For many of you, the school year is starting, or will soon. Summer flies by in a blink. But if you have a little prep time left and are looking for new materials to add to your curriculum, I encourage you to try SciLinks, NSTA’s online source to vetted web pages — that means “reviewed” to you and me ;).

Back in 1999, I was sitting in my office and reading the newsletter from NSTA. The article that really caught my eye was the one describing the new “SciLinks” project. I had been involved in educational technology since the early 1980s (and do I ever have stories about what now appears to be primitive technology!), and I was teaching a course in educational computing at the graduate level. The moment I finished the article, I contacted NSTA to find out if/how I could be involved.
What intrigued me was the idea of having a set of websites on a particular topic that students and teachers could easily access and use. Even in the late 90s, searching for websites on a particular topic resulted in thousands of potential sites, and some were not worth the time or were not appropriate for students or for using in a classroom setting.
That spring, I became a site reviewer. My task was to review sites that had been suggested by “Spotters” who searched for sites on a specific topic and to correlate these sites to the NSES standards. At first, we just did a holistic thumbs up/down review, but eventually a rubric was developed. I estimate that over the last 8 years, I’ve looked at least 10,000 science-related sites (as one of several spotters and reviewers!). And I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly. I’m hoping that we’ve filtered out the bad and ugly!
Brief Autobiography
I was a middle school life and physical science teacher for 16 years and a high school computer science teacher for 11 years (during which time I was also the district’s technology coordinator, among other assignments on a very full plate). I had a brief stint in higher education, and I recently retired as an administrator at a regional service agency, where I was involved in research and evaluation and served as the science resource person. In this capacity, I worked with many elementary teachers and classes in various projects related to science, mathematics, and reading. I say “retired” but I’m actually “retooling” into new opportunities, one of which is blogging. I’m still a reviewer for SciLinks, and I’m doing some consulting work for a Math-Science Partnership project.
How would I use SciLinks sites?
As NSTA members, we have access to the database at the www.scilinks.org site either by using the codes in a SciLinked textbook or NSTA publication or by searching for a keyword or standard on the site.
Recommending sites to students. As a teacher, I can provide logins for students to look at particular sites, or I can give them a printed list of suggestions. For interested students, I might go to the next grade level or I would go down a level for students who may struggle with the text. I’d share a login with the librarian so that he/she can remind students of this resource. In my town, many students use the technology at the local public library. Perhaps the staff there could be alerted to how and why students would access this. Parents or other caregivers may also be given logins to SciLinks, too.
In large group settings. Why just talk about science topics when there are many sites that lend themselves to illustrating the concepts? Building bridges, watching volcanoes erupt, seeing animals congregate around a water hole at night, or accessing photographs and video of various topics bring these topics to life. If you’re fortunate enough to have a smart board or projection unit, using a simulation or video clip with the class or a small group of students could be an engaging experience for them – and the resources are free and ready when you are. I’ve even printed some of the pages of a site to supplement or update the textbook information.
Teacher learning. One thing I’ve enjoyed over the years is using the SciLinks websites to keep current on topics such as the human genome and climate change. I especially love the earth science topics (I taught life and physical science, so I’m continuing to learn). If you’re unfamiliar with a topic, searching for sites geared to middle or high school students would be a quick and painless way to learn more about it. My former district’s teacher evaluation plan had an option for self-study, so I would have taken advantage of the SciLinks list (Note: NSTA has excellent professional development modules).
So how exactly does a site get from cyberspace to SciLinks? The next blog post will address this!