Argument-Driven Inquiry in Physics Volume 1, Mechanics Lab Investigations for Grades 9–12 is the latest addition to the popular NSTA Press Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI) series. The book includes 23 field-tested labs, along with reproducible student pages, teacher notes, and detailed instructions for running lab investigations, all designed to make it easier to teach complex concepts.

The authors, who are veteran teachers, want to shift instruction from students’ passively receiving information to instead learning how to ask questions and determine conclusions.

“Traditional instructional approaches, which were designed to help students ‘learn about’ the concepts, theories, and laws of science rather than how to ‘figure out’ how or why things work, were not created to foster the development of science proficiency inside the classroom,” the authors write in the book’s introduction. 

Times are changing. The innovative and engaging ADI approach focuses students on the practices of questioning, data analysis, argument development, evaluation, double-blind peer review, and report revision—all of which can prepare students for real-world application in a science career, while also meeting current science instructional standards.

“To help students become proficient in science in ways described by the National Research Council in A Framework for K–12 Science Education, teachers will need to use new instructional approaches that give students an opportunity to use the three dimensions of science to explain natural phenomena or develop novel solutions to problems,” the authors state.

The field-tested labs cover topics related to mechanics, including forces and interactions, energy, work, and power. Each lab is designed to help students to understand the disciplinary core ideas in the physical sciences, to use crosscutting concepts that span across various scientific disciplines, and to learn how to use fundamental scientific and engineering practices.

“Current research suggests that all students benefit from three-dimensional instruction because it gives all students more voice and choice during a lesson and it makes the learning process inside the classroom more active and inclusive,” the authors state.

The ADI approach promotes and supports three-dimensional instruction because it gives students an opportunity to construct and critique claims about how things work or why things happen. The labs can provide ways to make physics instruction more authentic and meaningful for students. In addition, the lab activities will allow students to develop the literacy skills outlined in the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts by creating presentations, reports, and evaluations.

Read the sample lab “Falling Objects and Air Resistance: How Does the Surface Area of a Parachute Affect the Force Due to Air Resistance as an Object Falls Toward the Ground?” 

Also check out the Student Lab Manual for Argument-Driven Inquiry in Physics, Volume 1: Mechanics Lab Investigations for Grades 9–12 by Victor Sampson, Todd L. Hutner, Daniel FitzPatrick, Adam LaMee, and Jonathan Grooms.

Follow NSTA

This week in education news, a new paper released by Education First suggests that a lack of focus on curriculum is the missing piece in the preparation of teachers; professional sports teams are becoming more involved in math and science education; the Girls Scouts announce the Girl Scout STEM Pledge; Rep. Lamar Smith believes that to fill STEM jobs, federal programs need to focus on results; new study shows that girls in Korea score and enroll in more STEM classes when assigned female teachers; Louisiana is trying to improve the number of students who pursue careers in STEM; and there is more to STEM than hard skills.

Let Science Educators Build New Science Standards

The Utah Science Teachers Association believes that all citizens should have a scientifically based understanding of the natural world in order to engage meaningfully in public discussions, be informed voters and discerning consumers. Problems arise when nonscience ideals impede the teaching and learning of science, either through the use of pseudoscience or the avoidance of topics because they are politically charged. This unfortunately occurred, to no avail, during the process of developing the sixth-eighth grade SEEd standards with regard to evolution and climate change, in particular. Read the article featured in The Deseret News.

A Novel Way To Improve Teacher Prep: Give Teacher Better Curriculum

Is a focus on curriculum the missing piece in the preparation of teachers? That’s the argument made by in a new paper released by Education First, a global education consulting group. It’s part of a project, partly funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, bringing together teacher-preparation experts from Finland, Brazil, Australia, and the United States. Read the article featured in Education Week.

From The Field To The Classroom: Pro Sports Teams Are Becoming Players In Math, Science Education

An emergency has occurred at the 49ers football museum in Santa Clara: the stand holding the famous football from “The Catch” has broken, and a classroom of 3^rd-graders must build a replacement. Using drinking straws, scissors and tape, the students are tasked with building a device strong enough to hold a 14-ounce, 22-inch football without collapsing. Read the article featured in EdSource.

What STEM Students Need To Know

The U.S. is about to spend a small fortune on teaching science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM. The White House has promised $200 million a year to expand K-12 computer-science education. Several large tech firms have pledged another $300 million to the effort. That’s a good investment in theory, but the American education system is in no position to make the most of it. Read the article featured in The Wall Street Journal.

How Girl Scouts Helped Astronaut Reach For The Stars—And Is Going All In On STEM Education for Girls

The Girl Scouts announced the Girl Scout STEM Pledge, challenging CEOs across the country to join us in growing the number of girls in the STEM pipeline by 2.5 million by 2025. Read the article by The74.

To Fill STEM Jobs, Federal Programs Need To Focus On Results

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) forecasts that next year U.S. employers will be unable to fill nearly 2.5 million job openings in STEM and STEM-related occupations. At an average pay of $85,000 per year for jobs in STEM fields, 2.5 million unfilled positions means working Americans will lose $200 billion in lost wages. Lost productivity will decrease U.S. economic growth. Read the article featured in The Hill.

Study Shows That Girls in Korea Score Higher, Enroll In More STEM Classes, When Assigned Female Teachers

A study of schools in South Korea has found that seventh-grade girls who are assigned to female teachers perform better on standardized tests, enroll in more advanced classes, and are more likely to make plans to attend college. The effects were observed from middle school into high school and are particularly pronounced in STEM disciplines like math and science. Read the article featured in The74.

Louisiana Pushing To Make STEM More Pronounced Among Students

Despite daunting hurdles, Louisiana is trying to make a big leap in the number of students who pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math. The fields, known as STEM, provide a pathway to lucrative careers, including engineering, digital media and cybertechnology. But the state’s longtime effort to improve public education achievement is even more pronounced when it comes to science and related fields. Read the article featured in The Advocate.

OER Adoptions On The Rise

More and more instructors are choosing open educational resources over traditional textbooks, a survey of more than 2,700 faculty members reveals. Read the article featured in Inside Higher Ed.

Majority Of Teachers Say Reforms Have Been ‘Too Much’

Change is hard—particularly for teachers, who are generally taking dozens of students along for the ride. Yet the majority of teachers say they’ve faced major changes—related to what and how they teach, as well as how they’re evaluated—over the last couple of years in their schools and districts, according to a recent survey by the Education Week Research Center. Read the article featured in Education Week.

Cross-Curricular Critical Thinking Is Integral To STEM Success

Whether you’re teaching STEM (science, technology, engineering and math), STEAM (STEM with art) or STREAM (STEAM with reading), the proof of success is in preparing students to be ready for everything. While upgrading the acronym to include elements of visual learning and literacy shows that we’re striving for equal importance for all education topics, having a strong cross-curricular, well-rounded cohesive education is what is really important. Read the article in Ed Tech Magazine.

Improving Educational Outcomes Of Underserved Students

Only 50.4 percent of Orange County’s more than half-a-million students met the academic standards to apply to a University of California or a California State University in the 2014-2015 academic year. The outcome is that approximately 250,000 local students are underserved, resulting in reduced access to higher education and other workforce development programs. But how can we, as educators, ensure that each and every student (and their families) have the same educational opportunities? One solution that is being explored locally is connecting charter schools — public schools open to all students that are granted the ability to operate as a separate entity by a local district, county board of education or by the state of California — and school districts. These collaborations show promise and help facilitate the spread of effective innovations in areas such as STEM education and dual language immersion programs throughout the county. They allow educators and community members to keep the focus on the children rather than other bureaucratic details that can often get in the way of providing the best learning experience possible. Read the article featured in the Orange County Register.

Stay tuned for next week’s top education news stories.

The Communication, Legislative & Public Affairs (CLPA) tea strives to keep NSTA members, teachers, science education leaders, and the general public informed about NSTA programs, products, and services and key science education issues and legislation. In the association’s role as the national voice for science education, its CLPA team actively promotes NSTA’s positions on science education issues and communicates key NSTA messages to essential audiences.

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

Follow NSTA

One of the conference sessions on engineering I attended at NAEYC quoted children in the title: “Don’t Call Us Kinders, We’re Engineers!”  To introduce an engineering design process to children in kindergarten up to second grade, Emily Poster and Jessica Holm from the Science Museum of Minnesota thoughtfully revise storylines used with older children by placing stories in more familiar settings and keeping them to a developmentally appropriate length. The revised stories still have a challenge, and include a character who is a professional engineer and how they use science, math, and creative thinking to design a technology. They recommend adding visual symbols to the words in graphic representations of engineering design processes, and encouraging children to “imagine” using their hands.

We were able to handle the materials for four different kinds of engineering design challenges, and engaged in an engineering challenge ourselves. The challenge was based on meeting a real life need that children in their region would be aware of—to design and build a model fire tower, a structure once essential for detecting and locating fires in areas that were the responsibility of the United States Forest Service, and still in use in some parts of the country. (See other lookouts at: http://www.nhlr.org/lookouts/us/or/dry-soda-lookout/ )

Working together with people at our table we designed and built a tower with the goals of a structure taller than the model tree (so the look outs could see over the forest to watch for fires), able to support 1 person (doll), and able to withstand the force of the wind (a fan) blowing on it. The materials were inexpensive, and easily found: paper cups in two sizes two sizes of cardboard pieces, two figures to stand on the tower to test its balance and sturdiness, and a model tree and the fan, used by the instructors. Emily and Jessica came around with the model tree cut-out to help us measure our towers and provide support for redesigning structures that were not successful. Our discussion included our redesign processes, what we might bring from our experience in the session to our own setting, and what supports we need to implement engineering lessons with K–2 students.

How did this session reflect the new understanding of what children know and how they learn as described in Taking Science to School:Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K–8 and the principles, declarations, and recommendations of the NSTA Position statement on early childhood science education? The program promotes learning by actively engaging in the experience and exploring the materials, the challenge recognizes that children already have substantial knowledge of the natural world, and that adults play a central and important role in helping young children learn science (National Research Council 2007 pgs 2–3). 

The museum program Emily and Jessica described recognizes that “Young children develop science skills and knowledge in both formal and informal settings,” and they “emphasize the learning of science and engineering practices, including asking questions and defining problems; developing and using models; planning and carrying out investigations; analyzing and interpreting data; using mathematics and computational thinking; constructing explanations and designing solutions; engaging in argument from evidence; and obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information (NSTA Position Statement: Early Childhood Science Education).

And their conference session provided early childhood educators with “professional development experiences that [engaged us] in learning science [and engineering] principles in an interactive, hands-on approach, enabling [us] to teach about science principles [and engineering design] appropriately and knowledgeably” (NSTA Position Statement: Early Childhood Science Education). 

Poster sessions at NAEYC are an excellent way to have small group or individual conversations with presenters and learn more about their research and teaching practices. “Drive full STEAM ahead! Realistic and developmentally appropriate ways to teach science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) to infants and toddlers during daily routines and experiences” presented by Angela Searcy, gave specific examples of how to invite exploration. Photos of children at work clearly illustrated how infants and toddlers are not too young to engage in the offered opportunities for exploration, and how teacher-support is essential for children’s learning.

Educators may plan engineering activities related to children’s literature, such as Goldilocks and the Three Bears or The Three Little Pigs. These are familiar stories for many children and they present problems that can be the basis of an engineering challenge. We can also look for those problems that young children identify themselves in their daily life, such as creating a sun shade on a hot day, carrying a baby doll hands-free, digging a deep hole in the sand box without it collapsing, and keeping a tall block tower upright. 

Other NAEYC conference sessions addressed engineering. If you attended or presented one of these sessions, comment below to share what you learned or where to find resources to support engineering in early childhood programs.

• Ramps and Pathways: A fun integration of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
• The “E” in STEM: Demystifying engineering
• Garden tools, ramps, and wind socks: Promoting engineering in preschool for all learners
• Contraptions and confidence: Transforming science learning with engineering design
• Young engineers in the woods: Bringing engineering design challenge to the outdoor classroom
• STEM curriculum (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics): Stories and experiences of a new teacher merged with a seasoned administrator’s perspective!
• Drive full STEAM ahead! Realistic and developmentally appropriate ways to teach science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) to infants and toddlers during daily routines and experiences
• Turning STEAM into STREAM: Integrating reading/literacy in science, technology, engineering, art, and math education for preschoolers

My partner and I are thinking of moving to rural North Dakota to teach. I teach high school science while my partner teaches middle school. We would both like to teach in the same district. Do you have any advice on how we should proceed?
—A., Missouri

Unpacking your question, I actually see several facets that can be touched upon: teaching in a rural setting; living in the country; finding jobs together.

A rural school can be quite different from one in the city. Some schools are small and teachers often teach many subjects, including ones outside their expertise. Classes may be smaller, perhaps even multi-grade. Teachers frequently know every student, possibly having them in class many times over several years. However, many rural schools, particularly high schools, may be large and bus in students from many communities. There may also be greater parent and community involvement. In northern states, many students will miss classes during snow storms. You will have to be flexible and adapt lessons accordingly.

Don’t overlook the change in lifestyle. Living in the country usually means commuting and sometimes being far away from many of the shopping, entertainment, and dining options you may be used to, although local diners can be great places to meet new neighbors. If you purchase a home you will probably develop some good do-it-yourself skills and become a snow clearing expert. Property taxes tend to be lower in rural areas and you will have access to farm-fresh products. I was amazed just how quickly news spread around the community, so privacy did not seem to be as great as in the city!

Finding a job with your partner in the same district can be more challenging as there are usually more opportunities in an urban district than a rural one. Contact the local teachers’ association for advice on job prospects and how best to approach the district. My guess is that rural districts like having couples and families in their employment —they are more likely to settle down for the long haul and get involved in the community.

Good luck!

Hope this helps!

Photo Credit: WinterforceMedia

Wisconsin recently adopted new K–12 science education standards. Learn more about the standards in this Q&A with Kevin Anderson, Science Education Consultant for the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

When were your science standards adopted and can you tell us a bit about them?

The standards were officially adopted on November 16, 2017.

With local control in Wisconsin, districts have been using the Framework for K–12 Science Education (Framework) and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) for a long time.  Data from an informal survey revealed that over 80% of districts were already using the NGSS to some extent before we officially adopted new standards. Therefore, when we brought together our writing committee, they supported the idea of staying true to those documents.

Are the standards based on the Framework and the NGSS?

Our Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction template for standards emphasizes K–2, 3–5, 6–8 and 9–12 grade bands. Our writing committee struggled with how to represent the three-dimensional nature of our standards (mirroring the NGSS) in this template. In the end, we decided to build from NGSS Appendices E, F, and G. We built from those grade-banded guides and encourage our educators to go to the Framework and NGSS for further depth in understanding these elements.

One change our committee made to the standards is to de-emphasize the Performance Expectations (PEs). We found that many districts around the state (and country) have been using them to determine curriculum and guide instruction. The committee wanted to help educators understand that while it’s essential that the three dimensions be integrated, they can be combined in various ways; a PE is only an example of one way to do it. We include the PEs in our document, but clearly label them as “examples” of three-dimensional performance indicators (“indicators” is a Wisconsin term). To emphasize the connection among our separated sections for each dimension, we added the following statement at the top of each part of the standards: “Students use science and engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas, and crosscutting concepts to make sense of phenomena and solve problems.” Each specific segment of our standards document about practices, core ideas, and crosscutting concepts only becomes a “standard” when it’s put into that statement as the practice, core idea, and/or crosscutting concept of focus.

Another change is the addition of a third Engineering, Technology, and the Applications of Science section, ETS-3. The committee titled it, “The Nature of Science and Engineering” because they felt that these ideas got lost in the NGSS and they were not sure if they were practices, crosscutting concepts, or an afterthought. The goal was to ensure these ideas receive a higher level of importance.

Did you have involvement from Wisconsin science teachers?

Yes. We had 26 committee members that included administrators, scientists, engineers, and higher education representatives, and K-12 teachers. Eric Brunsell, Associate Professor at UW-Oshkosh, and Christine Pratt, Science Coordinator at Kenosha Area School District, chaired our writing committee.

What excites you most about the standards?

As seen by the work already happening across Wisconsin, the standards provide an opportunity to revitalize science programs and more fully engage all students in making sense of relevant phenomena and solving meaningful problems. One tool that we’re excited about is Appendix A, which includes specific Wisconsin contexts and engineering connections linked to the core ideas of the standards.

What has been the response from science teachers in your state?

Teachers are glad the wait is over! Many feel justified to continue their use of the NGSS. Some districts have been waiting to move forward until they saw what the state would do, and now these teachers are grateful to join the same path of other districts. I’ve heard several comments that professional development around the science standards is increasing, particularly at the elementary level. Students will be the real beneficiaries.

What are your plans for implementation?

Telling stories and sharing our work will be critical. With so many district already years into this work, we need to learn from each other. I’ll continue to work with the Wisconsin Society of Science Teachers, our regional Cooperative Education Service Agencies, and local districts to support the learning of teachers and build/shared implementation resources. It’s wonderful that so many groups around the country are sharing ideas and resources already from which we can build.

Kevin Anderson

Visit the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction to view the science standards.

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

National Conference

• Atlanta: March 15–18, 2018

Follow NSTA