Bringing Geosciences to K-12 Classrooms: A Teacher Training Program Developed by the Sterling Hill Mining Museum

Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) outreach can be provided to many different stakeholders in the education ecosystem. This includes providing STEM training and experiences to teachers that can make a positive impact in the classroom. STEM covers a broad range of technologies and sciences, and one area that can use further support is the geological sciences. This paper discusses a program to aid in bringing the geosciences into the classroom through a teacher training program conducted at the Sterling Hill Mining Museum. A review of geoscience based outreach programs is presented along with a description of the Sterling Hill Mining Museum teacher training program. Key learning objectives are outlined to aid other teachers interested in bringing these materials, skills and knowledge into the classroom. Survey findings are also presented from the teacher participants that were collected pre, post and approximately six months after the program was conducted. With this data examples provided by participants on how these materials were integrated into the classroom are presented. Overall it is hoped that these findings will bring more geoscience into the classroom.