Biology

The Power and Promise of a Digital Tool for Teaching Inquiry Science





Author/Presenter

Katherine F. Paget

Jacqueline S. Miller

William J. Tally

Year
2015
Short Description

To examine the value of the electronic teacher guide (eTG) as a curriculum planning and teaching tool,
it was important to study it in the contexts of teachers’ actual planning, teaching, and reflecting.
This paper described two descriptive case studies.

Resource(s)

The Learning Portal: Hundreds of Free Digital Activities Using Models and Probes

The Innovative Technology in Science Inquiry (ITSI) project is a learning portal with hundreds of free, customizable science, math,

Author/Presenter

Carolyn Staudt

Camden Hanzlick-Burton

Carol Williamson

Cynthia McIntyre

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2015
Short Description

Using Life Cycle Data to Help Teachers Understand Key Energy Concepts

Day
Tues

Participants engage in and provide feedback on digital interactive learning experiences that use National Renewable Energy Laboratory life cycle data and help teachers understand key energy concepts. Please bring your laptop.

Date/Time
-
2014 Session Types
Feedback Session (Work in Development)
Session Materials

Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) and project partners are developing an online course for high school science teachers. The purpose of the course is to help teachers understand key energy concepts in alternative energy contexts. The course includes three interactive learning experiences (interactives) that use life cycle data from the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL).

Ocean Tracks: Bringing Large-Scale Marine Science Data to and Beyond the Classroom

Day
Tues

Participants engage in marine data investigations using the Ocean Tracks Web interface and analysis tools, offer feedback, and discuss possible synergies with other DR K12 programs.

Date/Time
-
2014 Session Types
Feedback Session (Work in Post-development)

Digital, large-scale scientific data have become broadly available in recent decades, and analyzing data, identifying patterns, and extracting useful information have become gateway skills to full participation in the 21st century workforce. Yet, pre-college classrooms are falling short in preparing students for this world and are missing opportunities to harness the power of Big Data to engage students in scientific learning. To address this issue, scientists, educators, and researchers at Education Development Center, Inc.

Meaningful Support for Teachers: Specific Ways to Encourage Game-Based Learning in the Classroom

Day
Tues

Panelists from three projects share lessons learned in guiding game use in classroom learning, highlighting specific examples of effective resources.

Date/Time
-
2014 Session Types
Collaborative Panel Session

The three panelists in this session are in the last one or two years of their game-based learning projects, and all have done extensive work in supporting use of their games in classroom learning. As their work has progressed, each has discovered valuable ways to support teachers as well as encountered surprises in what teachers wanted (and didn’t want), and now recognize things they wished they had learned in the beginning of their projects. Session participants leave with recommendations they can use in their current projects, including:

Why Formative Assessment?

Author/Presenter

Kathy Paget

Year
2013
Short Description

In this short text, the power of formative assessment as a teaching tool is detailed, and examples of opportunities for formative assessment within Foundation Science Biology proposed, for Learning Experiences (LE) 2, 3 and 4.