Asteroid Bennu

This poem, Asteroid Bennu, highlights the essence of a common scientific pathway: as surprise finding, followed by a careful analysis that culminates in an either-or type of outcome, usually testable as a hypothesis.

Summer STEM Camp Goes Virtual

Due to the global pandemic of COVID-19, camp and program directors raced to make decisions about summer programming. Traditionally, GSI Summer Camp is a day camp held on a local university campus for four weeks. Despite the disruption caused by the pandemic, the program staff decided to move forward with a seven-week virtual experience for 45 upper elementary, middle, and high school participants. This article presents a description of the implementation of an infectious disease module during a virtual STEM camp.

Inquiry at the Botanical Gardens: Practicing Science Processes during a Field Trip to the Zoo

Field trips offer excellent learning opportunities, but teachers often think of them as informal experiences to teach concepts and content. But it is possible to structure science lessons at sites like zoos, aquariums and museums as an inquiry activity. Using the NRC (2000) definition of inquiry and the Indiana Academic Standards list of process standards (IDOE 2016), facilitators at the BLINDED ACADEMY developed the Plant Adaptations Inquiry lesson. This activity lets learners hypothesize, observe, analyze data and construct conclusions about the types of plant adaptations seen in plants from different ecosystems. The observations, including the use of technology to use photographs, were recorded on the grounds of the BLINDED Gardens and the BLINDED Zoo. This article explains the design of the lesson and alignment with state and national standards. Readers can download a version of the lesson and rubric.

Using Models to Explain Science

Models are one key way scientist explain their understanding. In this aricle different types of modeling approches are used to support student learning.

Survival in space: A unit on plants

This unit provides a motivating way for high school biology students to engage in an instructional unit on plants. During this unit students will engage in observational and organizational processes while exploring plant structure/function, life cycle, and propagation. As the unit concludes students propose a formal plan to provide a sustainable plant-based food source for 300 people.

What teachers express as professional development needs of beginning teachers: Voices from the profession

In an effort to retain beginning teachers, the [Blind State] Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (X-STEM) Resource Network coordinated a statewide effort to identify and cultivate 59 mentor and 90 mentee (beginning) teachers. Two summer professional development workshops (summer 2016 and summer 2017) buttressed the school year (2016-17) aimed to mentor beginning teachers in teaching science and mathematics. New teachers (mentees) video recorded lessons and mentors provided feedback through a secure online platform. The area of focus for recorded videos were determined by the mentee and represent areas for desired feedback for future practice. Voices of mentor teachers were captured about the specifics of the observations and are offered as the types of professional development experiences needed by new teachers. These findings are presented based on this successful model where 89 out of 90 mentees remained in the profession.

Using Expansive Framing to Enhance Personal Relevancy and Engagement in Science

Indiana science standards conceptualize science, engineering, and computer science towards two main goals: preparing students with adequate knowledge and skills to pursue science careers, and helping students develop into scientifically literate citizens capable of fully engaging with socio-scientific issues. Meeting these goals requires an understanding of how to contextualize science skills and content for application outside the classroom: teaching beyond the test towards students' future needs and interests. They need to make connections between science taught in the classroom with their own lives. One strategy for doing so is by utilizing expansive framing, a way of making this connection more tangible towards increasing relevancy and engagement with science. Here, we discuss expansive framing, how it works, and how it can be easily utilized in the K-12 science classroom. We follow up with considerations and implications for effective science teaching and learning.

Moonlighting

An activity for elementary school children that simulates the moon’s cycle. The activity explains the reasons why we see the moon at different times of the day and in different parts of the sky. The activity may also be used to demonstrate moon rise, moon set, and the phases of the moon.

Talking and Writing to Learn: The Physics of Traffic Intersection Safety, Part One

Physics students learn to engage in argument-based inquiry through mathematical modeling and analysis of real-world data collected from a traffic intersection in their own neighborhood. In this first part of the lesson, students focus on a single traffic intersection. Groups of students used equations of motion to construct simple mathematical models to describe how a driver approaches a yellow light at a traffic intersection. Students tested these mathematical models with a fictitious data set, then as a group collected and analyzed data from an actual traffic intersection of their choosing. Students determined the safety of the traffic intersection and presented their findings to their peers and invited members of the community. This practical research project set the stage for students (in Part Two) to tackle the larger question of whether cameras should be used to enforce traffic laws.