PKU Institute of Examination Research launches free STEM lessons with MIT
Mar 23, 2020
Peking University, March 13, 2020: Due to the outbreak of COVID-19, online courses have become important learning resources for students. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology BLOSSOMS Initiative (MIT_BLOSSOMS) and Institute of Examination Research, Peking University have teamed up to offer 32 Mandarin-language interactive STEM video lessons to high school students in China, which is one of the ten partner countries of MIT_BLOSSOMS. Through this cooperation, the video lessons are available on the Chinese website, PKU AC Courses and WeChat, which can be accessed anytime using mobile devices.
The “PKU-MIT BLOSSOMS Lesson Sharing for High School Students” was made possible by the joint efforts of Professor Qin Chunhua, director of the Institute of Examination Research, and Professor Richard C. Larson, principal investigator of MIT_BLOSSOMS Initiative. On March 10, a report titled “MIT_BLOSSOMS and Peking University Team up to Offer STEM Education to At-Home Students” has been published in MIT Learning News.
The MIT Learning News report
Supported by MIT, MIT_BLOSSOMS is a series of free online interactive video lessons designed to inspire students’ interest in Science, technology, engineering and Math (STEM) and improve their critical thinking and interdisciplinary research ability. In 2004, founders of BLOSSOMS came up with the idea inspired by a visit to Ningxia, China. To help students with their study during the COVID-19 outbreak, MIT_BLOSSOMS worked with Institute of Examination Research, Peking University to establish a platform specifically for Chinese students, i.e. “PKU-MIT BLOSSOMS Lesson Sharing for High School Students”, which offers free Mandarin-language lessons and some English-language lessons to high school students in China.
MIT_BLOSSOMS
Attached is Professor Richard C. Larson’s letter to students in China:
Hello Students in China!
Greetings from MIT_BLOSSOMS, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts USA, at MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The BLOSSOMS collection contains over 200 lessons in math, science and engineering for high school students (https://blossoms.mit.edu).These lessons are quite different from usual textbook lessons, as they will challenge your critical thinking skills.
The lessons are interactive. You look at a video for a few minutes, and the video teacher then challenges you with a question, a puzzle, a situation that requires your attention, your best thoughts. You turn off the video and then work on the challenge. Once you are finished, you then restart the video and get to a second challenge. It continues this way for an entire lesson.
You should know that the idea of BLOSSOMS started in China. In the year 2004, MIT’s Elizabeth Murray and I were visiting a small public school in Ningxia, in North-Central China. We watched how the teachers there used videotaped lectures from Shanghai and Beijing to teach their classes, interrupting the video lecture from time to time to challenge the class to a thought exercise. Our new idea: Why not pre-design the educational videos to be interrupted? Focus on active learning, away from lectures. The idea of BLOSSOMS was born! In China, in year 2004.
So, we at MIT BLOSSOMS have always had a special place in our hearts for China, its students and teachers. We are happy to report that China is one of 10 country partners of BLOSSOMS. Several of the BLOSSOMS lessons were recorded in China, in Chongqing.
At this stressful time in China when many of you are not at school but are at home, MIT BLOSSOMS is honored to play a small role in helping your continued study and learning. Through a collaboration with Dr. Chunhua Qin and his supportive colleagues at Peking University, BLOSSOMS lessons available in the Mandarin language are now placed in a special China-based web site for your use, any time day or night. We hope you enjoy and are challenged by one or more BLOSSOMS lessons.
Once you have tried a BLOSSOMS lesson, please email me at rclarson@mit.edu and I will write back with a new BLOSSOMS-type challenge for you! The entire World is your partner in trying to help you all get back to your normal lives. May that happen very soon!
Have fun with BLOSSOMS and wishing you all the Best of Good Luck!
Dick Larson, Principal Investigator, MIT_BLOSSOMS
Professor, Institute for Data, Systems, and Society
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, Massachusetts USA
Written by: Wang Yupin
Edited by: Ma Yaoli
Source: PKU News (Chinese)
