JoinAll Blog Posts
Blog Post
After a number of years working in the science industry I have now become a teacher. Do you have suggestions for maintaining my skills in both education and science? – B., Arizona I like your plan to stay current and active in your former work!...
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Enhanced Ebook “magic act” engages students in fun science lessons about sound and light
When Rebecca Olien set out to write Sound All Around, The Amazing Light Show, an NSTA Enhanced EBook+, she knew a thing (or 20) about elementary schoolchildren, the book’s target audience....
By Carole Hayward
Blog Post
Anyone who teaches middle school students knows they have a lot of energy, and a lot of hot air. Why not put it to use? In this activity, students will be challenged to modify a simple plastic balloon racer to travel farther and faster. Students begi...
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
First Graders Become Corn Experts: Using Questions to Drive Instruction
First graders love when fall comes to Kansas. It’s a magical time when lots of events are occurring in their environment, and I take full advantage of their natural curiosity. We begin the school year with a mini science unit featuring corn and agr...
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
Scaffolding the Practice of Asking Questions and Defining Problems
With the adoption of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), teachers are wondering how to teach their students to do the science and engineering practices (SEPs). Some SEPs, such as carrying out investigations and analyzing data, are a natural...
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
Connecting with other educators who share my interests and help me expand them is one of the benefits of writing for NSTA’s journal and blog. Guest blogger Tom Lough is a contributor to Science and Children and has taught science and science educat...
By Peggy Ashbrook
Blog Post
Ed News: Igniting Students’ STEM Interest Begins With Education Their Teachers
...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
I will be student teaching in a school with small classes – between 6 and 12 students. I find this to be challenging. Any suggestions or advice? — M., Kansas ...
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Can Schools Use Federal Funds for Guns and Firearms Training?
A huge controversy over whether districts and states can use funds from the new federal education law to purchase guns and pay for firearms training is still ongoing, weeks after the issue first surfaced in an article published in the New York Times....
By Jodi Peterson
Blog Post
Problem-Based Learning: An Essential Tool in Each K-12 Science Educator’s Toolkit
Problem-based learning (PBL) is a strategy that is tailor made for teaching science. Under the PBL framework, students actively drive the learning process, one that takes them through rich and authentic, but incompletely defined, scenarios....
By Carole Hayward
Blog Post
Ideas and inspiration from NSTA’s September 2018 K-12 journals
Whether you’re looking for ideas on systems thinking, adding strategies to your teaching repertoire, or creativity in science, this month’s K-12 journals have it all. Regardless of what grade level or subject you teach, check out all thre...
By Mary Bigelow
Blog Post
Isopods—your favorite animal? Children are fascinated
What you call these small animals probably depends on where you grew up. Pillbug, sowbug, roly-poly, woodlice, potato bug, cochinilla, slater, and Armadillidium vulgare are some of the names I’ve heard for my favorite animal, the isopod. What kind ...
By Peggy Ashbrook
Blog Post
NSTA recently issued a position statement calling for greater support for science educators in teaching evidence-based science, including climate science and climate change....
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
This blog post describes steps teachers should take to ensure that laboratory freezers and refrigerators are free from safety hazards. Science teachers should adhere to the following standard operating procedures, via the University of Texas at Austi...
By Kenneth Roy
Blog Post
How can you use 3D printers in your science classroom? — S., Alabama ...
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Keep it grounded. Keep it real.
I’ve been teaching science for three years. My students seem to see science as an abstract subject and have trouble imagining it. How can I help my students appreciate the lessons more with limited time and resources? —R., Philippines ...
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Administrators: Be Intentional ‘For All’
As academic institutions strive to create stimulating learning environments where students embrace the “sciences” to become critical thinkers and ecologically productive citizens, more and more employers are recognizing they have an essential rol...
By Guest Blogger
Blog Post
Ed News: Can STEM Camps For Girls Really Make A Difference?
This week in education news, there’s no way of knowing whether summer STEM camps help nudge more women into STEM careers; education in STEM fields can be the road to economic empowerment for women; Missouri Governor calls on state legislators to t...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
Summer PD for Teachers in National Parks
At Paterson Great Falls National Historical Park in Paterson, New Jersey, students work on a physics activity as part of Batter Up!, an event—developed by TRT Christine Gish and colleagues at Paterson’s JFK High School STEM Academy—that incorpo...
By Debra Shapiro
Blog Post
Ephemeral art exploring properties of matter, natural materials
I had fun this summer spending 4 days over 2 weeks “enriching” preschool teachers and children in their program by collaboratively exploring ephemeral art projects....
By Peggy Ashbrook
Blog Post
Ed News: If Students Aren’t Trying On International Tests, Can We Still Compare Countries’ Results
...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
Seasonal Connections to Nature in the Outdoor Environment
I love to ask teachers, “Who are our best scientists?” You can see them shuffling through the list of outstanding scientists in their minds. But, quickly their faces light up and they enthusiastically respond with “Kids are!” And, they are ri...
By Korei Martin
Blog Post
What are the most successful experiments and activities to do with students when covering the human body? — K., West Virginia Here are a few of my favorite demonstrations and activities. Look online or in the NSTA Learning Center for most of these....
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Ed News: Summer Programs Increase STEM Learning Opportunities For Visually Impaired Students
...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
StEMT: A New Process for Designing Meaningful STEM Lessons
A simple, practical, and methodological process for elementary and middle school teachers to implement meaningful STEM activities in the classroom that are not labor intensive, can be used with existing lessons, correlate with “A Framework for K-12...
By Carole Hayward
Blog Post
Chemical Safety Training for Science Teachers
Academic science laboratories can be unsafe places for teaching and learning due to risks associated with biological, chemical, and physical hazards The OSHA laboratory standard (29 CFR 1910.1450) requires all employees working in laboratory settings...
By Kenneth Roy
Blog Post
There’s More to Math than Drills
“As a teacher it frustrates me when drilling is proposed as the remedy to society’s mathematical struggles.” —Patrick Honner, Math Teacher and 2018 NSTA/NCTM STEM Teacher Ambassador I like practicing. I’m weir...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
I can see and appreciate how science is really an awesome subject. How can I make science more fun and exciting yet effective for my students? —D., Philippines “It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowled...
By Gabe Kraljevic
Blog Post
Myths about Science, with an early childhood focus
The National Science Teachers Association website has a section for families titled, “Help Your Child Explore Science.” Here’s my adaptation of the “Myths about Science” page in that section, giving it an early childhood focus.&n...
By Peggy Ashbrook
Blog Post
You can’t believe everything you see in social media, but when something’s popular on Twitter/Facebook/Snapchat, it’s sure to be something you can use to catch students’ attention. The stories that caught our eye this week ru...
By Lauren Jonas, NSTA Assistant Executive Director
Blog Post
Ideas and inspiration from NSTA’s August 2018 K-12 journals
The August issues are ready for back-to-school! Regardless of what grade level or subject you teach, as you skim through the article titles, you may find ideas for lessons that would be interesting your students or the inspiration to adapt/create/sha...
By Mary Bigelow
Blog Post
First-Graders Modeling Day and Night: Making Sense of a Phenomenon
As a first-grade teacher in Detroit with predominantly Latinx students and English language learners, I worked for several weeks at the end of last school year with a doctoral candidate in science education and former elementary teacher, Christa Have...
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
Recently, my colleagues and I had an exchange with some teachers in one of our professional development programs. One teacher said, “I think I do a lot of modeling in my class. I have my kids draw pictures of the science ideas they are learning all...
Blog Post
Modeling in Science Instruction
With the shift toward three-dimensional teaching and learning that the Next Generation Science Standards requires, the Crosscutting Concept of Modeling has become a major focus of my instruction. I use a process that involves revisiting the sam...
By Cindy Workosky
Blog Post
Ed News: New Girl Scout STEM Badges & Back-to-School Spending Hits $82 Billion
This week in education news, the Girl Scouts have added 30 new badges in STEM to encourage more female involvement; back-to-school spending will hit $82.8 billion for K-12 and college combined, and more teachers are digging into their wallets; and m...
By Kate Falk
Blog Post
Freeze! We're doing science!
I have accumulated a large number of the freezer gel packs from a meal service. I’d like to find a way to use them in a classroom activity. —P., Georgia The best thing about these freezer packs is that they provide a constant that will help ...
By Gabe Kraljevic