The November 7th Sea World event was a great eye-opener!
Our group’s quest was to find out as much as we could about sharks for the day. We spent several minutes hunting and finding the ‘Shark Den’ and once we arrived, we watched the sharks swim and took many pictures!
From there, we went back to our ‘training room’ and created a glogster page with our shark information. We added a link to an animoto video and researched the internet for great shark information. Continuing with the theme of sharks, we found a website that had shark games!!
Follow our teams efforts…. here we go!
http://ascienceteacher.edu.glogster.com/Dennys-DOD/
By the Way…. Denny is our ‘Mascot’ for the FL DEN Leadership Council… watch for many many more visits and theme related events with Denny!!
Science Fair.
Mutter those words to students and they will either jump for joy or groan. Mention the words to parents and they often will groan louder. Somehow over the years science fair has gotten a bad name. Could it be that students are expected to conduct an experiment at home with little time spent in class actually working on their project? Or is it because the students wait until the last minute to tell their parents that they have a science fair project and they spend the entire night before it’s due coming up with a project idea that they can complete in less than 3 hours. Perhaps it’s neither of these, and instead it’s that both students and parents (maybe even teachers) haven’t had a user-friendly resource to help muddle through the scientific process of conducting a science fair project. I know that as a science teacher, we are expected to have our students complete science fair projects but don’t have time scheduled into the curriculum to have students actually work on science fair projects in class.
Luckily, Discovery Education has once again come to our aid. Discovery education has partnered up with Scotch® to bring us Science Fair Central.
Simply go to: http://school.discoveryeducation.com/sciencefaircentral/ for step-by-step help for students, parents and teachers. “Science Fair Central” contains more than 100 project ideas that are broken down into easy or complex investigations and there is even a section for inventions.
The website has a “getting started” section which will help students choose a project type, understand the difference between investigations and inventions and find testable questions. There is even a section where they can validate their topic – to make sure that they have enough time to complete their project, the proper materials, that they follow the appropriate safety procedures, their project is appropriate and that they follow safety if they are using animals in their experiment.
Parents can visit the site and use the “parent resources” section to help their students stay on track. This area of the site explains the parent’s role in the science fair project process, how to help their student come up with an idea and how to support their student during the investigation process and where to get supplies.
For teachers, or science fair coordinators, there is a section to help with reasons to host a science fair, types of projects available, science fair judging criteria and supplies needed to host a science fair as well as a parent letter that can be customized based on your needs.
The best part of the site, in my opinion, is the virtual labs section of the site. This section provides students with an opportunity to practice conducting experiments in a controlled environment. There are even teacher guides and student worksheets that are available to download.
I know that if I had come across this resource when I became the science fair coordinator at my school, it would have saved me hours of time coming up with science fair project ideas and science fair project expectations. I also would have a site to share with parents to help with some of the frustrations that come with their student’s science fair project.
With all of the great resources from Discovery Education and “Science Fair Central,” what will Discovery Education think of next?
As we return back to school our county mandates that we spend 8 days teaching the students how to be a scientist. The first two days I conducted my own experiments and the kids really enjoyed the activities. On the following day, I decided to use the textbook and see how the students responded. It turns out that the textbook actually put two kids to sleep! Granted it was the end of the day and everyone was very tired but it was the first time I remember a student falling asleep on the book and the page sticking to his face! I knew an intervention was needed and I turned to Discovery Science for help. The first thing I found were two songs about the Scientific Method. The students thought the first song was hilarious and the second song had everyone dancing and moving. One student even made a sign to go with the song “Science Rocks”. We had such a great time and everyone started to understand the steps of the scientific method. I highly recommend checking out the song library if you are stuck for a catchy way to teach students about the scientific method. My two favorite songs are Teacher and the Rockbots: Scientific Method and Music Makes It Memorable: Scientific Method. DE Science also has great lessons and units that are engaging and full of experiments for teaching students the scientific method. Enjoy and have a great week!
If you are like me, school has started this week and you are busy with meetings and getting our classroom ready for open house and the first day of school. If you resemble this remark, you may have also signed up for some of the amazing summer school webinars only to discover that your school has scheduled a meeting or training at the same time. I was very disappointed this week because I missed several webinars due to meetings. The good news is that the webinars are being archieved and can be viewed on your own time! If you want to check out any of the sessions you missed, visit http://blog.discoveryeducation.com/summer-school/ and click on the topic you would like to learn more about. Not all the sessions are posted yet but they are coming soon.
If you scroll down the page, you will see a link to Hall’s presentations in pdf or ppt files. These are excellent resources and I highly recommend downloading them and sharing them with others in your school or district. Enjoy these resources and good luck with the first week of school.
DEN pre-conference was an awesome day of learning. We held school at DEN Headquarters in Silver Spring, MD. DEN head quarters is a beautiful place, if you are ever invited GO!!! Even though, we were treated as students on this day (being required to have Hall passes) we were definitely given a fantastic day of EDUCATION. Two classes I attended and recommend:
Learning Through the Funnies with Brad Fountain
Learning Through the Funnies presentation
Top Ten FREE Web 2.0 Sites with Steve Dembo
View his presentation here
For those of you unable to attend, DEN has linked some of the presentations: Discovery School at NECC 09 Remember you can use these presentations as events with your faculty & staff .
I couldn’t trace who it was that emailed me, but you’re right. I’m asking you to try Bubblr, and I didn’t even do it myself. I used Jennifer Gingrich’s. I’m not as creative as she is, nor as great as the other two that commented with their Bubblr, but here’s the link to my sample Bubblr.
Also, please note, the two people that responded are from Georgia and California! Since you’re not in my DEN I don’t have your physical addresses. I’d like to send you something for commenting and sharing. North Florida DEN—- I know you’re busy with school ending, but it was fun creating the Bubblr. I had to force myself to quit. At least comment so I know you’re out there………I still have a sweet treat left……..
Jennifer Gingrich sent me this great link: http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr/?id=3351 . It’s Bubblr - a tool to create comic strips using photos from flickr.com. Create your own Bubblr Comic Strip today. The first 3 people who create one and leave the link below will get a sweet treat!
I am currently in Harrisburg, PA for a East Coast Team Meeting. After a fun day of getting to know the team and planning some great projects for the year, we decided to take in a mini lesson. The lesson started at 9 PM, which proves our dedication to you! Lance gave us a little tutorial on Google Earth, so I thought I would play around with it. (My motto is, playing leads to learning!) For those who are not familiar with Google Earth, it’s a program (FREE VERSION IS WHAT WE USE!) from Google that has so much potential for geography, science, history, and all the other wonderful subjects. I created a very short Google Earth Virtual Field Trip (topic in this month’s Resource Guide) of where I just moved from (Sumter, SC) and the place it’s often confused with (Fort Sumter, SC). All you need to do is download Google Earth, download this very small file and then open it up. Download Danielle.kmz I’d click on the play button to go from Fort Sumter to Sumter, SC. Lance listed a great PowerPoint on his blog for those who are interested in trying this on their own. (You’ll have to scroll down to find it.)
Just think, these can be created to meet your standards, quick simple little files to upload, and count as a resource for Discovery Educator Network and our contest!(San Deigo, here comes Florida Teachers!) I know Tom Turner from Polk County is creating a virtual field trip with Google Earth. Who else is taking it for a spin? Post your comments, tips and tricks below for a fun little sweet treat. (Think, where is Harrisburg close to?)
And get those events in quickly! Just one and a half weeks left of the contest! Who’s going to win?
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