There are many struggles with teaching science to secondary students. Unfortunately, one of these struggles is the reading abilities of our students. Many students struggle comprehending what they are reading and doing tasks like picking out the main idea. Scientific American has done some research in this area and has made some suggestions about what techniques and help students read better to improve their comprehension of science. This article is worth the read even if you think your students aren't struggling with reading.
The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History put together an exhibit called "Genome: Unlocking Life's Code." While we can't all take field trips to go see it, you can use the resources to bring it into your classroom. The resource library has lesson plans, videos, timelines, and other things you can use in your classroom. My favorite resource is the animated genome video. It explains the triplet code and its role in DNA replication, talks about how diet and exercise impact, your DNA, and even the forensic and geneological uses of DNA. replication
Of its STEM Role Models posters collection, Nevertheless podcast explained, “The women featured serve as amazing role models in their fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (or STEM as it’s often referred to). You can listen to our episode on STEM Role Models here.
of women who are transforming teaching and learning through technology, “commissioned another four female illustrators from South America, Africa, the Middle East and China” to create a new set of STEM Role Models posters for its growing collection. Nevertheless now offers a total of eight inspiring posters, each celebrating a different woman innovator everyone should know, and they’re all available to download now
Dr. Spencer Striker, an Associate Professor of Digital Media Design at Northwestern University in Qatar, has released a new mobile game. Dr. Sara: Disease Detective is a fully interactive digital learning mobile game about epidemiology.
The game is designed to get kids interacting and having fun while developing problem-solving skills, logic skills, increasing their scientific vocabulary, and learning more about pandemics. In this character-driven simulation of Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) detective work, students search for the index case, racing against time to find clues to a cure.
"Dr. Sara: Disease Detective features high stakes time pressure, compelling characters, narrative design, challenging puzzles, and the natural gameplay dynamics that emerge from network science and contact tracing," Dr. Striker said. "We hope this new visual novel mobile game will inspire students to develop an interest in science, medical technology, and public health."
This fun and immersive game features interactive dialogue, innovative character design, minigames about social distancing, hidden object investigation, eureka style logic puzzles, collectible scientific vocabulary, game-based learning techniques, cinematics, visual effects, original music, and immersive sound design.
Crosswords can be a fun way for students to review or a great activity for the students who finish early. The problem is that it is hard to find a crossword puzzle that goes along with the content you are teaching. Crossword Lab is a free site that allows you to easily make your own crossword puzzles. All you need to do is to enter the word that should appear in the puzzle and then the clue for it. For example: dog man's best friend. In this example dog would be the word that would be in the puzzle and man's best friend would be the clue written.
eSkeletons is a great site for viewing skeletal models. There are a number of mammalian skeletons that you can choose from and can even look at a specific bone. While there are many sites that will allow you to view models of the skeleton, what I like about this site is that you can easily compare comparable bones of different organisms.
It is a good website to add to your anatomy toolkit.
Elements.wlonk.com is the home to The Periodic Table of Elements, in Pictures and Words. It is an interactive site where students can click on elements to see how it used and in what commons prodcuts it is found. For example, if you click on calcium an image of seashell appears along with a list of other places it is found.
In addition to the interactive page, you can also print out a copies or purchase a high quality poster.
This is something that I would use in both my middle and high school classrooms. Students often think they know what things are made of, but it would be eye opening for them to see what elements are really in the items they use every day. Connections like these provide a better understanding and enhance learning.
There are many struggles with teaching science to secondary students. Unfortunately, one of these struggles is the reading abilities of our students. Many students struggle comprehending what they are reading and doing tasks like picking out the main idea.
