout troops in rural communities with organization group leaders to serve as mentors. Rural Girl Scout troops in northwest and central Arkansas were identified and permission obtained to solicit troop leaders. Four troop leaders agreed to participate in the leader workshop. The workshop consisted of a half-day training for all four projects included in the study. All participants were administered a pre-survey instrument. Changes/Problems:Retirement of PI, Dr. Glenda Revelle, resulted in change of leadership. Dr. Laurie Apple assumed the PI role with Drs. Kathleen Smith and Zola Moon as co-PIs. Re-allocation of resources and time amongst remaining team members kept the plan and activities of the project intact. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?This project has supported a Master's graduate assistant (GA). The GA has been trained in research design and development, working alongside experienced research team members. The GA has research grant opportunities and began the initial proposal. Two other Master's graduate assistants participated in preparing the kits and collecting data. These two students have been engaged with faculty in modification of the training modules as well as learning about data collection, IRB requirements, and data management. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Results were distributed in the form of a journal article being published and one master's thesis. Results gained from developing and designing the 2nd phase activities have been presented to professional associations and educators. Data from the pre- and post-tests are being analyzed. Those results will be disseminated through presentations to professional organizations and publication in peer-reviewed journals. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?The scope and sequence curriculum of e-textile activities to engage girls in STEM learning will be reviewed, modified, and finalized based on Year 2 results. To recruit and support the families that will participate in the field study, the project team will work with 4-H clubs in the state of Arkansas. The research team members will recruit 4-H organization group leaders to serve as the mentors in the next phase of the research. One of the goals of this phase of the research is to determine whether the curriculum of e-textile activities can be explained to local group leaders in enough depth and detail that they can serve as the mentors in their own community. This step is critical to ensure eventual roll-out of the project on a larger scale. Mentors will give a detailed presentation and demonstration of the projects to be completed in the workshop, so that the parents have an understanding of what it is their children will be engaging with in the weeks to come. Students then will participate in a 20-hour workshop using the e-textile design activities and they will be mentored by their local 4-H group leaders. Participants' interest in STEM topics, courses, and careers will be assessed pre- (the week before the intervention starts) and post- (the week after the intervention ends) via administration of the STEM Semantics Survey and the STEM Career Interest Questionnaire (both developed by Tyler-Wood et al., 2010) and the Sources of Self-Efficacy Scale (Lent, 1991). Results of this field testing will be used to refine and elaborate the project for development and evaluation on a larger scale, and a proposal for external funding will be developed.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal 1: Examine comprehension and enjoyment of the activities. Major activities completed include recruitment of troop leaders in the Girl Scout organization; obtaining required permissions from parents and students; development of curriculum for workshop; creation of sample projects for display and training funded graduate student in delivery of the workshop. Conducted two half-day workshops in which leaders were taught how to design and sew circuits to light up LED lights in four crafts projects: a bookmark using a simple circuit to light one LED light, a keychain using a parallel circuit to light two LED lights, a headband using parallel circuits and a LilyTwinkle computer chip to light four LED lights with twinkle function, and a tote bag using parallel circuits and a LilyTiny computer chip to light eight LED lights in a variety of different blink patterns. Data is in the collection phase and includes pre- and post-tests for participants in workshop. Goal 2: Investigate how well the activities succeed in supporting girls in engaging in STEM thinking and STEM activity processes, and whether participation influences girls' interest in STEM topics and careers. Major activities and data collection includes pre- and post- administration of STEM Semantics and Career Interests surveys for participants in workshop. These results will be analyzed using a repeated measures analysis of variance. Significant effort was devoted to developing the projects, curriculum, and instruments for the leaders training workshop. A key outcome realized was compiling the needed information to improve the e-textile training activities. This included creating a power point for the workshop to follow as a visual aid in training and explanation of each project. A second key outcome was the development of leader and participant kits. Kits were prepared for leaders and girls by project. This was done in a manner to facilitate creating complete sets for a given group and to make preparation for a training more streamlined. Assembly materials, instructions and guidelines were documented for continued use in the research project but also for dissemination to others who might want to utilize the curriculum. A third key outcome was the identification of potential federal grant opportunities. A graduate student compiled the list and began the initial proposal development for submission. This information will be used to complete a federal application for submission in 2017 in conjunction with the State 4-H leaders.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2016 Citation: Apple, Laurie M., Smith, Kathleen R., Moon, Zola K., Revelle, Glenda. (2016) Development of Teaching Modules Using E-Textile Activities to Engage Female Middle-School Students in STEM Thinking. Journal of Family & Consumer Sciences. 108, 1. pp.44-47.
• Type: Theses/Dissertations Status: Accepted Year Published: 2016 Citation: Kaiser, Kara. (2016) Designing sewn circuits and STEM self-efficacy in middle school girls. (Unpublished masters thesis). University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR.

Progress 04/16/15 to 09/30/15

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audiences for this project are rural, middle-school aged girls and local youth organization group leaders to serve as mentors. The target audience reached during the pilot phase of the project, however, is limited to rural, middle-school children. A rural middle-school in northwest Arkansas was identified and permission obtained to solicit participants - both boys and girls - from the after school programs. Twenty-one (21) 12-to 14 year old students (10 males, 11 females) signed up for the workshop. The workshop consisted of an hour a day after school for a four-week period. Ten males (10) and six (6) females completed all four weeks. Most of the girls left the program because of conflicts with other after-school activities, primarily cheerleading. All participants were administered a pre- and post-survey instrument. A control group of 20 students was recruited from a different rural middle school in the area. Ten (10) males and ten (10) females participated in completing the same pre- and post- survey instruments. Changes/Problems:The only major change during Phase 1 was that, as previously mentioned, we were not able to compare the experiences and responses of the girls using the e-textile activities to those of the girls using a traditional circuitry kit. This comparison had to be dropped due to the fact that there was not a traditional circuitry kit available that could support activities to cover 20 hours of activities to create a comparable workshop using those activities. Instead, all comparisons will be made with the control group. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?This project has supported a Master's graduate assistant (GA). The GA has been trained in research design and development, working alongside experienced research team members. The student's thesis work will come out of this project. Undergraduate students in a senior level textile design course created designs for bookmarks, key fobs, baseball caps/headbands and t-shirts. The students were directed to incorporate the conductive thread into the design as well as think through the circuitry for each item. This project gave the students opportunity to think critically, not just about design of graphics, but to include a medium that is unfamiliar to them, circuitry. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The project has already been recognized for innovation in instruction, winning the 2015 ATEXINC Award for Innovation in Textile Instruction. The award was presented to Laurie M. Apple, Kathleen R. Smith, Zola K. Moon, and Glenda Revelle for "Creating E-Textile Activities in a Textile Design Course to Engage Female Middle School Student in STEM Learning: An Undergraduate Design Experience." Presented November 13, 2015, at the ITAA 2015 Annual Conference in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Although the project is in its early stages, results gained from developing and designing the pilot study activities have been presented to professional associations and educators. Initial data from the pre- and post-tests are being analyzed. Those results will be disseminated through a Master's thesis, presentations to professional organizations, including a presentation by graduate student, and publication in peer-reviewed journals. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?The scope and sequence curriculum of e-textile activities to engage girls in STEM learning will be reviewed, modified, and finalized based on Year 1 results, and a field test with 30 rural girls, ages 11-13, will be conducted.To recruit and support the families that will participate in the field study, the project team will work with 4-H clubs, Girl Scouts, schools, churches, and/or other community groups. Efforts will be made to recruit girls in each age group representative of the demographic makeup of the community (race/ethnicity, language spoken at home, household income, and family structure). Recruitment efforts through local youth organizations for girls and families willing to participate will be buttressed with more concerted and specific recruitment as needed to increase representativeness. These additional efforts may include identifying and recruiting formal and informal group leaders within subpopulations to assist recruitment within underrepresented groups or snowballing recruitment from other girls themselves. The research team members will train local youth organization group leaders to serve as the mentors in this phase of the research. One of the goals of this phase of the research is to determine whether the curriculum of e-textile activities can be explained to local group leaders in enough depth and detail that they can serve as the mentors in their own community. We thinkthat this step is critical to ensure eventual roll-out and testing of the project on a larger scale after the current two phases of research. Participating families will be invited to come into a community gathering space for an initial meeting. At this time, the project team and community-based mentors will introduce parents and girls to the project. Mentors will give a detailed presentation and demonstration of the projects to be completed in the workshop, so that the parents have an understanding of what it is their children will be engaging with in the weeks to come. Children then will participate in a 20-hour workshop, similar to the pilot study, but in this case all of the girls will use the e-textile design activities and they will be mentored by their local group leaders. Participants' interest in STEM topics, courses, and careers will be assessed pre- (the week before the intervention starts) and post- (the week after the intervention ends) via both interviews and administration of the STEM Semantics Survey and the STEM Career Interest Questionnaire (both developed by Tyler-Wood et al., 2010) and the Sources of Self-Efficacy Scale (Lent, 1991). Pre- and post-interviews with parents of participants and group leaders will be used to document whether rural middle-school girls' participation in e-textile activities increases parent and community support for girls' STEM learning, expectations for girls' STEM learning and careers, and attitudes about the science interest and ability of their daughters/community's girls. Results of this field testing will be used to refine and elaborate the project for development and evaluation on a larger scale, and a proposal for external funding will be developed.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal: Examine comprehension and enjoyment of the activities. Major activities completed include identification of pilot study site; recruitment of participants for workshop and control group; obtaining required permissions from school, parents, and children; development of curriculum for pilot workshop; creation of sample projects for display and training funded graduate student in delivery of the workshop. Conducted four-week workshop in which students were taught how to design and sew circuits to light up LED lights in four crafts projects: a bookmark using a simple circuit to light one LED light, a keychain using a parallel circuit to light two LED lights, a baseball cap using parallel circuits and a LilyTwinkle computer chip to light four LED lights with twinkle function, and a t-shirt using parallel circuits and a LilyTiny computer chip to light eight LED lights in a variety of different blink patterns. Data collected includes pre- and post-tests for participants in the workshop as well as a control group. Ten of the participants were interviewed at the beginning of the workshop regarding their understanding of the circuit design they were working on, and ten participants were interviewed at the end of the workshop regarding both their understanding of circuit design and their enjoyment of the workshop. The interviews were all videotaped. A qualitative analysis will be conducted, in which interview data is coded for evidence of comprehension and enjoyment. Goal: Identify what's working and what's not working in the activities so that revisions can be made before the more ambitious study with rural girls is conducted. Major activities and data collected - Three members of the research team observed all workshop sessions and took notes on student responses to the activities, including aspects of the activities that seemed easy and/or enjoyable and aspects of the activities that seemed difficult, frustrating and/or not enjoyable for the students. We then compiled those notes into a "Lessons Learned" document. This document was discussed by the entire research team at a series of brainstorming meetings to improve upon the activities to be offered in the Phase 2 Field Study. We identified modifications in time allocations, design elements, materials, and teaching notes. As examples, we found more time was needed to pre-cut felt, should change to fabric paint from puff paint, and decided to create pictures of do's and don'ts for a display when training adults for Phase 2. Goal: Investigate how well the activities succeed in supporting girls in engaging in STEM thinking and STEM activity processes, and whether participation influences girls' interest in STEM topics and careers. Major activities and data collected includes pre and post administration of STEM Semantics and Career Interests surveys for participants in workshop as well as control group. These results will be analyzed using a repeated measures analysis of variance. Ten of the participants were interviewed at the beginning of the workshop regarding their understanding of the circuit design they were working on, and ten participants were interviewed at the end of the workshop interviews were all videotaped. A qualitative analysis will be conducted, in which interview data is coded for evidence of STEM thinking and process. Goal: Compare the experiences and responses of the girls using the e-textile activities to those of the girls using a traditional circuitry kit. This comparison had to be dropped due to the fact that there was not a traditional circuitry kit available that could support activities to cover 20 hours of activities to create a comparable workshop using those activities. Instead, all comparisons will be made with the control group. Significant effort was devoted to developing the projects, curriculum, and instruments for the workshop. This workshop was designed as a pilot field test and results will be used to revise, refine, and improve the e-textile activities so that they may be field tested with a larger rural sample in Year 2. A key outcome realized in the pilot study was compiling the needed information to revise, refine and improve the e-textile activities for field testing with a rural sample in Phase 2. The following are modifications of the projects and procedures needed for Phase 2, informed by the pilot testing in Phase 1. General: Documented amount of time needed to organize and complete the preparations ahead of time, including how long each step takes - cutting out felt, threading needles, etc. Modifications to instruction and curriculum based on observation and evaluation: Instructor to check both drawings and sewing with half of circuit done (positive) before allowing students to go on to do other half (negative). Do not double conductive thread. Use hot glue on everything except conductive thread. Adult should do all of the hot gluing. Students mark position of LEDs with pencil, then adult hot glues them. Use felt stickers wherever possible instead of gluing felt pieces. Plain felt for background, and sticky felt for cut-out pieces. Use fabric paint instead of puff-paint. For projects using paint need to arrange dry-time. Take pictures of the sewn circuits before covering them up Take pictures of "right" and "wrong" ways of completing tasks to create a "do's and don'ts" section in guide for leaders in Phase 2 Need to order more LEDs than originally allocated as the purple LEDs proved unreliable. No use of phones or ipads or any electronic devices should be allowed during the workshop sessions, Major modifications in training curriculum for mentors in Phase 2: Reduce amount of time allocated for training mentors to be more realistic for volunteers' time. Consultation with target organizations (state-wide Girl Scouts of the USA and 4-H) has been initiated to adjust training for recruitment and alignment with organizational program goals and structure. Modifications to materials and designs Use same pre-set designs for all locations. Do not try to tailor to school mascot as that is too complex. Bookmark: Keep ladybug design and create a second design using stickers instead of cut felt. Key chain: Use choice of pre-set designs with simple circuitry possible for key chain (cardinal was too complex). Keep monkey. Peace symbol was too complex. Need to create a second design. Ball cap:LilyTwinkle performance issues. Offer choice of using LilyTiny or none. Consider headband project instead of ball cap as girls and leaders might prefer it. T-shirt: 8 light circuits did not always work; often had to divide into two circuits with two batteries. This may have related to using the pellon as a substrate. Need to experiment with a variety of 8-light circuits and troubleshoot problems. T-shirt: Pellon didn't work. Putting circuit on felt and velcro-ing to the shirt makes the t-shirt very heavy. Alternative methods of attachment or alternative project should be considered. A tote bag may be a more successful project for this final activity. Another key outcome of the project was the compilation of initial quantitative and qualitative date for analysis. The sample sizes in the pilot are small but are expected to yield some insights and guidance for the more extensive Phase 2 project next year.

Publications

• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Accepted Year Published: 2015 Citation: Smith, K.R., Apple, L.M., Moon, Z.K. & Revelle, G. (2015). Development of Teaching Modules Using E-Textile Activities to Engage Female Middle-School Students in STEM Learning. American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences Annual Conference, Jacksonville, FL, June.25, 2015
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Accepted Year Published: 2015 Citation: Apple, L. M., Smith, K.R., Moon, Z. K., & Revelle, G. (2015). Creating E-Textile Activities in a Textile Design Course to engage Female Middle School Students in STEM Learning: An Undergraduate Design Experience. International Textile and Apparel Association Annual Conference, Santa Fe, NM, November 11, 2015
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Accepted Year Published: 2015 Citation: Kaiser, K., & Revelle, G. (2015). The Effects of Designing and Sewing Circuits on STEM Self-efficacy. Student Poster presented at the 14th International ACM SIGCHI Conference on Interaction Design and Children. Boston, MA. June 21, 2015.
• Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2016 Citation: Apple, Laurie M., Smith, Kathleen R., Moon, Zola K., Revelle, Glenda. Development of Teaching Modules Using E-Textile Activities to Engage Female Middle-School Students in STEM Thinking. Journal of Family & Consumer Sciences.