by Brian | Nov 7, 2018 | Change, Education, Messy Learning, Project Based, STEAM, STEM
In my work with teachers on assessing the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) I find one of the toughest shifts for them to make is to develop tasks that are meaningful and really worth diving into. The NGSS are performance based standards that are very different...
by Brian | Sep 5, 2018 | Change, Education, Making, Project Based, STEAM, STEM, Student Access, Teacher Access, Technology
I wrote a couple of weeks ago about a 5th Grade Engineering Fellows Program I am co-facilitating here in Nevada. We are kicking off the program soon with a lesson on plastic waste in the ocean (follow the link above to see a video and more that explains the issue)....
by Brian | Aug 29, 2018 | Change, Cooperative Learning, Education, Inclusion, Messy Learning, Project Based, Reform, STEAM, STEM, Student Access, Teacher Access, Technology
Yesterday, I wrote a piece about assuming students have collaboration skills and building class culture. These vital learning pieces were greatly deemphasized and cut (even ridiculed as a waste of time) during the last 15 years or so of school “reform.” I...
by Brian | Aug 28, 2018 | Change, Cooperative Learning, Education, Inclusion, Literacy, Making, Messy Learning, Project Based, STEM, Student Access, Technology
I remember back in the day (or do people still do these?) when teachers in 4th or 5th grade tended to assign “the state” or “the country” report. Way too often the assumption was made that the students pretty much knew how to do these. The...
by Brian | Aug 17, 2018 | Education, Making, Messy Learning, Project Based, STEM, Student Access, Teacher Access, Technology
I’m currently involved in designing a 5th grade inquiry experience aligned to NGSS – I’m actually part of a team of 3. I volunteered (or was volunteered, not sure) to design a Plastic Gyre that 5th grade students will then design a system to collect...
by Brian | May 21, 2018 | Change, Education, High altitude ballooning, High Hopes Project, Messy Learning, NASA, Project Based, STEAM, STEM, Student Access, Teacher Access, Technology, The High Hopes Project, Twitter
NOTE: If you’d like to be part of this project you and your students can send us their “High Hopes” for their school, community and the world and we will launch them up high to 100,000 feet where they will be released to slowly drift down to the...
