Atlanta, Georgia is the place to be this November for professional development opportunities at two conferences—the National Science Teachers Association’s area conference November 1-3, and the National Association for the Education of Young Children’s national conference November 7-10.

Both organizations offer sessions on teaching science in early childhood programs.
Here are just a few of those sessions at the NSTA conference. (Add your sessions to this list by commenting below.)
Thursday, November 1 12:30–1:30 PM. Teaching Forms of Energy to Younger Students. Georgia World Congress Center, B313. Join me for hands-on experiments on the fundamental concepts of energy. We’ll explore the science of motion, heat, sound, and light. Presenter(s): Karen Reagor (The NEED Project: Manassas, VA)
Thursday, November 1 3:30–4:30 PM. iScience. Georgia World Congress Center, B315. This engaging and enlightening session focuses on how iTechnologies (iTouches and iPads) can enrich the elementary science classroom. Presenter(s): Suzanne Edwards (Trinity School: Atlanta, GA); Anna Allen (Trinity School: Atlanta, GA); Kate H. Burton (Trinity School: Atlanta, GA)
Friday, November 2 11:00 AM–12:00 PM. Simple Setup STEM Activities. Georgia World Congress Center, B313. Planets, light and shadow, insect life cycles, fossils, and physical and chemical changes are used to develop scientific thinking in simple and adaptable labs. Presenter(s): Virginia Lucy ( Lilburn, GA)
Friday, November 2 12:30–1:30 PM. How Does Your Garden Grow? Georgia World Congress Center, B213. A school or community garden represents an ideal way to integrate across the elementary curriculum. Come discover lessons, plans, and trade books for any space or any school. Materials provided by Georgia Cooperative Extension Master Gardeners. Presenter(s): Juliana Texley (Palm Beach State College: Boca Raton, FL); Steve A. Rich (West GYSTC: Carrollton, GA)
Friday, November 2 12:30–1:30 PM. PreK and Kindergarten Science Activities That Encourage Critical Thinking. Georgia World Congress Center, B314. Experience hands-on engaging activities that can be used to encourage critical-thinking and problem-solving skills while introducing preK–K students to important science concepts. Presenter(s): John Payne (Mercer University: Lithia Springs, GA)
Friday, November 2 2:00–3:00 PM. CESI Session: Powerful Paper Projects for Physical Science. Georgia World Congress Center, B308. Join us to make flying, spinning, rolling, and floating creations that easily, cheaply, and memorably teach the basic concepts of force and motion. Click here for more information. Presenter(s): Barbara Z. Tharp (Baylor College of Medicine: Houston, TX); Julie Thomas (Oklahoma State University: Stillwater, OK); Michael Vu (Baylor College of Medicine: Houston, TX); Dee Mock (Baylor College of Medicine: Houston, TX)
Friday, November 2 3:30–4:30 PM. CESI Session: Council for Elementary Science International Share-a-Thon. Georgia World Congress Center, B308. Join CESI as we share a wealth of ready-to-use, classroom-tested hands-on activities created just for the K–8 teacher. Handouts and website links! Presenter(s): Many, many wonderful teachers.
Saturday, November 3 8:00–9:00 AM. Teaching Younger Students About Energy Outside the Science Classroom. Georgia World Congress Center, B313. Use language arts, math, and presentation skills to teach K–3 students about the energy resources we use. Activities can be implemented today with no special materials. Presenter(s): Karen Reagor (The NEED Project: Manassas, VA)
Saturday, November 3 9:30–10:30 AM. Science & Children—A Year of Inquiry. Georgia World Congress Center, B313. The highly anticipated Next Generation Science Standards are explicit—inquiry remains an important strategy to use in the classroom. Come learn ways to infuse components of inquiry into your curricula. Presenter(s): Linda Froschauer (Field Editor, Science & Children: Westport, CT)
NAEYC Executive Director Jerlean Daniel invites us to the 2012 annual conference the week following the NSTA conference. Here are some of the sessions offered at the NAEYC conference:
(Add your sessions to this list by commenting below.)
More Ramps and Pathways: An approach to teaching physical science and engineering in early childhood. Betty Zan, Sonia Yoshizawa. 11/7/2012 12:30 PM – 3:30 PM Room B213 Georgia World Congress Center
Learning to think: The role of scientific inquiry. Ingrid Chalufour, Nancy Clark-Chiarelli, Cindy Hoisington. 11/8/2012 8:00 AM – 9:30 AM Room B216 Georgia World Congress Center
Science inquiry and practices: Fun experiences with hands-on materials to awaken young scientists. Peggy Ashbrook, Linda Froschauer. 11/8/2012 3:00 PM – 4:30 PM Room B208 Georgia World Congress Center
Early Childhood Science Interest Forum Meeting. All are welcome at this annual meeting to discuss and plan. 11/9/2012 6:00 PM – 7:30 PM Juniper Room Omni Hotel at CNN Center
Finding the trees in the forest: Support toddlers’ developing problem-solving skills. Jill Uhlenberg, Rosemary Geiken. 11/10/2012 1:00 PM – 2:30 PM Room B208 Georgia World Congress Center
A “heads up” to programs in the DMV (Washington, D.C. metro area)—in 2013 the NAEYC Annual Conference & Expo will be held in D. C. on November 20-23. Plan now so staff can attend the conference next year. I hope to see you at one of these conferences—participate in worthwhile professional development with opportunities to network, and visit the vendor booths to see the products they list in the catalogs.

Pumpkins are beautiful and varied, and so are apples, plus they taste good. No wonder these fall crops are part of early childhood activities in so many programs. Accomplished early childhood teachers don’t just “do” pumpkins—they use pumpkins as a platform for deep learning about a concept, such as life cycle changes in living organisms.
Marie Faust Evitt describes how her students use pumpkins to learn about measurement on the Gryphon House, Inc blog.
“Gourd-ous Decomposition” by Amy Rubenstein, Stacey Cleary, and Christina Siry, in the September 2009 Science and Children, describes an in-depth observation of a pumpkin before and while it decomposes.
Karen Ansberry and Emily Morgan, authors of More Picture-Perfect Science Lessons: Using Children’s Books to Guide Inquiry, Grades K–4 write a “Teaching Through Tradebooks: Pumpkins!” column in the October 2008 Science and Children about making observations, asking questions, and designing a simple investigation. (Note that some of the NSTA journal articles are free to all and some require membership. Join the NSTA Learning Center  at no cost and search for resources, free or otherwise, and join in the discussions in the forums.)
Here is a song to use while becoming familiar with the feel and heft of pumpkins. Pass around a variety of sizes of pumpkins while singing (to the tune of Way Down Yonder in the Pawpaw Patch)
Pickin up pumpkins, pass em to your neighbor,
Pickin up pumpkins, pass em to your neighbor,
Pickin up pumpkins, pass em to your neighbor,
Way down yonder in the pumpkin patch!
After planting pumpkin seeds, and harvesting pumpkins, your students can learn this chant (with apologies to Laura Joffe Numeroff who inspired this with her book, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie):

If you give it some water, it will grow to the sunshine.
If you give it some sunshine, it will grow some roots.
If it grows some roots, it will grow a sprout.
If it grows a sprout, it will grow a vine.
If it grows a vine, it will grow a flower.
If it grows a flower, it will grow a green pumpkin.
If it grows a green pumpkin, it will grow into an orange pumpkin.
If it grows into an orange pumpkin, you will pick it.
If you pick it, you will make a jack-o-lantern.
If you make a jack-o-lantern, you will save a seed to plant.
If you save a seed to plan, you will need to give it some dirt.
And if you give a pumpkin seed some dirt…
(Repeat)
If you are lucky enough to have a pumpkin plant growing nearby, you and your students can draw the leaves and flowers, and look for tiny pumpkins that have just begun to grow at the base of the flower. Investigate other flowers to look for similarities in flower structure and to see if a seed-bearing fruit grows where the flower was.
A class of two-year-olds ably dissected the leaves and flowers of a zucchini plant using scissors and plastic knives. We teachers were surprised to find that the stems are hollow! Using magnifiers made it easier to see some of the delicate structures. I rubbed off most of the prickles beforehand to make the experience more enjoyable.
Perhaps your students will begin a Pumpkin Project, similar to the “All About Potatoes” project conducted by 3-to-5-year-old children at Bing Nursery School under the guidance of their teachers, Jane Farish and Mark Mabry.  Read more about the Project Approach at http://ceep.crc.uiuc.edu/eecearchive/books/projcat2.html
Then write a comment and tell others about what your class does with pumpkins or other fall fruits.

Small document cameras, or mini doc cams, are making inroads into many classrooms due to their low cost, USB power, small size, and adaptability. It is the latter feature that makes them especially attractive to science teachers.

One camera in particular is the IPEVO Point 2 View USB document camera. Since the camera connects to a computer, the full projection capabilities of the camera are only limited by the computer it is connected to. Unlike large tabletop document cameras, the IPEVO camera weighs about 60 grams with two thirds of that being the USB cord.

The tradeoff of low cost and light weight often disproportionately hits performance and resolution, but with a few tips and minor concessions, the advantages of the mini doc cam outweighs the disadvantages. But the strongest advantage of the mini doc cams are their portability and simplicity of operation, which in turn can give it an teaching adaptability that tabletop doc cams can only dream of.

As evidence of this, a magnifying lens designed for the Point 2 View camera has been released and for less than $20, students can use a flush surface-focus 2x lens with built-in lighting on mini doc cam.

While 2x might not sound like much given magnifying lenses and loupes are often 4x-20x and microscopes usually begin at 40x, the 2x is a big deal given the lens is almost touching the object under study. Further, when magnifying objects, the technical complications are also magnified including focus, lighting, and stability that in turn can become insurmountable obstacles to usable photography.

For conventional document projecting uses, the mini doc cams can attach to stands that allow them to mimic their tabletop brethren while maintaining their Superman-like ability to morph into a tiny, fast, mobile camera. And the mobility of a laptop is actually accented, not compromised, with a mini doc cam taking microphotography to a new level and into the field.

Here are a couple examples and applications for the camera outside my classroom. Enjoy.

I’m sharing a few free online resources that I’ve recently come across. Share a resource that you use, by commenting, below.
The Fred Rogers Early Learning Environment has many short videos that families and early childhood educators can use to get ideas for activities that are appropriate and engaging for young children.
I especially like the activities that feature real people doing activities that relate to science learning:

Getting to Know You where Ella Jenkins teaches Mr. Rogers (and the viewers) how to play a clapping game “Head and Shoulders, baby, 1-2-3.” The “Talk About It” commentary discusses how everyone makes mistakes, encouraging children to try something new, and modeling how to handle mistakes. The “Why This Is Important” section shows:

• When adults admit to making mistakes, we teach children that it is okay to make mistakes, and how to correct them.
• Complimenting effort, instead of ability, can help children feel more confident in their abilities and persist longer when they feel challenged.

Science is all about learning something new and accepting mistakes.

 Tracking Down Notes is a short video of children noticing and making sounds. The “Talk About It” commentary offers some open-ended questions to ask while exploring sound. The “Why This Is Important” section includes the relationship between learning vocabulary and hands-on experiences.

Teaching Young Children, a publication of the National Association for the Education of Young Children, has some material posted online. The June/July 2012 issue has a “Message in a Backpack: Home Sorting Ideas” page that describes sorting activities to help children notice how things are alike and different. One sort helps prepare children to assist with grocery shopping:
Sort shopping lists according to the type of item, such as fresh vegetables, frozen foods, or cleaning supplies. At the store, predict where each item will be located.
Online articles include “Planting Smart,” “Using Graphic Organizers in Preschool,” and “Creatures in the Classroom,” an article by Alyse C. Hachey and Deanna Butler from the March 2012 Young Children. You can receive the journal as part of your NAEYC membership or by subscribing.
The NAEYC website page “For Families”,  describes science activities in the “Music, Math & More” section of the Learning & Development pages. Two of the science-related activities are Playdough Power  and A Family Shadow Walk.
Here is a resource for the senses—from the Florida Museum of Natural History’s Marvelous Explorations Through Science and Stories: MESS®. See  Experience 6 in the “My Body My Senses” Teacher’s Guide for an activity on the sense of touch, and also take a look at the extensive bibliography on pages 46-55 listing books such as See, Hear, Touch, Taste, Smell by Melvin Berger, Seven Blind Mice by Ed Young, Touch the Poem by Arnold Adoff, My Hands by Aliki, I Can Tell by Touching, by Carolyn Otto.
A fun way to use our sense of touch designed by some preschool teachers is a “Sensory Walk,” done with bare feet along a series of trays with various materials. Pans or trays of corn starch packing “peanuts”, playdough, sand, rice, cotton balls, corrugated cardboard, cold jello, tempra paint and ending with warm water…and a towel. For stability, adults can hold a child’s hand. Children can use a wet wipe to clean the feet before and after. Putting socks and shoes back on is a good exercise in fine motor use (for the children) and patience (for all).
Activities for use in school and home can be part of a broader science inquiry into a concept such as “living organisms use their senses to find out about their environment” by continuing the exploration with additional activities and through many conversations and discussions to learn what children think and why they think it.
Peggy

I’m conducting a professional development (PD) workshop on instructional strategies for our elementary science department, sharing some of the great ideas I learned at a conference.  The teachers all know each other, so we don’t need the usual ice-breaker. I thought about opening by asking them to describe an effective learning experience they have had and why it worked for them. I could then refer to their input during the session. Do you have an experience to share as an example?
—Joyce from Rhode Island
I’ve played various roles in professional development workshops for teachers, as an attendee, a planner, and a presenter. I think you have a good idea— an introductory activity relating to the goals of the workshop can provide a frame of reference and give you some background information on the participants. I can share a memorable PD experience I had, but it was in a non-classroom setting.
I was taking a canoeing and water safety course. We spent time on the lake and then moved on to knot tying. I remembered a few knots from my Girl Scout days, but one in particular was challenging. The instructor gave verbal directions with no diagrams or modeling. Instead, he said, over and over again, something about a rabbit coming out of a hole and hopping around a tree. This made no sense to me as I sat there holding a piece of rope. When I raised my hand to ask him to explain, he gave me a condescending look, told me to pay closer attention, and repeated the hopping rabbit story in a louder and slower voice. Still confused, I asked him if he could demonstrate the process using my rope. He did so— once—and then asked “Any questions? Good.” He moved on to the next knot without giving those of us who were finally catching on time to practice.
After the class, I fumed with frustration. I vowed to never tie another knot again, even to keep my canoe from drifting away.  Then I took a deep breath and thought about the role reversal. I was the student trying to learn something new from a teacher who already knew the process.  He had one way to “teach” the skill (the rabbit story) and when some students did not get it right away, he assumed it was our fault for not listening.
It occurred to me that my frustrations were probably similar to those of my students when they were learning something new. I wondered how much more frustrated I would be if he had given the instructions in a language I did not understand. I thought about how I could have made the knot tying lesson much better.  I vowed to remember this experience and always have a variety of strategies up my sleeve to help students. For example, while the verbal instructions worked for some students in the knot class, others needed something more visual. I also vowed to give students time to ask questions, practice, and think about what they were learning.
Even negative experiences can have positive results!
Graphic: http://www.flickr.com/photos/whatindienights/6008244447/sizes/s/in/photostream/