STEELS Hub
Home
/
Instruction
/
STEELS Hub
Science, Technology & Engineering, Environmental Literacy and Sustainability (STEELS) Standards
The newly adopted Pennsylvania Integrated Standards for Science, Technology & Engineering, and Environmental Literacy and Sustainability, and Pennsylvania Technology and Engineering Standards were developed jointly to ensure consistency, coherence and a cohesive K—12 integrated approach to science education in the Commonwealth. On July 16, 2022, the Pennsylvania Bulletin published the new standards, designed for implementation July 1, 2025.
This STEELS Hub provides educators resources to implement and support the new standards. An implementation plan, developed by PDE, aims to ensure that all students have access to an education that prepares them to succeed and become life-long learners.
-
New and Noteworthy
-
Communication
-
STEELS Standards
-
Foundation Boxes
-
Curriculum Frameworks: Technology & Engineering
-
Curriculum Frameworks: Science
-
Curriculum Frameworks: Environmental Literacy & Sustainability: Coming Soon!
-
Instructional Resources
-
Curriculum Resources
-
Research
-
Professional Learning
-
Assessment
-
Safety Guides - Coming Soon!
-
LEAs should make a concerted effort to ensure students, parents, and guardians are aware of the new standards and their impact on classroom instruction. Communicating the new standards and implications for instruction is critical to ensuring strong support for the changes.
-
This standards document includes the new STEELS standards; each standard is hyperlinked to its relevant Foundation Box.
-
Foundation Boxes provide detail for each standard: Clarifying Statements, Disciplinary Core Ideas, Science and Engineering Practices, and Crosscutting Concepts or Technology and Engineering Practices. Foundation boxes also include a PA context, linkage to PA Career Ready Skills, and connections to other PA standards.
-
The two Curriculum Framework documents may assist LEAs in designing a standards-based T&E curriculum. The Frameworks are organized by strand and standard - and include essential elements necessary to deepen understanding.
-
The Curriculum Framework documents are organized by grade level and/or discipline and may assist LEAs in designing a standards-based Science curriculum.
-
Curriculum Frameworks: Environmental Literacy & Sustainability Coming Soon!
-
Instructional resources offer recommendations for selection of instructional materials, strategies for instruction, development of assessments, connections to other content areas, and utilization of anchor phenomena.
-
utilizes findings from one of the most extensive national P-12 STEM and CTE safety research studies to date (718 teachers across 42 states) to provide practitioner friendly safety recommendations with suggested resources. The recommendations provide implications for state education departments, professional associations, school districts/boards of education, administrators, and teachers to make data informed decisions regarding safety policies and practices to enhance STEM and CTE instruction.
-
Watch videos, play games, try activities, and share designs with the community. (T&E)
-
Provides STEL-aligned lesson plan examples for a variety of grade levels. (T&E)
-
Provides a wealth of real world examples to explain what’s different about practice-centered teaching and learning at all grade levels
-
Offers curated classroom resources, including lesson plans, book chapters, videos, simulations, and more
-
A guide on how to incorporate phenomena in instruction
-
Supports the importance of carefully chosen phenomenon that can drive student inquiry in the science classroom (an observable event)
-
Explains qualities of Instructional sequences based on students investigating compelling natural phenomena in science or work on meaningful design problems in engineering by engaging in the science and engineering practices
-
Discusses phenomena in the context of evaluating instructional materials
-
Explores the contexts in which teachers work – classrooms, departments, schools, organizations – and look at the conditions, structures, and resources that could support science teachers’ individual and collective learning in ways that might lead to improved outcomes for students
-
Provides a meaningful guide to professional development and professional learning for science education
-
Focuses on all the Performance Expectations, Disciplinary Core Ideas, Science and Engineering Practices, and Crosscutting Concepts
-
Provides a vision of ambitious science instruction for elementary, middle school, and high school classrooms
-
Pennsylvania educators developed a set of vetted resources to support curriculum development.
-
The National Assessment for Education Progress T&E Framework describes the assessment of technology and engineering literacy at grades 4, 8, and 12. (T&E)
-
Provides an up-to-date roadmap for educators to promote technology and engineering education program development and curriculum design, Pre-K -12. (T&E)
-
Provides educators with additional detail on what students should know and be able to do to meet each standard
-
Assists in focusing lessons on the PA Standards
-
Review lessons/units, provide feedback, provide examples/models for teachers’ use to inform development of new resources
-
Allows districts and educators to analyze and select materials based on key criteria and scoring guidance
-
Provides focus and evaluation of common claims by publishers
-
Describes innovations and provides insight on how the innovations should appear in instructional materials
-
Basis for the development of, and organization of, the PA Science, Technology & Engineering, and Environmental Literacy & Sustainability Standards
-
Explores the landscape of state science standards implementation
-
Focuses on selecting instructional materials aligned with the vision for science education to create high-quality learning experiences for students
-
A guide to implementation of new science standards focusing on changing curricula, instruction, professional learning, and assessment aligned to the new standards
-
Offers classroom resources, curriculum planning, and the change in standards
-
Focuses on implementation of standards in rural communities
-
Focuses on time devoted to science and engineering, tools and resources available, and teacher preparation
-
Short pieces highlighting ways of working on specific issues that come up during STEM teaching
-
Includes research for environmental education and the movement to connect children and nature (ELS)
-
Offers research-based evidence (and an extensive bibliography) on the benefits of environmental education (ELS)
-
Access a collection of peer reviewed articles with a focusing on the Standards for Technological and Engineering (T&E)
-
Provides an in-depth explanation of the development of the Technology & Engineering standards
-
Recorded training sessions include standards overview, unpacking the standards, structure of the foundation boxes, 3-D teaching & learning, science & engineering practices, cross cutting concepts, cross content connections, integration of environmental literacy and sustainability, phenomena driven instruction, and assessment.
-
PDE Training
-
Technology & Engineering (T&E) Advisor Brandt Hutzel unpacks the T&E Foundation Boxes and explains how they support instruction and curriculum development.
-
Technology & Engineering (T&E) Advisor Brandt Hutzel unpacks the T&E Standards organization and structure. Brief vignettes illustrate the relationship of the standards to the strands, the related practices, and the contexts.
-
Environment & Ecology Content Advisor Tamara Peffer unpacks the Environmental Literacy & Sustainability Standards organization and structure.
-
Science Content Advisor David Bauman shares the process and progress currently underway in the development and implementation of the new PSSA and Biology Keystone Exam.
-
-
PDE Science Advisor David Bauman unpacks the Foundation Boxes and explains how they support Science, Technology & Engineering, and Environmental Literacy & Sustainability instruction and curriculum development.
-
Access resources for local assessment development as well as updates on state assessments.
-
Offers 3-D classroom science assessments developed by a Wisconsin work group and groups from across the country; includes a useful template for thinking out a performance task.
-
Offers access to high-quality scenarios developed by teacher workgroups in the Tennessee District Science Network, focusing on phenomena or problems, integration of the three dimensions to make sense of phenomena or problems, and equitable features.
-
Contains a nine-step process designed to help teams develop three-dimensional assessment tasks in science that connect to students’ interests, experiences, and identities.
-
Provides a searchable database of high quality 3-D learning for both formative and summative assessments.
-
Focuses on assessment tasks to determine challenges commonly found in science assessment tasks
-
Focuses on classroom assessment tasks that are high quality, designed to elicit evidence of three-dimensional performances, and to provide a common set of features to demonstrate the kinds of performances expected by three-dimensional standards
-
Offers a new approach to capturing and communicating the complexity of summative assessment items and tasks designed for three-dimensional standards
-
Includes examples of innovative assessment formats, ways to embed assessments in classroom lessons, and ideas for interpreting and using assessment information
-
Develops an approach to science assessment to meet the vision of science education
-
Offers insights on developing instructional materials to achieve the goals of science education
-
The Pennsylvania Safety Guides provide a convenient reference for Science, Technology & Engineering, and Environmental Literacy & Sustainability (STEELS) educators. The guides include recommended safety practices for classroom, laboratory, and field experiences.
