Flip Flop Weather?

I don't know how daring everyone else is, but I think it's just about time to put away winter boots and bring out the flats and flip flops. I'm just so eager for summer already. It's so beautiful outside! All the trees and flowers have fully bloomed, and everything seems a bit more green outside! Therefore, I found this video which captures all of the four seasons in a mere 40 seconds. Sometimes that's how fast they seem to come and leave. 

The Future is an Unfamiliar Place

I recently read an article (21 Things That Will Be Obsolete By 2020) that discussed what will be obsolete from human, everyday life by 2020. It is frightening to think about all the common things we experience every day that could no longer be existent in our lives. For example, we recently do not even have to go to the library to pick up the latest book to read. We now have Kindels and Nooks, or electronic readers, that enable use to buy books on the Internet and read them on our personal readers. In my opinion, there is nothing better than reading a book and turning the page. I'd much rather have paper and a hard cover in my hand than a touch screen. The article goes on to discuss how desks, paper, computers, face-to-face parent teacher conferences, and other common things will be obsolete! Although technology and the Internet have provided us with amazing advancements and comforts in our daily lives, I believe nothing can replace face-to-face interactions. Are we going to completely eliminate the human experience? For example, this article I read in the NY Times discusses how real 3-D avatars could literally take your place in conferences, and can be controlled by you from home while you easily do something else- such as sleep! Well isn't that one big lie! To read this article on 3-D avatars, click here: 3-D Avatars

What do you think?

Pulling It All Together: Reflection and Self-Assessment

Science, as I have learned during the beginning of my science methods course, is a reflection of your beliefs and feelings and how you employ and act on those beliefs. I want my students to get out in the world and explore nature- get messy and active. They should be thrilled and motivated to explore the natural and ever-growing world of science, and it is my duty to help  this happen. Teachers are models to our students of curiosity and excitement about how the world functions and develops. 


In my own personal power point on my philosophy of teaching, I would include a personal philosophy statement, which would reflect what I firmly believe about teaching and remain unsure about. This statement will probably change over time, however, it will reflect my feelings and beliefs about teaching and the importance of real experiences in the classroom to help students learn. One quote that I truly love and reflects my opinion and position on teaching is, "Teachers are not in it for the income, they are in it for the outcome." (author unknown). In addition to knowing your positions and beliefs on teaching, it is important to always keep reflecting on your teaching skills and decisions made in the classroom throughout the year. It is important to make sure that how you are teaching students is beneficial to their learning, and is effective in helping them grow. It is important to make sure you are challenging their abilities and thinking, encouraging students to be inquisitive, using good assessments, incorporating technology, and providing time for exploration and explanations. Overall, evaluating your professional growth will allow you to judge the progress you have made over the years and areas you may still need to improve in to become a better educator. 


I believe we certainly teach who we are. This idea was discussed in the beginning of my science methods course and I agreed with this statement then and I agree with it even more now. Your teaching will reflect your beliefs and opinions. For example, if you believe students should learn through true and active experiences, then you will implement teaching methods in your classroom that support this kind of environment. You opinions and  feelings are reflected in your teaching, and students can sense it. Therefore, it is crucial to know who you are- your beliefs, opinions, feelings, ideas- prior to teaching in order to teach effectively and provide an environment suited for growing minds. 


Here's a great website to help you write a teaching philosophy statement: Teaching Philosophy

This week in class, we discussed how to improve and manage our pb works portfolios. This portfolio is a collection of my work and development over the course of my science education class. A great tool and form of assessment to use in my own classroom with my students. A link will be posted here soon once I have completed it!

What's the Big Idea? Matching Assessment to Instruction

Assessment is so very important and yet it receives so little attention and thought by many teachers. Assessment involves collecting information about what your students know and can do. Teachers often just give students tests and hand out grades, while these are simply low levels of assessment and do not fully assess how much a student understands and if the student can apply what he or she has learned. In performance assessment, also known as authentic assessment, students demonstrate their understanding by solving a problem or performing a task in the real-life context of their classroom or their world. Science is not isolated bits of observing, inferring, comparing , or recording; it is instead a contextual whole in which skills are employed because of a need to know. These assessments should match instruction. In addition to the lack of good assessment decisions, the term "evaluation" is often grouped with the term "assessment." However, evaluation refers to the process of examining all the data you have gathered from various types of assessments and making a judgement about how we the student understand a concept and use their science skills. Evaluations relate students' progress to their own prior performance and to that of their peers within the class. 


When I am a teacher, I will certainly utilize a portfolio as a form of collecting assessments and  evaluate students' progress over our time together. If I were to create a portfolio for my science methods class, I would include all of my assignments I have completed, my blog, my collaborative projects I have worked on with my group (power points, concept maps, etc), and reflections on my accomplishments- as reflection is the highest form of demonstrating understanding and knowledge. 


It is very important to use multiple forms of assessment for the reason that simply only using one form of assessment will not provide a true reflection of a students understandings and knowledge of a concept. Formative assessment is important to employ to gauge students' understanding of a particular topic while the learning is occurring, in order to prevent confusion and failure. Summative assessment is important to document students' final achievement and knowledge. Therefore, different assessments need to be given throughout the learning process, and this includes many different types. Having students keep science notebooks, in which students are engaged in thinking and their findings, is a great assessment tool to use with science in the classroom. One can assess students prior knowledge by asking questions in students' notebooks, offer opportunity to engage in inquiry, and offer a stimulus to further thinking. Students can also draw pictures in their notebooks to reflect their understandings, as well, and is a form of higher thinking and understanding. These notebooks can be assessed by the use of a rubric. Blogs are another great use of assessment, where students can communicate with each other and with their teachers, reflect on conceptual questions and experiences,and help each other learn. Technology can also be incorporated here, suing electronic portfolios and blogs to assess students (as we are doing in my science methods class!). Concept maps are a great tool to use to help students organize their knowledge. As long as the assessment is aligned with standards and the content being taught in class and students are aware of the criteria for success, then it should be a key factor in acquiring information about students' understandings. The more varied typed of assessments used, the more accurate and authentic information you will gain about students' understandings. 


Student presentations in science classes usually involve a power point presentation on their experiment- including an introduction to their topic and purpose, a few slides of the data collected, a discussion about what their data tells them, and a conclusion about what was found and how they will go forward with their experimentation. This is what I do in my science courses, and it is extremely productive and effective in presenting the information to others and is a good assessment of our understandings of our research and findings. Therefore, I believe I will use power point presentations, as well. In addition, I will use "prezi" which is a new site that offers a more creative twist and options to present information as a power point presentation does. Go to www.prezi.com to try it out for free!


Writing is a great assessment tool to use in the classroom, no matter what the subject is. Writing offers the students a chance to collect their thoughts and reflect upon their understandings and knowledge of the content discussed in class. Writing provides opportunities for the teacher to see if the student understands the vocabulary associated with the content, evidence of changes in understanding from previous reflections, and if the student is thinking about ideas further beyond those discussed in class. Writing offers a free form of expression for any subject, so it is a great way to understand what a student is thinking, feeling, and therefore, understanding. It does surprise me a bit that students use writing so much in math because I certainly was never offered that opportunity. However, now that I have been engaged in so much reflection in this course, I can now see how writing and reflecting could be applied to any area of content. 


This week in class, we discussed various articles on this "edutopia" website and each group compiled a power point presentation to discuss their findings. They revealed insight into different teaching methods, the importance of inquiry in the classroom, different important assessments to employ, how to ask right questions in the classroom, and other personal experiences shared by teachers. This was a great experience and has allowed me to gain insight and knowledge about great tips to make my classroom a place of true and active/true learning. The power point presentation is on my pb works site (link soon to follow).

Fieldwork Experiences

During the past week or so, my class has been attending Bishop Dunn Memorial School to attain experience in the field teaching science to 5th grade students. We were all paired individually with a student, and asked to both observe and assist the student throughout our time there. I really enjoyed going to Mrs. Benefer's class, as she is certainly a great science teacher. She involves the students, and uses inquiry/hands-on minds-on activities in her classroom. On the first day, she introduced the topic of mixtures and solutions to the students by physically demonstrating a mixture with pretzels and candies, and pepper in water and a solution by pouring sugar into water. The students appeared to learn more and remain interested when the science concept was made less abstract and more concrete. I also really liked how she used Smart board to quiz her students in a fun, interactive game using the science concepts they were learning in the class. All the students appeared truly attentive and interested in the game, and eager to learn.  


Throughout our time at the school I worked with my 5th grader, Shivan, and he is certainly a very smart boy. Together we explored his textbook, the science concepts in his assigned chapters, questions at the end of the chapters, inquiry activities within the chapters, and a test at the end one last week to assess his knowledge. When building the boat with Shivan, we collaborated nicely together, and he showed me that he was capable of teamwork and challenging questions and tasks. He very nicely initiated the inquiry process: predicting, planning, experimenting, recording, concluding, and analyzing. I have very high expectations for Shivan. 


When we began teaching 5 E (inquiry) lessons to the 5th grade class, it became evident to me how important it is to have directions made clear and explicit during the inquiry lesson. Students need to know what the problem is they are trying to solve and what they need to look for before simply just beginning the investigation. Overall, I see how crucial inquiry lessons are to advancing a classroom's knowledge or science concepts. Students shouldn't just be able to repeat information verbatim that they read in a science textbook-anyone can do that. Students should be challenged and asked to expand upon the knowledge they acquire during the reading of their textbooks. To truly learn a science concept, students need to investigate a problem, look at/investigate a concept from many angles, and be creative while utilizing inquiry and process skills. Applying skills through the utilization of process skills helps students truly learn. 


I will soon post a link to my reflections and pictures of my fieldwork experience. 

Science Content and the Curriculum: The Big Ideas and Your Scientific Self

The science curriculum at various schools around the U.S. can be both very different and alike. However, it is still of most importance to have students engaged in the concepts they are learning, and to be actively engaged at that. Therefore, cooperative learning groups serve as that purpose to both engage students in the learning process and truly connect to the content they are learning, and make connections between math, science and technology. STEM initiative involves integrating the disciplines of math, science, and technology in curriculum planning and stresses the integration of these enterprises by having students become active learners- brainstorming, designing, building, and solving problems. In addition to cooperative learning groups allowing students to be actively involved in the learning process, they are providing opportunities for students to collaborate and work together to reach the best solution to their design challenge. Not only do students need to just know information about a subject, they now need to apply that information in creative ways using process skills. Cooperative learning groups are helping students understand and truly learn these "big ideas" in science. Inquiry is key!

Even though you may sometimes, as a teacher, need t modify or let go of your planning you have for a particular lesson, it is still crucial to plan. You cannot plan for things such as accidents, mood changes, difficulties in understanding a concept, students not cooperating, or students going further with your ideas than you imagined. But, you need to plan and have structure in your classroom to promote learning in the first place. As a teacher, you are setting up the situation and problems for students to investigate, and you can guide them through the process of learning. Therefore, in order to correctly scaffold your students and challenge their thinking and abilities, you need to have planned for the lesson and created scenarios and questions for hem to investigate and consider. Teachers can try to address and plan for all possible issues or situations that may arise during a lesson in order to feel more confident and prepared for when they do arise. 

In addition, cooperative learning groups should include all groups, nationalities, abilities, and various types of students in them. This is important to the dynamic and benefits of the group. Doing so, students who are struggling can  be helped by those who are high achievers, and those who simply need some assistance can receive it, students can learn about different cultures, and those who do not speak English well can be aided with the support of team work in a cooperative learning group. Therefore, no one truly falls behind and all will cooperate to achieve and attain a common goal. With each member having a role or some sort of responsibility, this ensures that all members will be participating and actively learning. Students are helping scaffold one another and are providing that extra support. Together, they can collectively answers questions they may have that they could not answer on their own. Teachers are posing more challenging problems and situations for students to investigate in these cooperative learning groups in order for students to have a need to interact and create a plan and find a solution together. 

Teachers should look for science activities that encourage individual explorations of phenomena. Students should ask their own questions and seek their own answers. Students need to be encouraged to question the phenomena under study and invent their theories for why something works. 

This video is great! It allows students to collaborate and inquiry with other students from around the world in hands-on/minds-on activities! Students are now excited about learning, comparing data with students from around the world and use high-order thinking when comparing data with students from other areas. They have a real motivation to learn and be involved in the process. They can also investigate areas and science concepts otherwise impossible through technology by "ripping across" boundaries. Areas that would not normally be accessible or available are now so. 

April Showers Bring May Flowers

It's April! The first day of April it rained- surprise, surprise. However, at least it did not snow (a lot)! Besides, the rain we get in April leads to the beautiful flowers we see bloom in the spring time! So, I am willing to take a month of rain showers to see those beautiful flowers and warm weather once again. The large amounts of rain we get in March and April are helping the flowers and plant life grow and become nice and strong. Perhaps as a science activity or experiment my students could grow their own plants and see how the amount of water plants receive affect their growth and life. One plant could be given no water, another plant could receive too much water, and a third plant could be given just the right amount og water. To further or extend this experiment, the students could see how different types of soil affect the absorbance of water and nutrients plants need to grow.