FCAT Science

I recently had the plea­sure of con­duct­ing a full-day teacher train­ing work­shop for a char­ter school in Florida. Thir­teen teach­ers were actively engaged in inquiry-based inves­ti­ga­tions that tie directly to the Next Gen­er­a­tion Sun­shine State Sci­ence Stan­dards. Teach­ers con­ducted numer­ous hands-on-minds-on explo­rations to investigate:

• Nature of Science;
• Earth and Space Science;
• Phys­i­cal Sci­ence; and
• Life Sci­ence concepts.

The admin­is­tra­tor of the school requested that I rein­force the impor­tance of writ­ing and jour­nals within the sci­ence class­room, as well as across the dis­ci­plines. Thus, a major focus of the teacher train­ing work­shop involved the teach­ers main­tain­ing a jour­nal through­out the ses­sion. We spent the early part of the morn­ing explor­ing the school yard. Mak­ing obser­va­tions, col­lect­ing leaves, seeds, soil sam­ples, insect exoskele­tons, and more… While out­side the teach­ers recorded their obser­va­tions in their stu­dent note­books. When we returned to the class­rooms teach­ers were given time to reflect on their obser­va­tions within their jour­nals, observe spec­i­mens with eye loupes and micro­scopes. Teach­ers then attached spec­i­mens inside of their jour­nals. Addi­tion­ally, were introduced:

•  To effec­tive strate­gies to dif­fer­en­ti­ate between weath­er­ing and erosion;
• How liv­ing things inter­act with their envi­ron­ment via design­ing and con­struct­ing a bot­tle biol­ogy ecosystem;
• Botan­i­cal concepts;
• States of Matter;
• Dif­fer­ences between chem­i­cal and phys­i­cal changes; and
• Dif­fer­ences between mix­tures and solutions.

At the end of the teacher train­ing ses­sion, the teach­ers left the ses­sion with their arms filled with mod­els they had con­structed, ref­er­ences, man­u­als, and an inter­ac­tive stu­dent notebook/ jour­nal from the ses­sion. I’m quite cer­tain that these teach­ers will incor­po­rate many of the strate­gies they were intro­duced to as they imple­ment the Next Gen­er­a­tion Sun­shine State Sci­ence Stan­dards  (NGSSS) in their classrooms.

Thirty ele­men­tary teach­ers attended a full-day hands-on-minds-on, inquiry-based teacher train­ing work­shop enti­tled Teach­ing Sci­ence Through Children’s Lit­er­a­ture. Teach­ers were intro­duced to a wide-array of children’s lit­er­a­ture that can be incor­po­rated into the sci­ence class­room to teach inter­me­di­ate level sci­ence con­cepts cov­er­ing the New World-Class Sun­shine State Sci­ence Stan­dards. Teach­ers con­ducted a wide-array of hands-on-minds-on inves­ti­ga­tions to explore nature of sci­ence, earth and space, phys­i­cal sci­ence, and life sci­ence con­cepts. Inves­ti­ga­tions under­taken by the teach­ers were directly con­nected to the Big Ideas within the New World-Class Sun­shine State Sci­ence Stan­dards. Teach­ers explored the states of mat­ter with a unique non-Newtonian sub­stance called  . They also were intro­duced to how to use Oobleck to teach numer­ous earth and space sci­ence con­cepts. Teach­ers designed and con­structed bot­tle biol­ogy ecosys­tems to rein­force a wide-array of life sci­ence con­cepts includ­ing: food chains, food webs, inter­de­pen­dence, lim­it­ing fac­tors, oxy­gen cycle, nitro­gen cycle, carbon-dioxide cycle, pho­to­syn­the­sis, and the water cycle. Teach­ers were intro­duced to many of Leonardo daVinci’s inno­va­tions and inven­tions by explor­ing the book Who Was Leonardo daVinci by Roberta Edwards. Teach­ers con­structed sim­ple para­chutes and heli­copters, and com­pared bird feath­ers to air­plane wing design to explore force, motion, and energy con­cepts as well as make con­nec­tions to the con­tri­bu­tions of Leonardo daVinci to soci­ety. Teach­ers explored weath­er­ing and ero­sion con­cepts and the rock cycle by con­duct­ing hands-on inves­ti­ga­tions with Coquina Rock. Lastly, teach­ers observed and stud­ied man­grove seedlings to rein­force numer­ous life sci­ence con­cepts. Each hands-on-minds-on inves­ti­ga­tion was directly related to selected children’s lit­er­a­ture. All inves­ti­ga­tions under­taken dur­ing the teacher train­ing work­shop are directly related to FCAT Sci­ence annu­ally assessed bench­marks. A sam­ple of children’s authors included: Lynn Cherry, John Him­mel­man, Dr. Seuss, Ellen Prager, Kris­tine and Robert Thorson,Cherie Mason, Jean Craig­head George, Carl Hiassen, and many oth­ers. All of the children’s lit­er­a­ture intro­duced to the teach­ers and used within the teacher train­ing work­shop can be found and ordered from the fol­low­ing site.