Jun 15
Yesterday, Friday the 14th, was our last day of school. It was a half day of fun for us at the middle school. We did start the day by giving out awards to the top academic kids but those were the only awards (besides honor roll and attendance) that we gave out all year! After …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2013/06/15/another_close/
Jul 30
Live animals in Science class are great. For the past 15 years that I’ve been teaching mostly Science I’ve mainly taught Earth, Physical, and Environmental Science. Even in Environmental Science we barely worked with live animals. I did get to trap fish with students but we just caught, identified, then returned them to the creek. …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2012/07/30/live-animals-in-science/
Jan 02
This year my Science PLC is focusing on using learning progressions. We’ve worked for years on eliciting evidence so we moved on to a new focus, namely sharing learning expectations. [Disclaimer: I’ve read some bloggers who raise some great points about sharing learning expectations and using rubrics with our students so I’d like to note …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2012/01/02/learning-about-cells/
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/11/29/what-is-stem/
Nov 21
Content area teaching, teaching subjects in isolation, separate of each other, is a common practice in school. I’m guilty of continuing the traditional practice of specializing and teaching only one subject. And the funny thing is that my national board certification is on integration (generalist)! I started my career as an elementary teacher, 4th and …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/11/21/habits-of-mind/
Oct 31
Should I take time to teach my students in Science reading strategies to help them with our Science readings or should Language Arts teachers use Science readings as they teach kids to read? I’m all for integration. My national board certification is in early adolescent generalist (which, btw, doesn’t even exist anymore!) so integration was …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2011/10/31/reading-strategies-in-science/
Nov 23
Science kits are great for elementary and many middle school teachers. I’m a generalist (got the early adolescent generalist national board certification before it went away), which basically means I dabble in everything, so the fact that I’m teaching only Science is through some fortunate circumstance. I saw fortunate because I love teaching Science and …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/11/23/extend-the-lesson-for-inquiry/
Jul 21
After July 20th’s #edchat on the Goal of Education (see archive here) I got to thinking about my goals for the children I help educate. It helped me, with my thinking, to read “Backwards Design and Integrating New Technology” because I integrate technology whenever I can. I need to continually ask myself if what I …
Permanent link to this article: https://educatoral.com/wordpress/2010/07/21/goals-for-my-students/
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I've presented at NCCE
2016, 2017, 2019, 2022,
2023 and 2024!
I presented at WSTA 2015!
