This year, as a science supervisor, I will be observing teachers. I’m not sure whether I should interact with them during classroom visits if I see something that could be improved. How involved should I be? —J., Pennsylvania

You have a wonderful opportunity to observe (and learn from) a variety of teachers and share your expertise.

Discuss with your administrator what your role(s) should be: evaluator, mentor, observer, or coach. How often are you expected to visit each classroom? How long are your observations (a whole class period vs. a brief walk-through)? Are there protocols or procedures you are expected to follow? These parameters can determine how involved you become, and your rapport with the teachers will depend on whether they see you as an intrusive administrator or a trusted colleague.

When you’re in a classroom, intervene immediately if you notice a safety issue. Otherwise, be discreet. You don’t want to undermine the teacher or react to an event without knowing the context. You can call a teacher’s attention to something without interrupting the class. Perhaps while students are working, you could have a quiet chat with the teacher or give the teacher a note.

Afterwards, reflect on your observations before meeting with the teacher. How will they help the teacher improve instruction or relationships with students? As an observer/evaluator, I would debrief with teachers with discussion-starting questions: How did you know that students were engaged? What would happen if…? Did you notice that…? What happened right before I came in? What happened after I left?

The supervisory process is time-consuming, but reflection and face-to-face discussions can make it worthwhile for everyone.

[The article, “Should Supervisors Intervene During Classroom Visits?” (Kappan, October 2015) has a good discussion on in-class coaching.]

The Educators Evaluating the Quality of Instructional Products (EQuIP) Rubric for science provides criteria by which to measure the degree to which lessons and units are designed for the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). The rubric is a joint project of Achieve, Inc., and NSTA and was originally released shortly after the NGSS were finalized.

The purpose of the rubric and review process is to: (1) review existing lessons and units to determine what revisions are needed; (2) provide constructive criterion-based feedback and suggestions for improvement to developers; (3) identify exemplars/models for teachers’ use within and across states; and (4) to inform the development of new lessons, units, and other instructional materials. 

Revisions were recently made to the rubric. Matt Krehbiel, assistant director of science for Achieve, Inc., highlights some of the changes in the following Q&A. 

Q: What are the major changes that were made to the rubric?

A: The two biggest changes in the rubric are the addition of a scoring guide to the response form and the reorganization of criteria in the first two categories of the rubric. The details of these and other changes are outlined in Rubric Changes for Version 3.0 online.

Q: Why were the changes made?

A: The scoring guide was added to support the evaluation of lessons and units in a more concrete way. This version of the rubric will be used to vet lessons and units by the Peer Review Panel with the goal of identifying and sharing high quality lessons designed for the NGSS. The scoring guide supports the process of selecting high quality examples.

The criteria were reorganized to provide greater clarity about what designing lessons and units for the NGSS really looks like. While training thousands of educators to use the EQuIP Rubric for Science, we have observed where people struggle to understand the intent of the criteria and revised these sections for greater clarity.

Q: How were the changes made?

A: It was a team effort. Feedback from the thousands of educators using the EQuIP Rubric for Science across the United States was combined with feedback from those leading professional learning using the rubric and the revisions were guided by the same group of experts that authored previous versions of the EQuIP Rubric for Science. It was a year-long, iterative process that included piloting several drafts with groups of teachers for specific feedback on the clarity and utility of the changes.

Q: What does the new rubric allow me to do?

A: The new rubric allows for a more specific conversation about what is “quality” in terms of designing lessons and units for the NGSS. Together with professional learning support, the new rubric helps users become better able to identify lessons and units that are designed for the NGSS, better able to revise lessons and units of their own, and helps deepen their understanding of the standards themselves and what they expect of students and teachers. It is important to note that the rubric is best used within a community and, when used this way, it can also establish or reinforce a common language and understanding for what high quality lessons and units designed for the NGSS look like.

Matt Krehbiel is Assistant Director of Science for Achieve, Inc. Reach him at mkrehbiel@achieve.org and follow him on twitter at @ksscienceguy.

Visit NSTA’s NGSS@NSTA Hub for hundreds of vetted classroom resources, professional learning opportunities, publications,ebooks and more; connect with your teacher colleagues on the NGSS listservs (members can sign up here); and join us for discussions around NGSS at an upcoming conference.

The mission of NSTA is to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.

Future NSTA Conferences

2016 Area Conferences

• Minneapolis, October 27–29
• Portland, November 10–12
• Columbus, December 1–3

2016 National Conference

• Nashville, March 31–April 3

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Start off the school year with ideas and resources from your NSTA colleagues.

Science and Children – Sharing Products: Science Exhibitions and Beyond

The featured articles this month describe how teachers and students can go beyond traditional replicas and science fairs to create products and processes that showcase their learning and problem-solving skills (and their creativity)

• Need to know more about the “maker movement?” Bringing the Maker Movement to School describes student “tinkering” and problem solving, culminating in a showcase of ideas and projects.
• Remaking Science Fairs has alternatives to the traditional, competitive science fairs, including a timeline for a class science “convention.”  
• Celebrating Science With the Community describes how to modify a formulaic science fair into a celebration of learning with an authentic, public audience. Examples include a career fair, a science convention, and a pop-up restaurant in which students showcased their knowledge of plants.
• The lesson described in Firefly, Firefly includes trade books and the arts to capitalize on students’ interest in these insects
• The Early Years: Classroom Memories illustrates students creating a “documentation panel” to communicate, share, and reflecy on what they are learning. The article includes a lesson on water flow as an example.
• Teaching Through Trade Books: What We Do With Ideas has two 5E lessons that focus on helping students expand their thinking through fostering creativity and divergent thinking. Methods and Strategies: Science Storybooks also describes using trade books in science.
• The Poetry of Science: Sinking and Floating has a poetic way to introduce the concepts.
• Seeing Science in Haiku exemplifies how students can communicate their observations creatively. The article includes examples and teaching suggestions.
• Science 101: What Constitutes a Good Science Project goes beyond a lock-step scientific “method” to describe the reality of science investigations.
• Engineering Encounters: Designing Healthy Ice Pops combines two things students like: science and food (but don’t eat in the lab!).

For more on the content that provides a context for these projects and strategies see the SciLinks topics Arachnida, Bioluminescence, Buoyancy, Current Electricity, Electric Current, How does nature reuse materials?, Insects, Nutrition, Parts of a Plant, Plants as Food, Watersheds.

Science Scope – Asking Questions, Planning Investigations

Articles that describe lessons include a helpful sidebar documenting the big idea, essential pre-knowledge, time, and cost.

• Investigating Axial Seamount: Using Student-Generated Models to Understand Plate Tectonics has suggestions for helping students develop and use models to explain how and why volcanoes appear where they do.
• A Middle School Lake Study: Connecting Disciplines Through a Hands-On Experience incorporates math, science, the arts, and humanities into a cress-disciplinary experience.
• A Closer Look at Flowers: Exploring Structure and Function in Science and Art uses an artistic approach to studying plant reproduction
• Instead of teaching isolated skills, check out Teacher to Teacher: Start the School Year With an Authentic Activity for a 5E lesson using “double stuff” cookies (but no eating in the lab!)
• Disequilibrium: Teaching Discrepant Events With the 5E Instructional Model is the first installment of a new series that deals with misconceptions students have.
• Rather than reading a list of rules on the first day of school, try the activities described in Science for All: Creating Student Buy-In on Day One.
• Classic Lessons 2.0: The Power of Nanoscale combines current research with student explorations in measurement.
• Teacher’s Toolkit: A Bird in the Cage Is Worth Two in a Bush illustrates how to modify a lesson to incorporate the three components of NGSS.
• Citizen Science: Testing the Water: World Watering Challenge is another new feature of Science Scope, focusing on authentic nationwide projects.

For more on the content that provides a context for these projects and strategies see the SciLinks topics Chemical Reactions, Color, Deposition, Earthquakes, Eclipses, Lakes and Ponds, Plant Reproduction, Pollination, Plate Tectonics, Ring of Fire, Volcanoes, Volcanic Zones, Weathering/Erosion.

The Science Teacher – Systems and Models, Part 2

The featured articles in this issue continue a focus on systems and models, starting in the Summer issue.

• Achieving Liftoff describes how students can integrate questions and activities to develop a story that is an explanatory model of a phenomenon.
• Find Your Center includes a 5E lesson in which students explore the concept of the center of mass and apply this to biomechanics and human movements in sports.
• Scaling Up has a different spin on a traditional plant unit. Students progress through a study of the carbon cycle and plant growth.
• Separating a Mixture shows how students make and use models to explain interactions between ionic substances.
• Enzyme reactions are studied in A Twist on Measuring Catalase.
• Science 2.0: Transforming Science Education With New Tech Standards reflects on the many opportunities technology provides for students to collect and analyze data and to communicate their results.
• Focus on Physics: When Our Round Earth Was First Measured shows the connection between geometry and science.
• The Green Room: When Climate Change Causes Extinction has resources for current events.
• Health Wise: Should Your School Offer Grab-and-Go Breakfasts? (but not in the science classroom) has an interesting research question.

For more on the content that provides a context for these projects and strategies see the SciLinks topics Carbon Cycle, Center of Mass, Enzymes, Ethnobotany, Ionic Bonds, Measurement, Mixtures and Pure Substances, Nutrition, Plant Growth, Rocket Technology, Space Shuttle, Yeast Life Cycle.

As preschool and child care continue and a new school year begins, it’s a good time to refresh our memories about safety practices.

Goggles are not common in early childhood programs but they should be. Children love to dress up and goggles add to the “realness” of their science exploration. We use goggles when we make “slime” (The Early Years: Nurturing Young Chemists, 2006). One never knows when a planned activity will be taken in a new direction by a child’s actions. As part of a sensory investigation, I planned for children to try to identify a food item by its scent. Four foods, lemon (fruit), cinnamon sticks (bark), onion (bulb), and coffee beans (seeds), were in small opaque containers covered with squares of cloth so the children could smell but not see them. We used the “wafting” technique of waving the air towards our noses so we didn’t press them up against the cloth and share germs. So far, all was good. When we removed the cloth, children could see and identify the items or confirm their guess. One child looked into the container of cinnamon sticks and then blew into it. Small bits of cinnamon lofted into the air and into his eyes. Like sand grains, the bits were sharp and could have scratched his cornea (but didn’t). From then on we wore goggles during this activity and many others, such as when making playdough, because of the possibility of salt grains scratching children’s corneas.

The Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research’s “Eye injury: Tips to protect vision” has many suggestions. A cause for eye injury that I wasn’t aware of is flying rubber bands. Children use rubber bands in all sorts of ways once they are old enough not to chew on them.

Take a look at Ken Roy’s column, “Safety First: Safer Science Explorations for Young Children” in the March 2015 issue of Science and Children, to learn how to prepare for safer science explorations. Then read his blog posts to see how safety practices begun in early childhood are the beginning of what teachers (and children) will need to be aware of in upper grades.  

In “Risky Play and Children’s Safety: Balancing Priorities for Optimal Child Development” published in the International Journal Of Environmental Research And Public Health [9(9): 3134–3148], the authors discuss whether imposing too many restrictions on children’s outdoor risky play may be hampering their development. They state that “it is timely and important to reflect on our approach towards safety with respect to children’s outdoor risky play opportunities and to consider the impact on healthy child development.” They encourage an approach that “focuses on eliminating hazards, which Wallach (1992) defines as a source of harm that is not obvious to the child, such that the potential for injury is hidden, such as a broken railing; but does not eliminate all risks, which involve a situation that allows the child to recognize and evaluate the challenge and decide on a course of action that is not dangerous, but may still involve an element of risk.”

The Alliance for Childhood organization “promotes policies and practices that support children’s healthy development, love of learning, and joy in living.” Their publication, Adventure: The value of risk in children’s play, by Joan Almon, is an introduction to the topic of adventurous play and risk. It could be a good read for a staff and parent book discussion.

As I watch young neighborhood children running with sticks and crossing the residential street by themselves, I think, “As a teacher I would never allow that to happen, but as a parent I did.” As a parent I was okay with a certain amount of risk because I was the one who would have to take my child to the doctor for any injury. The Center for Disease Control says, “most child injuries can be prevented” and offers suggestions on how injuries can be prevented. One of my neighboring children has an arm cast for a break that happened during tumbling with a slightly older sibling. Another child got these scrapes on his face while playing the Hokey Pokey! We can be aware of hazards but children will still face risks, and learn from these encounters.

In addition to protecting children’s safety, do you protect yourself? How do you protect your eyes when pouring bleach to make the solution for sanitizing tables? Do you wash hands as frequently as we ask children to? What are your safety measures and stories? I’m feeling virtuous because I just got a flu shot! 

Wallach F. 1992. Playground safety: What did we do wrong? Park. Recreat. 1992;27:52–57.

Ask 20 teachers what scientific inquiry is and it’s possible you’ll receive 20 different answers. From a series of proscribed steps to a lab-based free-for-all, conceptions have shifted over time. In the National Research Council’s (NRC) 1996 National Science Education Standards (NSES), inquiry held a prominent position as its own content area, but the term rarely comes up in its 2012 Framework for K–12 Science Education (Framework). What Ever Happened to Scientific Inquiry, a report by the Midwest Comprehensive Center and myself, details how notions of inquiry have changed in recent history, particularly as seen within the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). A further section of the report that won’t be described here analyzes how the science standards of upper Midwest states describe inquiry.

In preparing this report, we reviewed articles about science inquiry from both current and historical perspectives, analyzed national science standards and related documents, and interviewed national science education experts.

Historical beginnings

In the early 20^th century, John Dewey proposed a list of five steps scientists use in their work, intending to emphasize their reflective work practices, but educators instead interpreted those ideas as the five linear steps to doing science. Pedagogy and curricula through the 20^th century showed the increasing popularity of labs with proscribed procedures and the idea of a set “scientific method.”  

Standards era shift

In 1993, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Benchmarks of Science Literacy clearly pushed on this idea of a set method and discussed inquiry as a “habit of mind.” The 1996 NSES attempted to further clarify notions of inquiry with the five big ideas of inquiry in its own section of the content standards. With a follow-up report, Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards (2000), the NRC stated that, “Students do not come to understand inquiry simply by learning words such as ‘hypothesis’ and ‘inference’ or by memorizing procedures such as ‘the steps of the scientific method.’”. In the NSES, inquiry instead described the way scientists study the world and build explanations based on evidence.

Teachers nevertheless continued to use the scientific method as a convenient way to organize scientific investigations and what it means to think like a scientist, and instructional materials supported this approach. Textbooks today continue to include separate chapters on a scientific method. According to Dr. Joe Krajcik, a member of the NGSS writing team, “While well intentioned, when the National Science [Education] Standards assigned inquiry to its own separate content area, it meant that inquiry remained separate from other science learning.” And, thus, got its own chapter in the textbook! Therefore, as noted by Dr. Melissa Braaten, a professor at the University of Colorado-Boulder, “In schools, inquiry had come to mean one narrow image of doing formulaic, defined experiments. Teachers would refer to it as ‘the scientific method’ like it was a titled thing.”

Framework and the NGSS

The writers of the Framework and consequent NGSS aimed to clarify ideas of scientific practice, moving away from varying ideas of “inquiry.” As emphasized by Dr. Helen Quinn, a researcher with the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center and chair of the NRC Framework committee, “While it is what we do—we inquire—scientists do not use the term inquiry.”

To summarize, in this report we emphasize four big ideas from the Framework and NGSS that take the place of some traditional conceptions of inquiry:

1) Inquiry is a means for constructing scientific understanding; it’s not a content area

Students should be involved in asking questions and investigating natural phenomena in the world around them. Instead of learning steps of a scientific method, they’re doing science.

2) Inquiry is a fluid set of practices that scientists use

As Dr. Krajcik notes, “Having the eight practices doesn’t mean that you start with a question, then move on to the next practice… There is no linearity implied. The practices are tied together and any one of them could lead to another.” Further, when working with the practices or discussing their use as a class, they shouldn’t be numbered.

3) Inquiry involves three-dimensional learning

The science and engineering practices are the means to gain scientific knowledge while investigating phenomena with a lens of the crosscutting concepts. Or, in other words from Matt Krehbiel, assistant director of science at Achieve, Inc., inquiry is “woven into science learning throughout the year, where practices are exercised and integrated with learning of the crosscutting concepts and disciplinary core ideas.”

4) Inquiry is independent from science pedagogy

Inquiry-based teaching is essential, but it’s not the only appropriate type of instruction. Varying instructional practices based on student learning needs make sense.

Final thoughts

I’m certainly not suggesting that you shouldn’t do inquiry-based lessons; however, I would suggest that you rip out the chapter of your textbook on the scientific method and consider ways to structure labs beyond hypothesis testing. There are as many ways to “do science” as there are scientists, so allow the practices to infuse your instruction where they naturally and logically fit rather than in any prescribed way. 

A former middle school science teacher and education researcher, Kevin J. B. Anderson, PhD, NBCT, is the Science Education Consultant at the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

Visit NSTA’s NGSS@NSTA Hub for hundreds of vetted classroom resources, professional learning opportunities, publications, ebooks and more; connect with your teacher colleagues on the NGSS listservs (members can sign up here); and join us for discussions around NGSS at an upcoming conference.

The mission of NSTA is to promote excellence and innovation in science teaching and learning for all.

Future NSTA Conferences

2016 Area Conferences

• Minneapolis, October 27–29
• Portland, November 10–12
• Columbus, December 1–3

2016 National Conference

• Nashville, March 31–April 3

Follow NSTA

I’m a first-year middle school life science teacher. After a few weeks, I am really stressed with all of the planning and paperwork. Any resources or words of encouragement? —L., New York

Welcome to science teaching! Every teacher has gone through what you’re experiencing, even if they had a great student teaching experience. Fortunately, there are resources to help.

NSTA’s email lists  have timely advice on specific questions concerning content, the Next Generation Science Standards, safety, classroom management, assessments, and more. NSTA journals have lessons that you can adapt. Other NSTA publications, such as those mentioned in Tips for the First Day of School, also address your concerns.

It’s easy to get bogged down in the time-consuming details of lesson planning and evaluating student work, but remember to look occasionally at the big picture. A recent higher education blog post described What Every Incoming Science Student Should Know. The author’s suggestions can be modified for what incoming science teachers should know:

• Decide what you want your students to gain from your class. They may forget the bulletin boards or elaborate presentations, but they’ll remember if you fostered a love of learning and an appreciation for science and if you respected them and gave them choices.
• Help students become independent learners. Teach notetaking skills rather than preparing lots of handouts. Encourage students to ask (and answer) their own questions. Recognize your students’ creativity and curiosity.
• Whenever possible, help students make the connections among science, the “real world,” and their own interests.
• Take time for yourself and don’t neglect your health. Have a support group of mentors and other first-year teachers to relax with and share adventures.
• Understand that real teaching is hard. Allow yourself to make mistakes (but not when it comes to student safety!). Reflect on, learn from, and then let go of the mistakes.

Think about your successes every day— there will be many! Good luck!

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/daviddmuir/1410227652/sizes/m/in/photostream/

According to a recent article in Safety + Health magazine, Honeywell Safety Products had to recall about 9,700 bottles of Eyesaline emergency eyewash solution due to “a low risk of contamination” of bacteria that can cause eye infections (NSC 2016).

Science teachers need to see if they have this type of eyewash solution and also need to take care of the eyewash stations that have sat in their labs during the summer. Eyewash can mitigate eye injuries when there is exposure to physical and chemical irritants or biological agents.

An Infosheet by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration gives background information on the American National Standards Institute standard Z358.1-2014. The standard states that for plumbed systems, “the eyewash must deliver tepid flushing fluid (15.6–37.8°C or 60–100°F) to eyes not less than 1.5 liters per minute (0.4 gpm) for a minimum of 15 minutes” (OSHA 2015).

OSHA further notes, “Whether permanently connected to a potable water source (plumbed) or has self-contained flushing fluid, improper maintenance may present health hazards that can worsen or cause additional damage to a worker’s eye” (OSHA 2015).

If students or school employees use an eyewash that is not properly maintained, biological organisms can come in contact with the eye or skin, or may even be inhaled. Eyes also may be more susceptible to infection after being injured. Eyewashes not properly maintained may serve as a breeding ground for a host of organisms and present serious health hazards. OSHA mentions the following organisms as examples (OSHA 2015):

• Acanthamoeba—a microscopic single cell organism (amoeba) that may cause eye infections.
• Pseudomonas—infections typically caused by a common bacteria species.
• Legionella—bacteria that may cause Legionnaires’ disease, a serious lung infection.

Teachers need to check manufacturer’s instructions regarding how often and how long the eyewash needs to be flushed to reduce or eliminate biological contaminants, which often require a once-a-week flushing regimen. To maintain self-contained eyewash units, consult the manufacturer’s instructions for appropriate procedures.

It is important to first try working with your school administration to address your safety concerns. If your concern is not addressed, you have a right, as an employee, to file a complaint, under which OSHA will conduct an on-site inspection for potential hazards and determine whether your employer is following OSHA rules (OSHA 2014, p. 11).

Teachers or union representatives can call OSHA with questions or additional information at 1-800-321-OSHA. However, many states operate their own OSHA-approved safety and health program. Visit OSHA’s website to determine if your workplace is under Federal OSHA, a state OSHA plan, or other individual state department.

Submit questions regarding safety in K–12 to Ken Roy at safesci@sbcglobal.net, or leave him a comment below. Follow Ken Roy on Twitter: @drroysafersci.

References

National Safety Council. 2016. Safety + Health. Honeywell Issues Voluntary Recall of Eyesaline Eyewash. August 23. www.safetyandhealthmagazine.com/articles/14599-honeywell-issues-voluntary-recall-of-eyesaline-eyewash.

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). 2015. Health effects from contaminated water in eyewash stations. www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3818.pdf.

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). 2014. Workers’ rights. www.osha.gov/Publications/osha3021.pdf.

NSTA resources and safety issue papers

NSTA resources and safety issue papers

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With the fall harvest season coming up, planning begins for family and class fieldtrips to local farms and farm markets. People who live in farming communities have a much different understanding of what a farm can be than those who live in urban or suburban communities. The Maryland Agricultural Education Foundation, Inc. explains why we should teach about agriculture: “Incorporating agriculture into teaching and learning creates the foundation that students, as future citizens, need to make educated decisions regarding food choices and nutrition, community issues, land use planning, and natural resource conservation.” 

Getting to know where our food comes from is the first step and teachers want to plan meaningful, accurate experiences so young children can become familiar with food sources. We have tastings of different apple varieties, children graph their favorite flavor, and we read How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World by Marjorie Priceman (Dragonfly Books 1996).  My children enjoy seeing live farm animals at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoo where even the chickens have names. At Oxon Cove Park & Oxon Hill Farm, which replicates a historical farm, the Pre-k to 1st grade program on Animal Life on the Farm introduces children to the milking cows and chickens. (There is a PreK-1 teachers’ guide, Animal Life on the Farm to help teach about the animals and that they provide us with milk, eggs, wool and meat.)

We also visit the Claude Moore Colonial Farm in McLean, Virginia, “a living history museum that portrays family life on a small, low-income farm just prior to the Revolutionary War” where they raise tobacco, wheat, rye, corn, apples and vegetables, and heritage breeds that represent animals that were present in Virginia in the late 18th century.  The children delight in seeing live cattle, hogs and geese. Many children get their first experience with live farm animals at these museum farms. 

If we don’t live near farms of any kind, we can reach out to those who do for help in designing curriculum about food sources. National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) members have been answering one teacher’s request for help planning a social studies and science unit on farms for kindergarten students. The teacher’s planning began with activities such as, making homemade butter, milking a pretend cow, meeting and petting a real bunny, making a scarecrow, planting a vegetable garden, and meeting a real farmer.

Educators on the NSTA members’ listserv recommended first considering what the teacher wants children to learn about farms, and then prepare children ahead of time for a visit to a modern or historic farm. Here are some suggestions:

“Take it from someone who once took 20 (3) and (4) year olds from the inner city to a dairy farm. Singing Old MacDonald and doing cow puzzles had not in any way prepared them for the sight of those gigantic furry beasts lowing and breathing on them!”

“Everything we know about how young children learn tells us that REAL experiences (not one-shot activities and not worksheets) are what promote learning. Real experiences are even more critical when children are being introduced to concepts that they do not encounter in their everyday lives. My suggestion would be to provide as many authentic experiences about farms upfront and then have a fun farm day, having children help with planning and creating the activities.”

“Analyze and dissect ‘fruits’ to find seeds.”

“I highly advise “The Project Approach” by Judy Harris Helm. This helps teachers understand how to do in-depth investigations and learn the processes of engineering and science inquiry as well as develop understanding of the social world. As an Iowan growing up on a farm and now managing a farm for my mother, remember to consider female farmers as well as male.” Resources include: Young Investigators: The Project Approach in the Early Years (Teachers College Press 2010), Kohl Children’s Museum Projects of Chicagoland: Successful Implementation of the Project Approach 2009 (see pages 90-92), “Implementing the Project Approach in Part-time Early Childhood Education Programs” by Sallee Beneke (2000).

“If the class can’t get to a real farm, then providing kids with some real life experiences with the plants, animals, and activities found on a farm is the next best thing—having kids do some planting and growing of their own in a classroom garden, creating their own compost pile with worms; and hatching chicks and having other authentic experiences with farm animals. These types of activities extend way beyond one day and obviously require more time and commitment, however the pay-off in terms of what children will learn is well worth it. They will learn more about the characteristics, needs, and life cycles of living things and inter-dependency among living things.”

“And dig into soil!”

There are many books about farms, farm animals, and growing vegetables and fruit, but fewer about growing animals for meat. Adults can read or view media before choosing to share it with children. Farm animals may be discussed in great detail like in the delightful video, Come With Me Science, Farm Animals: Pigs by Pat Perea, which also lists products for human use from pigs. Lesson plans about farms often say “beef comes from,” and “chickens produce eggs and meat,” which could be misinterpreted by young children as unrelated to the animal’s death. The American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture’s materials about beef begin at grade 3, and include book suggestions: Protein (Healthy Eating with My Plate) by Nancy Dickmann (Heinemann 2012) and Producing Meat (The Technology of Farming) by Rachel Lynette (Heinemann 2012). Children can read about a turkey farm in, My Family’s Farm, and a beef farm in My Family’s Beef Farm, both by Katie Olthoff.

The omission of butchering animals to produce meat reminds me of how the topic of death is avoided when teaching about life cycles—the animal or plant grows into an adult…and the story ends there. How do you include death of living organisms when you teach about a life cycle?

Books about animals eating other animals can be a stepping stone into the discussion of humans killing animals for food. Animals Eat Animals, a board book by Sarah Hutt and illustrated by Dave Ladd and Stephanie Anderson (Phaidon Press 2016), is a collection of three accordion-foldout volumes showing three food chains (humans not included). In What Do You Do When Something Wants To Eat You? Steve Jenkins’ always wonderful and realistic paper cutout illustrations depict many kinds of animals and what they do to avoid being eaten (HMH Books for Young Readers 1997). (See the teachers’ guide for Jenkins’ books.) The blog, The best children’s books.org lists additional books about food chains.

There are thoughtful discussions on talking about meat production with children—see “Kids and factory farming: Yes, tell them the truth” by Christina (Feb 27, 2012) and “Eating Reading Animals” by Jennifer Armstrong (May 1, 2010). That’s Why We Don’t Eat Animals by Ruby Roth (North Atlantic Books 2009) presents a vegan perspective where “We strive for a world where every earthling has the right to live and grow.”

What do you think young children need to know about how meat arrives at their table?

Using Web Tools to Support Learning

Standards play an important role in developing a strong curriculum and preparing students for the future. Science teachers are currently adjusting their curriculum to meet the Next Generation Science Standards, but other standards can also help us as the line between science and other subjects blurs.

The ISTE standards
The International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Standards for Students were originally published in 1998 under the name of the National Education Technology Standards. The standards emphasized technology as tools and required students to demonstrate proficiency with the tools.

Nine years later, in 2007, ISTE released an updated version of the standards that focused on how students use technology and moved away from simply learning about technology tools. They aspired to demonstrate such student behaviors as Creativity and Innovation, Communication and Collaboration, and Critical Thinking.

Now, ISTE has once again updated the Standards for Students. The new standards, released in June, look at how technology amplifies learning. They address the following student roles: Empowered Learner, Digital Citizen, Knowledge Constructor, Innovative Designer, Computational Thinker, Creative Communicator, and Global Collaborator.

Improved classroom activities
The 2007 revision of the ITSE standards made us rethink the skills students should be able to demonstrate upon graduation. We began to develop activities that combined one or more of the standard areas with curricular goals. At the time of their release, Ben Smith, co-author of this column, had an activity published by ISTE that required his physics students to make a video of some type of motion, analyze the motion with software, and publish their results on a website. Ben’s students learned how to use iMovie and VideoPoint and to create a website using Inspiration and Word. This multifaceted assignment was a great way to use standards to assess student skills.

Another assignment enhanced by the standards was Ben’s amusement park physics project. In earlier days, students simply took measurements while riding on amusement park rides and calculated experimental values. At the end of the day, they turned in a packet of papers to provide evidence for these calculations and perhaps performed some analysis.

In light of the evolving standards, students were next asked to become experts on just one ride and communicate how the ride works. They were assessed on creativity and ability to collaborate with peers and communicate their findings. This led to many different types of submissions. For instance, one group created a podcast while riding a roller coaster, explaining the physics behind the ride.

As technology developed, students created new formats for completing their work. Nowadays, they can even use apps for instant video analysis and for the collection of acceleration and motion data. Some use presentation tools while others make movies, websites, or other products with specific web 2.0 tools.

This year, students tweeted about physics experiences during the park visit. They used the hashtag #rlphun (RL for Red Lion and Phun for the class slogan “Physics is Phun”) as they gave a brief description of the activity and included a hashtag for the instructional unit (e.g., #momentum, #circular, and #newtons1st).

Conclusion
We are inspired by the actionable nature of the ISTE standards and the emphasis on student behaviors. These standards naturally fit with the NGSS as well as science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) and science, technology, engineering, art, and math (STEAM) curricula. In coming issues, we will take a deeper dive into the tech standards and discuss what they may look like in a transformed science classroom.

Ben Smith is an educational technology program specialist, and Jared Mader is the director of technology, for the Lincoln Intermediate Unit in New Oxford, Pennsylvania. They conduct teacher workshops on technology in the classroom nationwide.

Editor’s Note

This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of The Science Teacher journal from the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA).

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