Arts Education

The best professional development I have attended this year was a day-long session on Modeling Education. For years I have seen information about the summer workshops offered by the American Modeling Teachers Association . I have wanted to enroll in one, but they often last several summer weeks and I haven't found one close enough to home that means I wouldn't be away from my family. That's part of why I was excited when local experts Holly McTernan and Jeremy Secaur shared their modeling expertise with many Northeast Ohio Science Specialists on March 1st. If you are not familiar with modeling, I created the infographic at the left to sum up its big ideas. The basics include showing students a demonstration or problem or phenomenon and use it to set up an experiment, conduct the experiment, and then present results to the class. The teacher facilitates group activities and provides instruction as needed, often in small groups and through questions. We worked through this c...

This year I have tried two great, and similar tools, for asking students to make quick videos of themselves and submit them for viewing. Last month I blogged about using Flipgrid to record students as they demonstrate a chemical experiment and then explain it using a gas law. You can watch a sample here . Earlier this year I used Recap to record the members of the Speech and Debate Team as they read something of their choosing so I could get to know them better at the beginning of our season. You can see what a Recap video looks like here . Both tools were great - easy to use and provided valuable information about my students. So which one would I recommend? That's an impossible choice because they offer different features. In fact, so many different features are offered that the only way I can keep it all straight is by creating a data table. Here it is: Hopefully this chart will help you determine which one better meets your needs. No matter what you're looking for, I ...

As a kid, I loved to play cards. I have many fond memories sitting around the kitchen table with my grandparents, playing Go Fish, Rummy, and Cribbage. Once I got to college, my game of choice became Euchre. As a mom, I have gotten to revisit many card games, including the first one I remember ever playing which was the memory game. On a recent trip to Target, my kids began squealing when they saw small figurines that go with a Basher Science card game . Longtime fans of all things Basher , they were very excited to see figures of the characters in the books they love so much. I was immediately attracted to the card game and told the kids that I was buying the chemistry version for my classroom. Of course, they each picked out a figurine too. The cards feature the delightfully drawn Basher characters that represent science concepts, like catalyst or element or reaction . Each card also has a sentence about the science concept.  It might be a definition or similar information. Fo...

I spent several hours today [finally!] grading the PBL that my students completed in January. If you haven't read the previous 4 posts , here is a quick summary. In groups, students created an infographic about a topic related to chemistry because people don't like chemistry because it doesn't feel relevant to their lives. I'd love it if you'd take a look at the final products. All of the infographics are housed at this website . If you don't want to sift through all the projects (my students' projects are there, but also my the projects of my PLC partners too), take a look at my favorites: Chocolate Chip Cookies and Ice Cream . If you feel compelled, please comment. When I return from spring break, I will be working through the PBL reflection protocol with my PLC. To prepare for that, I asked the kids some reflective questions. What did they like? What didn't they like? What was the value of each step of the project? Here is the one that really jump...