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Join this hands-on workshop demonstrating the enormous potential for data collection, analysis, and student lab reporting in your digital laboratory. Handouts.

Join us to learn about this collaborative partnership that brings STEM education to gifted and talented elementary and middle school students. Participating students are provided with intensive and interactive activities in science, technology, engineering, and math. Specific connections to the NGSS, as well as practices to increase student interest and knowledge in the STEM subjects will be included.

Enzymes are active proteins that listen, follow directions, and complete the job they are supposed to do. Similar to students, correct?

Designing and implementing assessments for the NGSS require a markedly different approach to science assessment than traditionally taken. Effective assessments have the potential to generate a robust suite of usable information about science performance, if designed and used well. Emphasis will be placed on practical dos, don’ts, and strategies for transitioning assessments to be 3-D.

Model stellar evolution processes using NASA images, plot H-R diagram transitions, and determine the chemistry and physics of supernovas using NASA STEM image analysis tools.

Attention will be paid to breaking down the essentials of computational thinking (CT) with examples and providing strategies and activities to infuse CT into existing STEM curriculum.

Join us as we explore AACT and ACS lab safety resources and how to use them in your middle school and high school science classrooms.

Life science activities designed to address the newly accepted NSTA/ASTE 2020 Science Standards for Teacher Preparation and increase the pedagogical content knowledge of elementary preservice and inservice teachers will be presented.

Introduce basic energy concepts early on with hands-on lessons disguised through songs, stories, games, and chants to teach energy buzz words.

We will use common rock types and specific fossils to provide evidence of how the landscape of the Midwest changed over billions of years.

Examine obstacles and solutions for rural girls in STEM and analyze data from a supporting lab to demonstrate effectiveness to administration and community partners.

Feeling overwhelmed by all there is to see and do at an NSTA conference on science education? Join us for an interactive exploration through the program, the conference app, and NSTA’s social media. By the end of the session, you will know just how to get the most from your conference experience in addition to building new networks with science colleagues.

What does pH actually measure? In this investigation, you will measure pH indirectly using indicators and absorption using the Lab-Master. Using their data, participants generate a graph of absorbance versus pH. This graph can be used to determine the pH of solutions, within the measured pH range. Join us for this activity from The Natural Approach to Chemistry program.

Explore the role literacy plays in the IQWST classroom. Take part in a science lesson that demonstrates the integration of literacy strategies in the context of science, including the incorporation of academic language in written responses and oral discourse in conjunction with investigations using an interactive word wall. Reading and differentiation strategies highlighted.

A decomposing corpse is found in a field. Four possible missing persons fit the description. But who is it? Using clues near the scene will help determine identity. Forensic anthropologist Diane France helped to develop this free middle school and high school forensic science lesson.

Explore a new, atomically accurate model of double-helical DNA that can be untwisted into the familiar two-dimensional ladder and separated into two single strands to model the processes of replication and transcription! Engage students with manipulatives that allow them to convert deoxyribose to ribose sugars and generate the universal currency of energy, ATP.

Scientific argumentation is more than filling in boxes. Experience how students grapple authentically with competing claims, evaluate evidence quality, and are supported in the struggle to make their reasoning clear—all with examples from the newest curriculum from UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science, designed from the ground up for NGSS.

We distill water to purify it, or so we think. So why does the clear distillate from apple cider smell like apples? Join us and find out! Using a clever test-tube distillation apparatus, we will distill the essence of vanilla and the scent of mint…and even show you how to make brandy from wine! Distillation is a crucial process in chemical engineering and technology, yet few students ever get to explore the process.

Looking for lab activities that work every time, not just periodically? Explore easy, engaging, and safe chemistry activities that will produce a reaction in your students. Whether you’re new to chemistry or feeling out of your element, you’ll learn new ways to create excitement with hands-on labs, demonstrations, and digital content.

Add action and excitement to your science class with live organisms! Discover fun, simple hands-on three-dimensional activities with a variety of insects and arthropods you can use in your labs. Learn about care and handling, as well as easy ways to introduce phenomena. Additional resources available online for your classroom.

What is the difference between subscripts and coefficients? What does “balancing” a chemical equation mean? Many students have trouble with these fundamental concepts in chemistry. If a student does not fully understand the chemical formula, then moles, reactions, and stoichiometry are hopelessly confusing. Join us for some elegant, intuitive, and well-differentiated lessons that allow students of all levels to master the chemical formula and thereby move confidently into a deeper understanding of chemistry.

Glowing cats? Personalized medicine? Designer babies! Empower and prepare your students to think critically as modern biology revolutionizes medicine, industry, and human lives. Learn from a leader in biotechnology education how to build your bioscience lab program step-by-step with equipment, supplies, and student credentials.

Explore how instructional sequences designed around real-world problems can lead students to figure out phenomena using the three dimensions of science and engineering. Leaders from UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science will showcase an example from the Hall’s research-based pedagogy and curriculum.

Explore the role literacy plays in the Science Companion Prime classroom. Participate in a lesson that demonstrates the integration of literacy strategies in the context of science. This includes the incorporation of academic language in written responses and oral discourse in conjunction with investigations using an interactive word wall. Reading and differentiation strategies highlighted.

Explore STEM with concrete, metal, clay, and plastics. Apply math concepts to lots of real-world examples. Cheap supplies and destructive testing ROCK!

We will combine biology and coding to create an artificial heart! With some basic materials, you will construct a four-chambered heart and then innervate it with an artificial nervous system. From there, write some very simple code (no coding experience required) to bring the heart to life! If time permits, you will also create an AED! Appropriate for middle school and high school.

Support three-dimensional learning with materials that engage your students in an exploration of the unique chemical and physical properties of water and the phospholipid bilayer that separates cells from their surrounding environment. Construct a model to explain diffusion, osmosis, active and passive transport across cell membranes.

Experience a novel approach to Earth science. This new pedagogy uses a “systems” approach for plate tectonics, astronomy, natural resources, geology, and paleoclimatology. There will be several take-home activities and ideas to implement or augment your existing Earth science curricula. This curricula is put together by AGI (American Geoscience Institute) out of Washington, DC.

Experience how students use models, analyze data, and gather evidence from text to figure out ideas about structure, function, and adaptive traits, to inspire their biomimicry designs. Join a hands-on dive into Amplify Science for Grades K–5, a new NGSS-designed curriculum from UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science.

The NGSS have raised the bar for scientific rigor and thinking. In grades 3–5, students define problems using criteria for success and constraints or limits of possible solutions. Learn how Building Blocks of Science 3D helps students use criteria and constraints to solve real-world problems. Take home lesson and workshop materials.

Students develop a model for an ecosystem and then introduce a new species to explain how this new component in the system affects the flow of energy and cycling of matter throughout the ecosystem. This activity provides an opportunity to assess student work related to ecosystems and heredity (MS-LS2-3).

An after-school program such as the Drone Racing Club presents a broad range of applications for students. The drones should grab the students’ attention and engage them in an activity as they apply and master the skills they learn in their science and STEM classes. The use of robotics in general allows students to have concrete examples of how STEM concepts are applied and used in the real world.There are a lot of lessons to be learned when it comes to responsibility, as well as technology when it comes to using drones.

Enable your students to understand the meaning of data by using a mathematical/algebraic model to analyze multiple representations—in a table, graphically.

Uncover information and engage in memorable activities on soils so you become more comfortable teaching that topic.

How are crime scenes mapped and processed? How is evidence collected, documented, and photographed? We will show how to develop an activity for your students. Handouts.

We will work through an inexpensive, hands-on activity that allows students to clearly understand why Hubble’s famous graph implies an expanding universe.

Cultivate new learning by using engineering design principles to teach ecology and sustainability through active student involvement in an urban garden.

Come explore strategies for linking science and literacy that support students’ abilities to read, write, and discuss in the context of science and inquiry-based learning using fiction and nonfiction texts. Hands-on examples of how science supports literacy and literacy supports science will be used.

We will examine sample student responses to explore how to design cognitive assessments of 3-D learning and engage in sensemaking to interpret student responses. Participants will work together to define options for next steps of instruction based on their understanding of student thinking of sample student responses. Issues of equitable assessment will be discussed, including addressing linguistic diversity, cultural assessments of student and community interests and funds of knowledge, and ways that assessments intersect with students’ identity development.

Learn about an integrated project that asks students to explain and construct dynamic 3D models that demonstrate the formation of geologic features around the Earth.

Attention will be paid to NGSS test writing, from starting the story to identifying topic trees and relevant standards to writing the questions.

Do you have a lesson you’d like to use, but aren’t sure it is truly three dimensional? Join us to experience an elementary science lesson “before and after” NGSS. We’ll evaluate lessons using a structured process and NGSS resources. Leave with a format to help evaluate your lessons and those you are considering.

Citizen science provides an accessible way to facilitate student science investigations and engaging STEM learning. Students making citizen-science observations ask questions through curiosity and interests.

Experience engaging activities that allow you to take young children outside and easily integrate, art, music, science, math, and social studies while using NGSS science practices. Handouts.

Beyond motivation, music is a phenomenon that includes all the elements of STEM. Go beyond “good vibrations” to sampling, mixing, spectrograms, and musical problem-solving.

We will demonstrate how students learn as they see beauty in the environment—and their organic response is ethical: We want to take care of this!

The American Chemical Society has produced Guidelines for Chemical Laboratory Safety in Secondary Schools. The guidelines also outline a protocol, designated by the acronym RAMP, for designing and writing improved safety procedures for chemistry experiments. We will explore examples and applications of the four principles of safety: Recognize the hazard; Analyze the risk of the hazard; Mitigate the risk; and Prepare for emergencies, as well as show examples on how to integrate RAMP into lab activities.

Join National Inventors Hall of Fame (NIHF) representatives as they introduce the invention process as the ultimate teaching and learning tool for all learners.

Learn how to access and explore NOAA’s data-rich resources, lesson plans, and visualization tools to help you build student proficiency in scientific data analysis.

Viruses are everywhere in our world! Engage students in a hands-on NGSS-focused engineering/modeling activity that challenges students to explore the world of viruses.

Connect the human impact of plastic pollution to engineering design. Get your students thinking critically and creatively as they collaborate in real-world problem solving.

With the transition to three-dimensional learning and NGSS, is there still a place for dissections in the classroom? The answer is yes! As you dissect a Carolina’s Perfect Solution® frog, we will demonstrate how to integrate the three dimensions of learning, highlighting adaptations and the relationship between structure and function.

STEM picture books/tradebooks are different from other picture books. They incorporate divergent thinking and problem-solving skills, which expand student understanding of content and process.