DEN: Florida

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?

 By Cheryl Watford, Network Manager, Polk County Schools

As we begin our journey of becoming teachers, one of the biggest challenges is to learn how to do an adequate, efficient, lengthy, informative lesson plan.  We are taught key features that must be included in that lesson, such as guided practice, independent practice, review, bellwork, reasoning, essential questions, and so on.  What we are not taught, but we must have, is the ability to be flexible with our planning.  To know when we are getting it to the students in a manner they can understand or if we have to change in mid-stream because we are staring out at a bunch of blank faces.

The ability to be flexible is not something that can be taught, but must be within a teacher if they are to be successful. Having great teacher resources and proven lesson plans are another way for a teacher to be successful.  Part of the Discovery Education Network pages provides a ton of lesson plans that have been used in classrooms, by other teachers, and shown to work.  Resources of all type of media are available at your disposal, just waiting for you to put them together yourself, if you prefer to create the lesson plan yourself.  (But of all the things I have learned throughout my years of teaching, why reinvent the wheel, if someone else did it before me, ‘Borrow’ that and tweak it to fit my needs.

So, borrow away, use to your hearts content, or put together a variety of items to create a fresh new lesson.  Please feel free to share your created lesson, or your ideas on how you tweaked a prepared lesson. We are all here to grow and benefit from each other.

After all, the puzzle pieces of a lesson are to be fit together perfectly for the group you are teaching, as well as the individual that you are.  All pieces of your lessons can fit together for you, no matter what type of personality you have or what genre of subject area you have to reinforce.

Here is an idea I ‘Borrowed’ from the DEN lesson pages: They have a weekly thematic focus, this week is Astronomy.  They
provide a discussion guide based on grade levels, so I chose Grades 6-8.  Once you download the PDF file, you have the needed layout or lesson plan for that unit.  It even provides the needed vocabulary words and active links to watch videos and whatever else you need. All at your fingertips, with really no need to tweak, unless you do not have the two class periods available, you may have to pick and choose what parts you use for your classroom.  Than they have a tab available for Media and another for Activities.  Explore and play, all learning about the universe.

So, what are you waiting for?  Go check out the DEN Lesson Plan pages….. Go to the thematic units or browse by subjects. There is a field of knowledge already at your fingertips!

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.

If you live near the Orlando area and would like to attend the Orlando Science Center’s Open House, mark your calendar for Saturday, August 29.  You will need to RSVP either by email or phone.  The flyer below contains all the information about the event.  Let me know if you plan to attend and we can have a DEN social at the Science Center.  I look forward to seeing you at the event.  This will be a great way to incorporate Discovery Science and the Science Center into your curriculum this year.

Teachers, do you want to be appreciated?  Do you enjoy receiving goody bags full of teacher supplies?  If so, this Saturday, August 15, 2009 is your lucky day.  Staples and Office Depot are hosting their annual Teacher Appreciation Events at 9:00am.  Bring your id and sign up to join their teacher rewards program.  Staples offers a great deal for teacher too.  Teachers are able to purchase 25 of any item in the add, regardless of the limited quantity amount.  All you need to do is show your id and they are yours.  This offer even includes their $.01 items!   Staples is giving away free gift bags to the first 100 teachers on Saturday.  Office Depot is providing breakfast, 10% off purchases and a tote bag filled with gifts.  Mark your calendar and enjoy the events.

The University of Minnesota is doing a study on the impact of Twitter in the classroom.  Check out the video showing the students actively engaged in their English course using iMacs and Twitter.

The new school year is just around the corner and I would like to take a moment to welcome every back to school.  There are some new and exciting changes to DE Streaming this year that you will definitely enjoy.  How many of you are aware that you will be able to create a class for your students in DE Streaming?

To check out all the new changes to DE Streaming, just click here for seven pages of information. The Florida Blog will be updated weekly with great information to share.  If you are not already receiving email updates, you can sign up by entering your email in the upper left hand corner of this window.

 Good luck this year and I look forward to a great year with the Florida DEN!

Debbie Bohanan

NEFEC (North East Florida Educational Consortium)  recently purchased Discovery Education Streaming Plus and Discovery Media Share for all 15 member districts in North East Florida. The Discovery team held train the trainer sessions in Lake City for NEFEC members responsible for training in their home counties on July 20 & 21, 2009.  Welcome to teachers/staff in the following counties: Baker, Bradford, Columbia,  Dixie, Flagler, Gilchrist, Hamilton, Lafayette, Levy, Nassau, Putnam, Suwannee, Union. PK Yonge DRS, Florida School for Deaf & Blind.

On June 24th and 25th, representatives from all fifteen of NEFEC’s member districts participated in the Summer Drive-In Conference entitled, “The Power of Less: Making the Most of Your Return on Investment”. This one-day, technology-centered event was held at Columbia High School in Columbia County on the 24th and replicated at Matanzas High in Flagler County on the 25th.

The conference consisted of two speakers that are on the cutting edge of integrating technology into best teaching practices, Hall Davidson from Discovery Education, and John Kuglin from the Eagle County School District in Colorado. Both speakers discussed the implications of technology on today’s learners, and the presentations touched on everything from professional networking sites to Twitter and cloud computing.

The day also included several districts showcasing their use of technology in planning and teaching to the individual learning needs of all students. Some of these presentations included:

As you begin thinking about the upcoming school year and your professional development, check out the DEN Webinar Series running August 3 - August 27.  The sessions will include topics such as Digital Storytelling, School Leadership, Science and Web 2.0.  All of the DEN Summer School Webinars will begin at 11 AM ET. You can register for any of the webinars by visiting The Nutshell and clicking on the registration link on Justin’s page.  The following is the link for the DEN Webinar descriptions:  http://tinyurl.com/mfz3fx