I teach 5th and 6th grade STEM in the lovely Pacific Northwest in a small, rural town called Chimacum. My goal is to help students discover that all learning is life-long and that 21st century tools can be used for work as well as fun.
Feb 08
Republishing these posts to get new readers to my students’ class blog to inspire this new group to write posts! This is the third in a series of posts where I share something my 6th grade Science students came up with, an idea for sharing their thoughts and questions about the problems facing our Earth. …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2017/02/08/the-world-needs-change/
Feb 07
Republishing these posts to get new readers to my students’ class blog to inspire this new group to write posts! This is a second in a series of posts where I share something my 6th grade Science students came up with, an idea for sharing their thoughts and questions about the problems facing our Earth. …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2017/02/07/a-6th-graders-plea-for-clean-energy/
Jan 31
This post was originally published on the WA State CORELaborate site! A STEM Partnership and Rocketry This is my second year as one of the teachers of OESD 114’s Olympic STEM Pathways Partnership (OSPP). This past summer we got to work with UW Earth Science professors through a NASA-funded consortium! One of the activities we …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2017/01/31/ngss-and-rocketry/
Jan 11
I just found out about an update to Google Classroom from THE Journal that allows teachers flexibility in pushing out assignments to students! So now when I add an assignment, question, or post I can send it to the entire class OR I can select individual students, or a single student, to send it to! …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2017/01/11/differentiating-with-google-classroom/
Dec 22
This post was originally published at the CORELaborate blog here. Aligning a Kit (or any Science Activity) to NGSS I have the STC/MS Kit, Energy, Machines, and Motion (EMM). I use that kit with my 6th grade students for their physical science experience. The first unit of the kit is the Energy unit. The NGSS …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/12/22/aligning-a-kit-to-the-ngss/
Dec 01
This post was originally published at the CORELaborate blog here. Do you correct student papers and give students feedback? Do you use rubrics to score their work and provide feedback? Have you tried Doctopus and Goobric? Those two tools together are awesome! Make sure you have Doctopus and Goobric installed: Here’s how they all work: …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/12/01/doctopus-goobric-sweet-combo/
Nov 30
Had a great day at the 2016 WA STEM Summit in Redmond, WA, at the Microsoft Conference Center! I put together my Tweets from the day along with a small assortment of the many Tweets that flowed! We started the day with an amazing breakfast and some great speakers (Tweets from the morning are at …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/11/30/wa-stem-summit-2016-wastemsummit/
Nov 28
This post was originally written on the CORELaborate blog here. Last week my 6th graders used Inquiry Boards to design and conduct experiments flipping water bottles. I took photos of a few of their lab write-ups and graphs to show the great work they did. Using Inquiry Boards makes the lab write-up process much easier …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/11/28/inquiry-boards-bottle-flipping-lab-write-up/
Nov 27
This post was originally published at the CORELaborate Blog here! Isn’t it fun to find out your plan didn’t work AFTER students start turning in work? I see my error NOW and I even have an idea for how to fix it but I won’t know how well the fix works until next time students …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/11/27/hindsight-is-easy-i-need-foresight/
Nov 22
This post was originally published on the CORELaborate WA blog here. NGSS says start with a phenomenon to hook kids, get them interested and get them thinking and asking questions. After having to ask kids every day to stop flipping their bottles in class so we wouldn’t have to hear that obnoxious bottle falling sound, …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2016/11/22/bottle-flipping-lab/
I'm a Curipod Ambassador! :)
I've presented at NCCE
2016, 2017, 2019, 2022,
2023, 2024, and 2025!
I presented at WSTA 2015!
