So let's get this straight... In less than 1 month I have prepared for and graduated school with my bachelor's, found employment, found a residence, and will have moved twice. There's also beginning a curriculum from scratch for a course I've never taught before. WHEW, what a month! All in all, I couldn't be happier. It's been a whirlwind but a successful one and I can't believe that classes start in 10 days!

As soon as I'm comfortable with my place in the never-ending battle of planning, I will post pictures and reflections of some of my times during student teaching. It was a great experience and I learned a lot and made several good friends!

Here's to hitting the ground running!

Boy it's been a while!

 
     Whoa it's been a while since I was able to work on this blog! Turns out that graduation, student teaching, job search, and the search for a new home can keep one very busy lol. Needless to say, I'm back and newly employed at Stratford STEM Academy in Nashville, TN and boy do we have a lot to catch up on! I'll do my best to keep this post brief lol. I plan on posting some pictures and other items from my student teaching experience as well as some of the things I've done in my personal life in the past few months. I'm super excited to begin teaching Physical World Concepts to the Spartans of Stratford and begin my career in Nashville, TN!

Demo Success!

I did the salt battery demo at Union City Middle School today and it was a success! The students were really excited about the demo and seemed to have a great time reviewing the material afterwards. The level of student involvement was much higher than usual. Normally, there are a few hands that shoot up when I ask a question, but today, the students were excited about answering and taking part. All in all, this experience will motivate me to do more demos and hands-on activities in order to motivate students and make science more "real". It will be interesting to see the results of assessment to determine how effective the review actually was.

Salt Battery Demo!

     The middle school that I'm observing for one of my classes is reviewing energy transformation this coming week and I decided to create a homemade battery to help the students see how the chemical energy of the cell is converted to electrical energy. After looking around the internet for some good ideas, I decided to try this one out. It's a pretty simple setup composed of items you can generally find in your home, although you will probably have to purchase some zinc strips. The electrolyte is a mixture of 2 parts water to 1 part hydrogen peroxide. Each cell contributes approximately 0.8V and when wired in series, should push close to 5V with 6 cells. I'm hoping that there is enough amperage to light a small bulb and run a small 1.5V buzzer, showing electrical to light and electrical to sound conversions. Once the demo is completed, I'll try to post a reflection about how it went and what can be improved. Here's to hands-on science!

Development of Possible Vaccine for the Zika Virus

     An Indian biotech firm has developed 2 vaccines to help combat the Zika virus which has been causing quite a panic throughout the Americas this year. Bharat Biotech International filed for a patent for the vaccine 9 months ago and hope to have a tested and ready vaccine in as little as 4 months. Check out the article from Russia Today here.

Francis Crick Institute Gets Go Ahead for CRISPR-Cas9 Embryological Gene Editing

     For the first time, a national regulatory authority has approved the use of gene editing research in human embryos. The Human Fertility and Embryology Authority (HFEA) approved the research at the Francis Crick Institute in London and it will be headed by Dr. Kathy Niakan. The research could provide ground breaking insight into human development and help create a better understanding of the genes responsible, enabling scientist to combat developmental disorders and increase viability for those struggling with fertility. To learn more about this interesting development, check out this article in Nature.

Hack the Planet: Eco-Makers offer open source solutions to save the world

    

     Makers went wild at an innovation camp held in France last October. There's a growing online presence of makers, or resourceful and ingenious people who just love to tinker and come up with interesting solutions and improvements to everyday experiences. What happens when you put 100 capable makers in a 16th century French chateau and tell them to save the world? You get POC21. 

     This article by Michael Floyd is going to be a great asset for inspiring kids to get interested in science. Many of the projects posted on POC21's website can be done in a classroom or lab setting and will give students the opportunity to work with science, creating solutions for problems they see around them. These online maker communities, magazines, and websites can be very valuable tools for science educators and I highly recommend following several if you're not already doing so!

Quantum Dots: New Tool in Fighting Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria

     Antibiotic-resistant bacteria has been in the news a lot lately. You may have heard that scientists have discovered a new strain of E. coli dubbed "pan-resistant E. coli" which is resistant to some of our strongest antibiotics. The resent emergence of these highly resistant bacteria coincides with a decline in novel antibiotic production, exacerbating the issue further. The CDC tells us that "Each year in the United States, at least 2 million people become infected with bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics and at least 23,000 people die each year as a result of these infections."

    Well, lucky for us, there may be relief in sight as scientists in Colorado have created what may turn out to be a great tool in fighting these infections: quantum dots. These nanoparticles (really tiny things, like 20,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair!) are light activated and have been shown to destroy 92% of the resistant bacterial cells while leaving other cells unscathed. This is great news because many antibiotic treatments can harm the normal microbiota (symbiotic bacteria) in the body.

   You can read more about quantum dots in the articles provided by The Huffington Post and Science Alert.

Discovery of a 9th planet in our solar system?

A recent article posted on Sciencemag.org tells us that two astronomers may have proven that a 9th planet exists past Neptune! Watch the video or read the article here.

Supreme court to hear collective bargaining rights for educators case tomorrow

Reuters tells us that the supreme court will weigh in on collective bargaining rights for educators tomorrow. Read the article here.

First snow of the year!

How effective are your assessments?

     

      In a short article by Grant Wiggins, he asks us "How can the verb, itself, determine the rigor?" We recently stopped using Bloom's Taxonomy in favor of Webb's DOK chart and this brief article begs the same question that made the change to Webb's model. Is your assessment doing the best job possible? How can we improve assessment?
      One of my instructors discussed this conundrum with us just a couple of weeks before the last semester ended and it's kind of stuck with me. It's been easy in my brief experience to rely on buzzwords for assessment, using Bloom's or Webb's models to find an easy way to put something on paper. While this is a great way to complete a lesson plan for an assignment in an education course, I don't believe it will the best approach for my students. So, back to the drawing board, looking for the best method of assessment and assuring that the assessment is effective.
     In short, I think good old fashioned effort and a little ingenuity are the recipe I'm looking for. Nearly gone are the days of lesson planning for a grade, slapping something together that merely fits the rubric and looks good on paper. Now, I need to focus on the long term effects of my lessons and assessments. Does this lesson maximize retention and comprehension for a majority of my students and does the assessment highlight more than simple recall. Will my students be better thinkers after this? Did critical thinking, creativity, and growth happen? That's what the assessment needs to show, not how many of the buzzwords in the chart I included in my lesson plan, even if it does look great on paper.

Teacher's Toolbox - Online Question/Answer Bank for Teachers

     So, the new and excitement of winter break is wearing off and I find myself tinkering with things. What things you ask? Well, I've decided to create an online question/answer bank for my future classes. I remember making up assignments and assessments this past semester and thinking to myself "It sure would be nice to have an easily accessed resource where I can grab material and go, kind of like an educational content drive-thru!" So, seeing as downtime isn't my favorite thing in the world, I've decided to get to work.
     The idea is to use Google Drive to organize and share content for assignments and assessments. I've created a main folder that will be shareable to anyone I provide with the link, that way some of my fellow educators can get in on the fun. This folder will be divided into my individual units and into subjects within that unit. This way, when I'm getting ready to create an assignment or assessment covering something like protein denaturation, I just head to the proper unit in Drive and pick from the list of questions with provided answers!
     This is just one of the many ways that new technologies help educators stay organized and connected and it's a great resource that will pay huge dividends when it's completed or full enough to be of use. If you would like to take part in this, add your own content or access what little content I've added (and don't worry, there's more to come!), just contact me or leave a response in the comments below!

Is the Every Child Achieves Act a new direction or just a rebranding?

William J. Mathis gives his opinion of the new education bill, Every Child Achieves Act, which seeks to find new direction after the less than loved No Child Left Behind. Mathis critiques the efficacy and the amount of actual change in the legislation, what will it actually accomplish for our future students. One thing I did notice and was grateful to see was the understanding of how important the socioeconomic gap between students can be when related to student performance. I'll leave that rant for another post ;) What do you think of the new education bill and the article? Leave your comments below!

Here's a link about the bill from the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
Here's a link to the actual bill.