Teacher Advisor Opportunity! Assist WGBH with a digital media science education project

Teacher Advisor Opportunity! Assist WGBH with a digital media science education project Applications are due February 8, 2017 WGBH, America's premier producer of science content for public media, is on a five-year mission to develop media-rich digital learning resources that will increase students' engagement with science phenomena and practices in the classroom. In collaboration with NASA, WGBH's The Bringing the Universe to America's Classrooms* initiative will distribute resources and professional development experiences that have the potential to impact millions of students and teachers nationally. Because teacher voices are a critical part of our design and production efforts, we developed a teacher advisor program. This is an opportunity for K-12 educators to become teacher advisors in the design and implementation of digital media tools for STEM classrooms. Produced by WGBH, these resources will feature WGBH and NASA content, and will be distributed free of charge through the PBS LearningMedia™ platform. We're looking for 50 teacher advisors across the grades to help us in Year 2 of this mission. If you will be a full-time educator in the 2017-18 school year and expect to teach Earth science topics of weather, land and water (K-5) or weather and climate and geoscience processes (6-12), we invite you to complete this application. The application deadline is February 8, 2017 at 11:59pm EDT. Applicants will be notified of selection by March 2, 2017.    Please be sure to see our information site for further details. Questions? Contact carolyn_jacobs@wgbh.org. Thank you! *This activity is funded by NASA under cooperative agreement award No. NNX16AD71A.  Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration

All 2.3 Million Species Mapped into a Single Circle of Life

Over the past three years, researchers from a dozen of institutions combined tens of thousands of tree into one giant circle that represent all 2.3 millions species.  While only about 5 of all species have been genetically sequenced, biologists are working on increasing that number.  As they do, the relationships between species may change and this map may look different.

Anyone can propose updates to the database (OpenTreeOfLife.org). Greater detail could improve understanding of evolution and help scientists invent drugs, make crops more productive and better control infectious diseases.

14 Free Space Posters from NASA - Visions from the Future

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory website has created 14 different space posters that you can use in your classroom. Each one is available for you to download as either a small PDF file or a high quality TIFF file. The different posters cover topics such as specific planets, moons and space expeditions. In addition, each poster has a short description of the poster and give you some background information on the context. 

From the JPL website. "A creative team of visual strategists at JPL, known as "The Studio," created the poster series, which is titled "Visions of the Future." Nine artists, designers, and illustrators were involved in designing the 14 posters, which are the result of many brainstorming sessions with JPL scientists, engineers, and expert communicators. Each poster went through a number of concepts and revisions, and each was made better with feedback from the JPL experts." You can learn more about each poster's author and concept on their about page.

Do you hang posters around your classroom? What are some of your favorites?

Field Testers Needed - Medicines and Me

I received the following information via e-mail and wanted to pass this on to you if you were interested.

The Life Sciences Learning Center at the University of Rochester has developed a series of Medicines and Me lessons that focus on the safe use of over-the-counter (OTC) medicines and dietary supplements. These lessons are designed to incorporate medicine safety education into middle school life science, biology, health, or family and consumer science classrooms.

We are seeking grade 7-10 teachers who are willing to field test one of these Medicines and Me lessons with their students:

A Family Medicine Cabinet   

Students use information from a brief reading to classify labels and compare prescription drugs, over-the-counter drugs, and dietary supplements.  They learn that scientific testing is an important part of determining that drugs are safe and effective.  Estimated time = 2 forty minute class periods

Choosing and Using Medicines Safely    

Students analyze mini-cases and Drug Facts labels to determine which over-the-counter medicines patients should use and how to use them safely.   Estimated time = 2 forty minute class periods

Cold, Flu, or Allergy?    

Students conduct simulated flu tests to determine whether patients have the flu or not.  Product labels are used to select the medicines appropriate for patients with the flu, the common cold, or allergies.  Estimated time = 2 forty minute class periods

Field test teachers will be asked to:

• Make copies of the student handout, pre-test, and post-test for their students
• Administer a brief pre-test (10-15 questions) for the lesson to their students
• Use the lesson with their students
• Administer a post-test for the lesson to their students
• Match the pre-test and post-test answer sheets
• Complete a lesson evaluation survey
• Provide written feedback with suggestions for improving the lesson activities, the student instructions, and the teacher guide
• Provide 3 samples of student work for the lesson

Field test teachers will be provided with instructions and free supplies needed to complete one Medicines and Me lesson with their students.  Field testing will take place between October 15 and May 1.

A stipend of $100 will be provided for teachers who return matched pre/post-test answer sheets, a lesson evaluation survey, annotated teacher information and student handouts, and samples of student work.  All field testing data must be returned no later than May 1.

Here is a link to the online application:    https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/fieldtestMM

Please complete the application by September 20.  Field test teachers will be selected by September 30.  Lesson materials will be shipped to field test teachers by October 15.

Get to know your students with Padlet

I have never really done a get to know you activity with my students because my school is small.  The kids have been together since Kindergarten and by the time they are in middle and high school I figured that they knew everything there is to know about each other.  This year I am trying something new and, of course, I am using technology to help me out with it.  I've decided to have each student share one fact about them that most people don't know.  To do this, I created a Padlet board for each of my classes.  Padlet is basically an online builtin board.  You share the link with others and they an add text, videos and images to the board.  Neither you or the people you share your board with need an account, but I find it help to have one as the teacher.  Padlet gives you the ability to choose a background image and set other preferences to customize what your board looks like.



Once students have all submitted their facts about themselves, I am going to have the students try to guess who they think each fact belongs to.  I'm still trying to think of a fun way to do that part, but I would love any suggestions that you have!

This post is cross posted on my technology blog The Tech Savvy Science Teacher. 

Savvy Secondary Science's Top Ten Posts of July

Below are the ten most popular posts during the month of July.  Thank you to all of my loyal readers.  As a reminder, you can sign up for my newsletter to get a monthly e-mail with all of the posts from the previous thirty days.

1. Earth's Motion Stations
2. Zygote Body - 3D Anatomy Viewer
3. 42 Awesome YouTube channels for your Science Classroom
4. The Best Pencil Sharpener EVER!!!
5. Density of Pennies
6. Phases of the Moon Webquest
7. A Twist on the typical Cell Project
8. Newton's Third Law and some fun
9. Savvy Secondary Science Newsletter
10. Inquiry Projects - a hands on approach to the science fair

What was your favorite post or what would you like to see in a future post?

Zygote Body - 3D Anatomy Viewer

Zygote Body is a 3D Anatomy Viewer that allows you to slowly peel back the layers of the body.
When you first log into the website you will have to choose a subscription plan.  There are three plans, but I choose the free one (we know teachers want everything for free).  Of course the free version is as robust, but the features you can't find for free here can be found for free on other websites.

There is a slider on left side that allows your to move through the layers of the viewer.  The first layer that you encounter is the skin.  Following that you reach muscles, bones, tendon/ligaments, interior organs, circulatory system, nervous system and finally the brain.

You also have the option to turn on and off individual systems.  If you click on the bottom of the slider images, the slider will change from and up and down continuous slider to a left to right slider for each system.  This way you can turn on and off specific systems.

On top of the slider column is a box that will allow you to change the model from a male to a female.

Lastly, at the very top there are arrows to move the body up and down and spin it left and right.  Although you don't have to use those arrows because you can click and drag the image around.  Below that are plus and minus signs that allow you to zoom in and out on the image. You can also do that by scrolling up and down over the image.

Below is a video that will show you the features of this website, but it does show many of the features that are paid features.  My suggestion, and this is usually my suggestion for all new sites you are exploring, is to just go to the website and play around with it. :-)

What are some other images or animations you use with your students when discussing the body systems?