Understanding Sensory Ecology

As visual creatures, humans sometimes have difficulty understanding how other organisms encounter their environments through nonvisual means. Many organisms rely predominantly or exclusively on senses other than sight, including olfaction, chemoreception, and thermoreception. This lesson will give high school students insights into how other organisms encounter their environment, the benefits and limitations of different senses, and why we should be aware of other organisms’ perceptions. Educating students about sensory ecology introduces fundamental concepts in physiology, ecology, and animal behavior. Students will learn a new vocabulary term (umwelt) and about the sensory ecology of other organisms via an active-participation presentation, collect and analyze data on sensory disruption of classmates, and put their new knowledge to work by brainstorming ways in which human activity interacts with the sensory ecology of wildlife through case studies (Common Core State Standard HS-LS2-7).

Should New York City Teachers Support Opt Out?: Two Views in the UFT

New York State's Opt Out movement was described by the <em>New York Times</em> as "the vanguard of an anti-testing fervor that has spread across the country." The movement consists primarily of parents and students who fought against high-stakes Common Core State Standard (CCSS) tests by "opting out" of taking the exams.&hellip; [However,] this article is not about the massive parent and student-led "Opt Out Spring" of 2015. It is about how Opt Out threw into relief two different ways of thinking about unionism within New York City's UFT [United Federation of Teachers].&hellip; The leadership of&hellip;[the UFT,] the largest union local of any kind in the United States&hellip;. supported the CCSS and standardized testing, including the use of student test scores as part of teacher evaluations, and refused to support Opt Out.&hellip; Meanwhile, rank-and-file UFTers in the MORE-UFT (Movement of Rank and File Educators) caucus and other groups joined the city's Opt Out movement as part of the struggle against "ed deform."<p class="mrlink"><p class="mrpurchaselink"><a href="http://monthlyreview.org/index/volume-67-number-10" title="Vol. 67, No. 10: March 2016" target="_self">Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the <em>Monthly Review</em> website.</a></p>

Integrating Multimedia Animations to Support Common Core State Standards in Mathematics Classrooms

Multimedia animations offer students the context required to apply mathematical concepts to support their understanding. This chapter shares information about the NSF-funded Math Snacks, short animations designed to target specific math concepts that students may find difficult, including ratio and proportion. Additionally, the authors offer research-based guidelines for integrating these animations in the math classroom in a way that supports the Standards for Mathematical Practice. The chapter concludes with an introduction to the support materials available at www.mathsnacks.org for teachers who wish to use animations to support the Common Core State Standard for Mathematics in the middle grades.