STEM and Sports Best Practices
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Draft Day: What Happens When Fantasy Football Meets Algebra 2
We recently brought Fantasy Sports Math League to math students at Ballou Senior High School in Washington, DC. The students were in Algebra 2 and Statistics, and we introduced them to practicing math with fantasy football for Draft Day! Fantasy Football Drafting is the math hook Using the FSML platform, each student built a fantasy…
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How to Use Live NFL Data to Teach Math to Your Middle School Students
The wait is over. Football season has kicked off, games are playing all weekend, and that means one thing for math teachers: it’s time to get in on the action. Every touchdown, every completed pass, every rushing yard is a math problem waiting to happen. With Fantasy Sports Math League (FSML), you can turn this…
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Teen Sports Betting: Can Game-Based Learning Help?
A generation ago, the average teenager’s first bet was a friendly poker game or a bracket pool. Today, it’s a few taps on a phone. Sports betting is now legal in most U.S. states, online platforms and prediction market trading operate around the clock, and marketing engineered for maximum appeal is landing directly in the…
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How to Get Students Learning Fractions: Fantasy Football Scores Skills and Confidence
Can playing fantasy football help middle school students learn fractions? According to a new independent study, the answer is yes. Students who used Fantasy Sports Math League (FSML) significantly outperformed their peers in a comparison group on math assessments, and reported meaningful gains in their confidence solving fraction-based equations. Spring 2026 QED Findings Arroyo Research…
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Fractions & Fantasy Football: Tackle Middle School Math Anxiety
Why do middle school students struggle with fractions? Are they confusing the numerator and denominator? Do they understand equivalent fractions? Are they using addition instead of multiplication? Or is it something else? Research suggests there’s often something shaping their math readiness before students even pick up a pencil…and these ontogenic obstacles may be one of…
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March Mathness: Real Basketball Data for Real Math Learning
Every spring, millions of people fill out brackets, debate upsets, and obsess over college basketball statistics during the NCAA Basketball Men’s and Women’s Tournament March Madness. What if we could harness that excitement to teach essential math concepts? That’s exactly what STEMPlay Labs Teacher Insiders are doing with Fantasy Sports Math League’s March Mathness. Here…
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It is time to draft your Fantasy Football Team!
Come play Fantasy Sports Math League with us! Need some coaching on how to use math to build a championship-caliber team? We got you! Here are our favorite FSML coaches’ strategy advice to build math skills and sharpen strategic thinking. 💖 Dream Team: Select as many of your favorite players as possible.Coach Bianchi: “Saquon Barkley…
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Create New Playbooks: Integrate Sports into STEM Lessons
Sports-based learning can motivate students who might otherwise be disengaged from STEM. Classrooms become more diverse, bringing different perspectives and experiences to problem-solving. Students learn that there are many ways to be “smart” and many paths to STEM success. Here are some simple strategies that work.
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STEM and Sports hits a Homerun in Middle School
STEMadium is the research-backed learning app built for 4th-6th graders that provides STEM education through baseball-related games. It has been proven to increase STEM knowledge scores during the school year and prevent students’ “Summer Slide” when the game is used in summer camps!
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A New Champion: STEM and Sports Learning Shatters STEM Stereotypes
Picture this: A student who has never considered themselves “good at math” suddenly finds themselves calculating batting averages, analyzing quarterback statistics, and creating graphs to track their fantasy team’s performance.