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My eBook “Think Like a Scientist: Understanding Weather & Climate” is now available through NSTA Press. Learn more about this and other NSTA ebooks for the K-5 classroom here.
Tag Archives: earth science
NSTA’s “Daily Do” and my eBook: Investigating Weather and Climate
The NSTA recently made the generous decision to open all of its NSTA Kids eBooks freely available on the web at nsta.org/ebooks. These digital, interactive readers are aligned to Next Generation Science Standards across K-5 grade levels and a great … Continue reading
Posted in 3-5, Digital Tools
Tagged climate, earth science, NSTA, patterns, reading, technology
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Empowering Student Empathy and Risk Taking through “The [Climate] Talk”
Climate change is hard and I don’t just mean teaching the science behind the overwhelming data supporting its existence, or even executing solutions designed to reduce or limit its effect on our global systems. I mean talking about it, like … Continue reading
Posted in 6-8, Classroom Activities, Professional Development
Tagged #innovateinsidethebox, climate, earth science
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Beyond Toothpicks and Marshmallows: Engineering Earthquake Resistant Structures
I’ve been searching high and low for an earthquake engineering design challenge that gave students more control in planning and evaluating their earthquake-resistant constructions than the common “toothpicks and marshmallows” challenge often seen in primary and middle grades. So … Continue reading
Posted in 3-5, Classroom Activities, Digital Tools, NGSS
Tagged earth science, earthquakes, engineering, waves and communication
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Assessing Human Impact in the Cafeteria
Hundreds of mouths stood agape as six students in white “haz-mat” suits picked through a mountainous pile of trays, plastic wrappers, tater tots and pizza sticks. Shrieks and “ewwwwwww”s carried through the gymnasium. Students and teachers collectively held their noses. … Continue reading
"Create a Cloud" and Connect Children to Weather and the Water Cycle
Many of the second grade classrooms in Burlington have recently investigated weather as a unit. Students typically learn about temperature and how to measure it before logging changes in temperature over two weeks along with wind conditions and cloud coverage. … Continue reading
Celebrate the Solstice! – Sundial Activity and More
Cross-posted on the Burlington Science Center blog. There is plenty to celebrate the week before holiday break, but among the many religious traditions don’t forget to take pause on December 22nd to celebrate a very special day in Earth’s orbit … Continue reading
Student Feedback from Dynamic Earth Project
After two weeks of student-driven research, planning, and production the results to the Dynamic Earth Project were shared and were (to be completely blunt) … disappointing. With the exception of a few, productions were typical and mundane. Many groups, given … Continue reading
Posted in Classroom Activities, Professional Reflections
Tagged earth science, project-based learning
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The "Dynamic" Earth Project
Fellow earth and space science teacher, Connie Quackenbush and I came back from February break charged to shake up our ‘business as usual’ approach to an upcoming unit on earth processes and their effect on the earthen landscape. Instead a … Continue reading
Posted in Classroom Activities, Professional Reflections
Tagged earth science, Grades 6-8, project-based learning
2 Comments
Musselman / Science 