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National Science Foundation
Now Showing: Film, TV, Museums & More
Promoting Public Understanding of Science & Engineering
NSF supports a wide variety of educational and informational projects for the general public
IMAX films and other film projects for diverse audiences
Permanent, regional and traveling exhibits and associated outreach programs
Innovative programs for children and adults, and science information material for broadcasters
Radio shows, Web-based resources, community programs, life-long learning opportunities
Overview of NSF's Informal Science Education program


TV
SciGirls

a girl with a butterfly on her hand

SciGirls is the only PBS series built on best practices for engaging girls 9-13 in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). This Emmy Award-winning multiplatform project understands how today's "digital native" kids learn, communicate and connect.

SciGirls' third season, developed in partnership with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, highlights citizen science. Citizen science initiatives invite all curious, bright, ordinary people (like the SciGirls!) to observe and record data about everything from birds to beaches, monarchs to maple trees, and then share it with professional scientists for use in research.

In six new episodes, the SciGirls and their female STEM professional mentors partners dive into STEM adventures with the following citizen science organizations: FrogWatchUSA, Nature's Notebook, NASA S'COOL, Monarch Larva Monitoring Project, Celebrate Urban Birds, Seafloor Explorer. And of course animated characters Izzie and Jake are back, still getting into jams that can only be solved by the real-life SciGirls--and STEM.

In addition to these exciting new episodes, SciGirls continues to reach girls, educators and parents across all digital platforms. During Season Three, SciGirls' popular PBS Kids website has gone mobile with two new games:

  • Rule the Roost combines online and real-world interactions, players engage in a variety of STEM topics by completing quests. Players contribute to collaborative data collection by answering "The Big Question" posed in a short video. Players then collect data and report back to the site, where everyone can interpret data by reading charts and graphs representing state data.
  • Creature Features, a game featuring Izzie, has players use observations skills, tools for data collection, and a field guide to identify and match animal features in different environments.

On the air, online and on the ground, every girl can be a SciGirl!

SciGirls is funded by the NSF with additional support from the Northrop Grumman Foundation, Infor, The Mosaic Company Foundation and the PPG Industries Foundation, and is produced by Twin Cities Public Television (TPT). For more than 25 years, TPT's Science Unit has served kids, parents and teachers with TV series, activity guides, multimedia software and websites, from the classic PBS series Newton's Apple and DragonflyTV to documentaries for NOVA. With each TV series, TPT leveraged the most current digital technology to create innovative multimedia resources and websites on the highly trafficked (and highly trusted) PBS Kids website.

 

 

Credit: Twin Cities Public Television, Inc.