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Many elementary science teachers have faced some challenges in implementing meaningful and equitable modeling practices in online science instruction that is aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards. Integrating technology tools into modeling practices in project-based learning environments can support meaningful and equitable modeling practices by promoting the development of student agency, the use of diverse modalities, and collaboration. Through an example lesson on the changing shape of earth features, we illustrate how a teacher can help students with varying levels of language learn about earth’s systems by collaboratively developing an explanatory model of vegetation and soil interaction to represent their ideas. We conclude by discussing in what ways this lesson supports meaningful and equitable participation in modeling practices.

Making science accessible is an important and worthy goal, but for many students, science is inaccessible because what counts as science in the classroom is narrowly defined as what is known as western science, rooted in Europe in the 1600s and often privileging white, male-centric perspectives. In this article, we describe five examples of expanding what counts as science to help remove barriers to learning and to make school science more equitable and inclusive. Indigenous ways of knowing can complement western ways of thinking. Black botany provides examples of how Black scientists and farmers have shaped best practices for agriculture and sustainable land management while fighting for economic and food justice. Feminist perspectives on science redefine what counts as objectivity, while queer science challenges what is considered normal. Finally, neurodivergent sensemaking illustrates how people with autism have applied their strengths to provide new insights into how the world works. Expanding what counts as science helps us value multiple ways of sensemaking, see and hear the science in what all children say and do, and recognize the brilliance of all children in our classrooms.

Looking for something REALLY exciting, creepy-crawly, accessible and pertains to phenomenon-based/ storyline-based NGSS? Bugscope is a free educational project at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. K-12 classrooms have an opportunity to view insects using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Students engage in making sense of the insect world by asking their own questions, construct explanations, engage in argument from evidence, and obtain, evaluate and communicate information. Multiple disciplinary core ideas and crosscutting concepts can be covered: information processing, human impact on Earth systems, biogeology, structure and function, systems and system models, and delimiting engineering problems. This article illuminates a sample lesson for a 3rd grade classroom, adaptable to any grade, using a storyline format. Students participate in a session where classes have mailed their own insect samples to view with an entomologist present. “Bugs” are often collected by students who get excited when they are able to view their own insects. By having an actual “bug scientist” present, students are comfortable asking the questions they actively develop while looking at the insects. This part of the Bugscope experience also provides students with one way to see what different scientists do and ask the entomologist questions about their job.

Equalizing opportunities for students to learn science and engineering in the ways described in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) requires intentional planning. In this paper, we describe a framework for designing equitable and inclusive science lessons. We then share an example of how this framework was applied to the launch of a fifth grade science unit, specifying the instructional strategies used to provide students with a meaningful, relevant, and engaging learning experience.

Creating learning opportunities for students to culturally connect in the science classroom is crucial to ensuring inclusivity and accessibility for all. This article describes how multicultural picture books that use visuals to capture diverse representations and contribute to interdisciplinary storytelling can enhance culturally relevant science tasks. By incorporating such texts in the science classroom, students can be empowered with tools to recognize and respect scientific contributions from non-dominant groups and use asset-based language to challenge discourse-perpetuating stereotypes and deficit perspectives. Suggestions are made for how to purposefully select supportive texts, and two sample multicultural picture books are examined in the context of facilitating cultural connections to Earth and Space Science (ESS) content, respectively Earth and Human Activity (ESS3) and Earth’s Systems (ESS2). Science educators are encouraged to use the sampled multicultural picture books and other provided recommendations to help students envision science as a culturally-embedded activity, thereby providing opportunities for students to make sense of the world around them and see themselves as scientists.

Calls for disciplinary literacy instruction in elementary schools encourage teachers to provide authentic opportunities for students to read and write like scientists. Enacting disciplinary literacy with problem-based learning practices to inquire about the world and find solutions to real-life problems is an effective practice for integrating elementary science and literacy instruction. Science texts found in printed and digital formats are becoming increasing multimodal in nature and require students to have complex navigation and interpretation skills when being asked to read like scientists. We provide a framework, that emerged from our work with urban elementary students in a summer camp, with steps that support students to read like scientists as they use multimodal science texts within a problem-based learning context. These concrete, practical steps combine explicit instruction using think-alouds with disciplinary literacy strategies in science.