TBox

The significance of STEAM education has never been more pronounced. It empowers students to weave together knowledge from various disciplines and apply it to real-world scenarios, fostering critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.

Despite its clear benefits, schools face considerable challenges in effectively implementing STEAM programs due to resource limitations, training deficiencies and curricular constraints. They require a multifaceted approach to professional development that goes beyond just understanding technology and encompasses active methodologies and didactic strategies to enrich STEAM projects.

TBox has been at the forefront of STEAM education, providing comprehensive curricular materials designed to be used in dedicated STEAM spaces.

Recognizing the multifaceted challenges schools face in adopting and integrating STEAM projects, TBox offers extensive support to ensure a smooth transition. This includes online courses tailored for teachers, equipping them with the necessary skills and knowledge to effectively lead and implement STEAM initiatives.

“Since inception, we have focused on enabling students to develop technology skills through projects intertwined with academic learning objectives,” says Juan Valiente, executive director of TBox. “Our project-based approach ensures that technology is not learned in isolation but as an integral part of the broader educational experience.”

TBox’s innovative four-step methodology— research, explore, build and apply—is designed to guide students through the learning process effectively. The final step, ‘apply,’ is particularly significant. It emphasizes the transition from acquiring technology skills to achieving cross curricular learning objectives. By applying their knowledge to real-world situations, students reinforce their understanding and see the relevance and impact of their learning beyond the classroom.

Committed to maintaining a high standard of education, TBox aligns its curriculum proposals with international standards.

The curriculum, which spans from Kindergarten (K3) to 12th grade, is updated annually to reflect the latest educational advancements and technological developments. This ongoing revision process ensures that students receive a current and relevant education, preparing them for future technological careers.

One of the distinguishing features of TBox’s approach is the creation of a coherent technological career path for students. Each project is interrelated, contributing to a cumulative learning experience that spans 15 years of educational material. This structured progression helps students build on their knowledge year after year, ultimately preparing them for advanced studies and careers in technology and STEAM fields.

Lately new projects have been developed integrating AI and other tools. For example, in “Story Creators” primary students become familiar with AI applications to develop content and to generate original stories with text, images, narratives, and music.

TBox´s solutions have more than 3,300 class hours of curricular material organized in more than 400 projects. It has close to 1,000 introductory videos to projects, 5,000 demonstrative videos and over 1,000 working templates. What’s more, it has over 2,000 referred websites (500 internal to TBox sites and 1,500 ‘cured’ external sites) and more than 400 teaching guides.

We offer curricular materials to use in a STEAM Space and also can accompany schools in the transitional process required to successfully develop STEAM projects. We have online courses for teachers to prepare them for these challenges

As an example, the International School of San Salvador (CISS) has been using TBox as a gateway to technology-based learning. After working with the TBox curriculum for over 23 years, the school recognized the student's immense learning progress in computer classes, proving the curriculum's success. In educational science, this learning by doing approach is often referred to as project-based learning.

Here’s what Jorgelina Giammattei, former high school principal has to say about the collaboration, “What convinced us of following the TBox curriculum for more than 20 years is the innovation and flexibility TBox allows us. We make suggestions or ask questions and TBox provides us with different options and solutions, all the time.” Using TBox, CISS integrates newest technologies, up-to-date knowledge content and modern learning approaches.

The example stands as a testament to the expertise that TBox has garnered over the years. The company has been a maverick in strengthening students from preschool through high school (K-12) to use technology in a creative and responsible way.