STEAM Power: Infusing Art Into Your STEM Curriculum

Artist and educator Tim Needles brings a fresh approach to STEAM topics, focusing on creativity, innovation and collaboration.

There are numerous books on STEAM, but most are either arts and crafts project books designed for children or high-level books that can be weighty and inaccessible for new teachers. This accessible and engaging book offers creative ideas for blending arts and STEM learning (STEAM). It covers the fundamentals of STEAM, with project ideas and best practices, while providing insight from educators in the field.

Technologies covered include: coding, robotics, 3D printing, virtual and augmented reality, photography, video, animation and digital drawing. In addition, the book addresses several different approaches to bringing STEAM learning to the next level, such as collaboration, global learning, project-based learning, makerspaces and social-emotional learning.

The book:

• Features a breadth of technology and project possibilities, with project ideas organized by technology type.
• Explores long-standing concepts that are relevant regardless of specific advances in technology, providing the pedagogy behind the projects rather than technology for technology’s sake.
• Offers a highly visual approach, incorporating photographs and hand-drawn sketchnotes.
• Illustrates concepts through author examples as well as a series of interviews featuring STEAM professionals and expert teachers.
• Presents topics in a clear, concise manner that's useful for repeated reading and as a practical resource.

With its friendly style and visual design, the book is a practical guide for new and emerging educators, and for educators looking for fun and creative ways to invigorate their STEAM curriculum.

Audience: K-12 educators

Tim Needles is an artist, writer, performer, and educator from Port Jefferson, New York. He has been teaching art and media at Smithtown School District in New York for more than twenty years as well as serving as an adjunct college professor. His work has been featured on NPR, in the New York Times, the Columbus Museum of Art, the Norman Rockwell Museum, the Alexandria Museum of Art, the Katonah Museum of Art, the Cape Cod Museum of Art, and The George Washington University Museum. He is the recipient of the ISTE Technology in Action Award, the ISTE Arts and Technology Network Creativity Award, the National Art Educators Association AET Outstanding Teaching Award, and the Robert Rauschenberg Power of Art Award at the National Gallery of Art. He has served as a National Geographic Certified Teacher, a PBS Digital Innovator, an Adobe Education Leader as well as a TEDx speaker. He is active on social media, guest hosting education chats and sharing his thoughts on arts and education. You can find him on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram @timneedles.