Coweta Science Update
May 2019
Coweta Classroom Innovation Summit
The Coweta Innovation Summit is an opportunity for Coweta educators to share their work with other Coweta Educators. Sessions cover different classroom topics like STEM/STEAM, Google Apps & Add-ons, PBIS, & more. Its a fun, safe environment to learn new things to help spark growth in your classroom or school. Door prizes include a 50 inch LCD TV, Yeti Coolers, and more "summer fun" items.
Date: Friday, May 31, 2019
Time: 8:30am-4:00pm -Lunch Provided- VARSITY FOOD TRUCK- 2 entrees, 1 side
Location: Nixon Centre for the Arts
Cost: $20 ($25 for non-Coweta attendees) Make check payable to "Coweta STEM Institute". Send via courier to Donald White at Werz by May 24 or pay at the door.
Want to Present? Click Here.
CWET Summer Water Adventure
Art Improves Science Performance
Putting Investigation and Design at the Center of Science Instruction
Free Classroom Resources from NSTA
2019 GIFT Internships for Teachers
Founded in 1991 as a program of the Georgia Institute of Technology's CEISMC, GIFT provides paid summer STEM internships in industry workplaces and university laboratories for K-12 science, mathematics, and technology teachers. Teachers spend 4 to 7 weeks experiencing first hand how industrial scientists and researchers approach problems, design experiments, interpret data, communicate findings, and develop and implement workplace solutions. GIFT offers teachers "real world" applications of the subjects they teach, allowing them to increase content knowledge and gain practical examples of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics applications for enriched instruction and teaching practices based on evidence-based experiences. Since its founding, GIFT has placed teachers in more than 2000 positions statewide.
Science in the Swamp
Georgia Tech Invention Studio Virtual Field Trip
GPB Education will be live streaming from Georgia Tech’s Flowers Invention Studio in Atlanta, Georgia on Thursday, May 9, 2019, from 10 AM to 11 AM EST. This live virtual field trip will offer students an inside look into one of the nation’s leading makerspaces as they learn about the engineering design process, hear from Georgia Tech students, and see ideas transform into inventions. The program is aligned to Georgia standards and targets an audience in 3rd-8th grades. Find out more and register by clicking on this link.
New Science Teaching Resources
New Sample Science Tasks
Three-dimensional science standards based on A Framework for K-12 Science Education (like the GSE) raise several questions about how to monitor student progress toward those learning goals. The Task Annotation Project in Science (TAPS) was launched to provide an answer to the questions “what does it look like to ask students to demonstrate progress toward three-dimensional standards?” and “what are the most important features of high-quality science tasks?” By asking a diverse set of experts to identify concrete features of three-dimensional assessment tasks across multiple domains of science across the K-12 spectrum, this project was designed to 1) collaboratively provide concrete, annotated examples of different kinds of three-dimensional assessments, highlighting features of high-quality science assessments and opportunities for improvement, and 2) surface lessons learned from looking across grades, domains, and task purposes.
This suite of resources includes annotated examples of assessment tasks for elementary, middle, and high school as well as a series of short resources that highlight the major takeaways across the whole project. These include:
- Project-wide takeaways for educators, administrators, policy-makers, and assessment developers.
- The “must-have” features of all three-dimensional science assessments.
- Features of equitable science assessments.
- Features of high-quality scenarios that drive three-dimensional assessments.
- A practical definition of sense-making and its critical role in distinguishing three-dimensional assessments from more traditional science assessments.
- Lessons-learned about how to assess science and engineering practices and crosscutting concepts.
- Implications for science assessment systems, including large-scale assessments, and recommendations for decision-makers involved in assessment design.
Tasks by Grade Band:
Click the links below to explore the set of task annotations in each grade band:
Interactive Video Quizzes
Using scientific phenomena to engage your students is an effective learning strategy. Sometimes you may not have easy access to the live version of the phenomenon so you may need to use a YouTube video (maybe from the Georgia Science Teacher Phenomena Bank). It helps if you can make the video interactive for your students. One way is to use Vizia.
When you create a Vizia video quiz you have the option to require that viewers enter their names and email addresses before they begin. Alternatively, you could make the first question in the video a prompt to enter a name.
Argumentation Toolkit
How has your address changed over the past 750 Million Years?
Science Google Classroom Codes
Elementary: uz7l4 (that's a lowercase L...not a 1)
Middle: wumkvdb
High: s0ei0d (those are zeros...not Os)
STEM/STEAM Resources
https://www.teachengineering.org
http://www.novelengineering.org
http://www.stemcobb.com/lesson-links.html Elementary STEM Lessons
http://www.stemcobb.com/ms-stem-lessons.html Middle School STEM Lessons
Upcoming Professional Learning
Summer Science PL K-2
This session will help teachers connect science and literacy as well as develop common assessments for 3D Science. This session is for Kindergarten, 1st Grade, and 2nd Grade teachers. Use this link to register. A $100 stipend is offered to teachers who complete the training.
Wednesday, Jun 5, 2019, 08:30 AM
167 Werz Industrial Boulevard, Newnan, GA, USA
Summer Science PL 3-5
This session will help teachers connect science and literacy as well as develop common assessments for 3D Science. This session is for 3rd, 4th, and 5th Grade teachers. Use this link to register. A $100 stipend is offered to teachers who complete the training.
Tuesday, Jun 11, 2019, 08:30 AM
167 Werz Industrial Boulevard, Newnan, GA, USA
Summer Science PL 6-8
Thursday, Jun 13, 2019, 08:30 AM
167 Werz Industrial Boulevard, Newnan, GA, USA
Summer Science PL 9-12
Monday, Jun 17, 2019, 08:30 AM
167 Werz Industrial Boulevard, Newnan, GA, USA
Comments, Concerns, Questions?
Email: donald.white@cowetaschools.net
Website: bit.ly/CCSSScience
Location: 167 Werz Industrial Boulevard, Newnan, GA 30263
Phone: 770-254-2800
Twitter: @dwhitesciguy