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Science Questions to get students thinking

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Science Questions to get students thinking

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Uncovering Student Ideas in Science, Volume 1, Second Edition: 25 Formative Assessment Probes

by: Page Keeley

This is the new updated edition of the first book in the bestselling Uncovering Student Ideas in Science series. Like the first edition of volume 1, this book helps pinpoint what your students know (or think they know) so you can monitor their learning and adjust your teaching accordingly. Loaded with classroom-friendly features you can use immediately, the book includes 25 "probes"-brief, easily administered formative assessments designed to understand your students' thinking about 60 core science concepts. All probes in this new edition are provided in both Spanish and English.

The detailed Teacher Notes that accompany each probe have been updated to include current research summaries, connections to A Framework for K-12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards, new instructional suggestions, and related NSTA resources. These teacher materials also explain science content, present developmental considerations, and suggest instructional approaches for elementary, middle, and high school students. Other books may discuss students' general misconceptions about scientific ideas. Only this one provides single, reproducible sheets you can use to determine students' thinking about, for example, Moon phases, conservation of matter, reflection, chemical change, and cells. All probes have been field-tested with hundreds of students across multiple grade levels, so they're proven effective for helping your students reveal, reexamine, and further develop their understanding of science concepts.

NSTA Press produces classroom-ready activities, hands-on approaches to inquiry, relevant professional development, the latest scientific education news and research, assessment and standards-based instruction.
Learn More

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Uncovering Student Ideas in Science, Volume 1, Second Edition: 25 Formative Assessment Probes | National Science Teaching Association

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by: Page Keeley This is the new updated edition of the first book in the bestselling Uncovering Student Ideas in Science series. Like the first edition of volume 1, this book helps pinpoint what your students know (or think they know) so you can monitor their learning and adjust your teaching accordingly.

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Back To School Ice Breakers for Distance Learning

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Back To School Ice Breakers for Distance Learning

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Virtual learning is not something we all thought would be happening, but it is new, real, and happening now! As summer is slowly coming to an end, it's time to revamp some of our icebreakers for the beginning of school to make them ready for a virtual environment!

8 Virtual Ice Breaks for a Digital Back-to-School

The icebreakers may look a little different, but they are even more important to build that human connection and community. It is definitely true that students learn better when they like their teacher and when they feel like their teacher likes them!

Check out some of these virtual icebreakers for the new school year to start your year off right!

1. Make a Selfie

There are some amazing ways to use technology today and we know kids of all ages love to take a good selfie. Teachers of course can model by making their own first! This process can be as detailed as you want.

Start by having students use their devices to take pictures of themselves. From there you have a few options. First, you could simply have students insert their picture into a Google Slide and add images that represent them. Photos can be from their home or digital images that they find online. Each child could have a slide, and then you would have a great class project to build community!

Other options are using the Selfie feature on Flipgrid or using Canva to decorate their selfies.

If you have a Bitmoji classroom, it would be a great place to "hang these" and also help you get to know student names!

For information on how to create a Bitmoji classroom, take a look at this YouTube video or this blog post. Be sure to keep teacher sellers' and clipart copyright in mind as you create and share these digital classrooms!

If you want to take this icebreaker to the next level, have students make inferences about the teacher or classmates based on their selfies!

2. Two Truths and a Lie (or a wish for younger kids)

This classic, getting-to-know-you icebreaker, can easily be done virtually!

Model the activity by making two truth statements and one lie about yourself. Students will vote to decide which is the lie!

Use pollingeverywhere.com, a simple polling feature, for students to vote. Google forms are also a simple way to see the results quickly!

Another option is to use Padlet for students to create their own two truths and a lie and have other students respond! Even better, jump on Flipgrid, do a video of your two truths and a lie, and have the students do one as well. They can share their videos with their classmates and have some fun while doing it!

3. Scavenger Hunt

Learn a whole lot about your students and the environment they live in by doing a scavenger hunt while at a group meeting!

A really easy version of this is using colors. Go find something blue, red, orange, etc.

Students can explain what they bring and it will give the teacher insight into how they live! Make it a race and learn student names as they bring their items back!

Another option is a show and tell. Each student could share something they have at home that they love. This would be a great community-building and sharing!

4. Roll a Die or Spin a Wheel to Select a Question

Number a list of open-ended questions, roll the die, and have students answer the question associated with the number that was rolled!

Use virtual dice! Check out this one on Google. A spinner would work too! Here is one called Wheel Decide.

You could do this in breakout rooms, also allowing for smaller groups to get to know one another. This could also easily be used to interview each other, collaborate, and introduce one another. Asking open-ended questions opens up endless possibilities when getting to know one another.

Depending on the age of the students, these would make great writing prompts to share or they could make drawings and snap a picture for you to save!

Here a few questions you could include:

Where in the world would you go if given the opportunity? Why

Who do you trust the most? Why?

What would you do if you won the lottery? Why?

If you had a superpower, what would it be? Why?

What do you like the most about virtual school? What about the least?

If you were going to live on Mars, what 5 things would you bring? Why?

Would you like a few more questions? Here are 67 to Build Community in an Elementary Classroom.

5. Guess Who?

This one is so fun! Have students create 3-4 clues about themselves and have classmates use their inference skills to try to guess who!

Flipgrid has this awesome pixelate tool that works great for this activity. Go to the "Disco Library" and search for Guess Who! Other options include using Google Slides, Google Classroom question tool, or Padlet for a discussion board!

6. Write a Story

Another great icebreaker that could easily be done virtually is students writing a story together! Google Docs is great for this! Splitting up the class into smaller groups would be ideal. Start with a story starter or picture prompt! This gives you a great piece of writing to determine where students are in writing!

In fact, writing a group story is one of my 80 Sponge Activities or Brain Breaks. Many of these activities are great for small bits of time you might have while waiting for students to join you online. Most of them can be done virtually!

7. Time Capsules

Time capsules are pretty great tools to see how students grow and change through the year. Asking questions like, what is your favorite food or what is your favorite song are simple ways to get to know you students and fun to look at in the future.

Time capsules are also a great opportunity to do some goal setting to help students prepare for their growth for the year! Scaffold the goal-setting for younger students by providing sentence frames and templates. I have a free one you can download to use with your students.

Time capsules can be done in a few different ways virtually. Flipgrid videos work and can be saved to view later. Google Slides can be done with minimal setup.

If you want a simple time capsule with just writing, try Padlet and save it for the end of the year! This would be a great reflection activity for students!

8. Kahoot!

Kahoot is a great and easy game tool for students. You can create your own or use a premade Kahoot and kids love them! You can easily share your screen and students can split their screen to be in the virtual classroom and Kahoot at the same time!

Make one about you and see if students can match your answers!

Whatever icebreakers you choose, just remember this is an important part of our new school year, even when virtual! Choose tech tools that will help you build routines for the year and give your students a chance to try them without pressure.

Make sure to remain positive, roll with the bumps in the road, and have an amazing virtual year!

More Back-to-School Ideas

More Distance Learning Ideas

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Virtual Icebreakers - Back-to-School with Distance Learning

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Virtual learning is not something we all thought would be happening, but it is new, real, and happening now! As summer is slowly coming to an end, it's time to revamp some of our icebreakers for the beginning of school to make them ready for a virtual environment!

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I love this book! It provides practical information to support all our teachers as they shift all or some of their instruction to distance learning. It is the best of what Doug Fisher and Nancy Frey have to teach us about great instruction, all packaged up in a hands-on tool to guide teachers as they plan for the upcoming year. From teacher self-care to feedback, assessment and grading, it's all addressed here. It's right on time and it will be a foundational tool to help shape our instructional focus at my school this year.

-- Jennifer Carr Published On: 2020-05-31

As we charter the unfamiliar territory of a blended learning platform, we turn to the experts who have gone before us. Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, and John Hattie remind us that the focus is not technology, learning management systems, or devices, but the focus remains student learning. This book serves as a safe haven, as it reminds us what effective teaching and learning entail, and it rewraps it around a digital learning framework. Whether districts are familiar with distance learning, or if they are starting from ground zero, The Distance Learning Playbook is the place to start.

-- Melanie Spence Published On: 2020-05-31

Echoing through the pages of this timely book is the message: Effective teaching is effective teaching, no matter where it occurs. Teacher voices and classroom examples animate core principles of research-based teaching and learning, enabling the reader to visualize practices in both face-to-face and online learning environments. Multiple self-assessments and templates for reflection support reader interaction with the content. The authors connect Visible Learning and informed teacher decision-making to all facets of effective lesson design and delivery, and address the important issues of equity and inclusiveness; learner self-regulation and driving of their own learning; and use of formative evaluation and feedback to move learning forward. A must-read book!

-- Jackie Acree Walsh Published On: 2020-05-31

We are in a place in history where we desperately need answers to questions that will determine the future of our nation′s most precious possession -- our children. The Distance Learning Playbook is an incredible resource with a wealth of practical support for teachers and administrators, and it will fill a huge information gap that many schools are experiencing in educating students in a virtual setting. Very practical, easy-to-use samples about how to start and end a class, the social-emotional support needed, and setting up norms to develop a safe culture for students to learn at high levels. This is a must-have for educators at all levels -- district leaders, principals, coaches and teachers in the 21st century and beyond. This resource is ideal for schools that are looking for answers to a whole-child approach to virtual education.

-- Dr. Charles Newman Published On: 2020-05-31

The year 2020 will be forever etched as the Era of Distance Learning. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused cascading changes that have shifted our educational institutions. This concerted seismic move has elevated the need for robust internet connections and meaningful virtual interactions. The Distance Learning Playbook is an invaluable resource to prepare our teachers to provide a powerful learning environment through technology, while promoting the most powerful tool available to educators -- a caring and challenging relationship with students.

-- Dr. Francisco Escobedo Published On: 2020-05-31

Never has there been another time in history where the majority of educators around the world jumped into action to reinvent how schools and classrooms function. Using current research of what constitutes 'best practice,' The Distance Learning Playbook helps guide us all through 'pandemic teaching.' This book is filled with ideas and insight from real educators as they reflect on what they themselves need and what students will need to learn within a new teaching and learning environment. Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey, and John Hattie continue to develop relational pedagogies that support cultural responsiveness and social emotional development in order to have a positive effect on student achievement, but this time, in a new setting. They help us understand new research-based approaches to engage every student, and in doing so, help us select the appropriate digital tools. I can't wait to use this book in our professional learning.

-- Lisa Riggs Published On: 2020-05-31

is Professor of Educational Leadership at San Diego State University and a leader at Health Sciences High & Middle College. He has served as a teacher, language development specialist, and administrator in public schools and non-profit organizations, including 8 years as the Director of Professional Development for the City Heights Collaborative, a time of increased student achievement in some of San Diego's urban schools. Doug has engaged in Professional Learning Communities for several decades, building teams that design and implement systems to impact teaching and learning. He has published numerous books on teaching and learning, such as Douglas Fisher, Ph.D., Assessment-capable Visible Learners and Engagement by Design.

is a Professor in Educational Leadership at San Diego State University and a leader at Health Sciences High and Middle College. She has been a special education teacher, reading specialist, and administrator in public schools. Nancy has engaged in Professional Learning Communities as a member and in designing schoolwide systems to improve teaching and learning for all students. She has published numerous books, including Nancy Frey, Ph.D., The Teacher Clarity Playbook and Rigorous Reading.

John Hattie, Ph.D., is an award-winning education researcher and best-selling author with nearly 30 years of experience examining what works best in student learning and achievement. His research, better known as Visible Learning, is a culmination of nearly 30 years synthesizing more than 1,500 meta-analyses comprising more than 90,000 studies involving over 300 million students around the world. He has presented and keynoted in over 350 international conferences and has received numerous recognitions for his contributions to education. His notable publications include Visible Learning, Visible Learning for Teachers, Visible

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grades k-12: teaching for engagement and impact in any setting

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distance learning; effective distance learning; distance learning for teachers

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The Distance Learning Playbook, Grades K-12: Teaching for Engagement and Impact in Any Setting

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The Distance Learning Playbook, Grades K-12: Teaching for Engagement and Impact in Any Setting [Fisher, Douglas, Frey, Nancy, Hattie, John] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Distance Learning Playbook, Grades K-12: Teaching for Engagement and Impact in Any Setting

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*Studies Weekly- physical and digital resource

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Online manipulatives bring all of the learning and fun without the mess. Our math virtual manipulatives help students grasp abstract concepts through modeling. Literacy virtual manipulatives create a fun space for practicing spelling, rhyming, and more!

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Virtual Manipulatives | Mathematical Modelling | Toy Theater

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Original teaching tools aimed at supporting teachers in the elementary school classroom. Two color counters, 3D dice, probability spinners, graph builders, fraction bars, base ten blocks, and more!

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Flocabulary (not a free tool, but there is a free trial)

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Flocabulary (not a free tool, but there is a free trial)

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Great tool with grade level content set to music with quizzes and optional practice.

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Create your own quizzes:
https://quizizz.com/
https://kahoot.com/

Digital Flashcards:
https://quizlet.com/

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Leveled Reading, news articles, and quizzes

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Leveled Reading, news articles, and quizzes

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ReadWorks
NewsELA

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Allows students to watch videos and respond to questions throughout the video- you can personalize or use ones that are already created

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Easily create beautiful interactive video lessons for your students you can integrate right into your LMS. Track students' progress with hassle-free analytics as you flip your classroom!

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Extension with built-in attendance, raising hand feature, show your screen and see student screens

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Extension with built-in attendance, raising hand feature, show your screen and see student screens

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Make Google Meet better with these 5 Chrome extensions

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Good tool for planning- writing, science

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*Daily Check-In: possibly use to shape how CARE group will go on Friday
*Assessments
*Keeping track of conversations with students and parents- DocAppender
*Practice work- utilizing the support feature if students get the wrong answer (Screencast coming soon)

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Google's Explanation for Parents utilizing GC

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Google's Explanation for Parents utilizing GC

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A teacher or school administrator can invite a guardian to receive email summaries about their student's work in class. To get summaries, the student must use Classroom with a Google Workspace account (looks like student_name@school.edu). Email summaries do not include grades.

What's included in an email summary?

Missing work-Work not turned in when the summary was sent.

Upcoming work-Work that's due today and tomorrow (for daily emails) or that's due in the upcoming week (for weekly emails).

Class activity-Announcements, assignments, and questions recently posted by teachers.

Guardians who sign up for email summaries can't see the Stream, Classwork, People, or Grades pages in Classroom.

How do guardians get summaries?

1. A teacher or admin sends an invitation to a guardian.

2. After a guardian accepts the invitation, they choose when to get email summaries for each of their students.

By default, email summaries for classes are turned off. If you're a teacher, learn how to turn email summaries on.

Tip: All guardians are added to BCC when an email is sent to all guardians.

When do guardians get summaries?

Guardians can get emails daily or weekly and can unsubscribe at any time.

Guardians won't get an email summary if:

There's no activity to report for the given time period.

All their student's teachers turned off notifications for their classes.

They accepted the invitation but chose not to get any summaries.

They aren't connected to any student in Classroom.

See what an email looks like

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A teacher or school administrator can invite a guardian to receive email summaries about their student's work in class. To get summaries, the student must use Classroom with a Google Workspace ac

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Create a new spreadsheet and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Sheets to edit Excel files. Free from Google.

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The "Disco Library" in FlipGrid has a lot of different grids that other teachers have used. You can filter by age, grade level, and content area too

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.