This year I have challenged myself to use only local animals in the classroom, for budget and ecological reasons. Luckily for me and my students, Cabbage White and Black Swallowtail butterflies go through their life cycle to adulthood in our area before the end of the school year and can easily be found on collard [...]
I wonder how teachers include the “E” in this acronym when designing or selecting class activities. And yet, the play that children do can be the foundation for future interest in engineering. This issue has several articles that describe how to capitalize on children’s curiosity and problem-solving abilities with engaging and purposeful activities, from race [...]
The word “data” for some people conjures up pages of numbers or a dreadful experience in statistics class. But get rid of the deer-in-the-headlights look and dig into lessons focused on forensics, snow, fruit flies, and Down syndrome. The protocols, rubrics, and examples can help you work with students in this critical inquiry process. I’ve [...]
Some children love pandas, some love dogs, but many more love dinosaurs. At times it seems young children feel dinosaurs are “more real”—more interesting, more important, more present in their minds—than modern animals. “More real” might be an exaggeration, but details about dinosaurs are verbalized more often than those about most modern animals. They can [...]
There has been an interesting discussion going on among the middle and high school science teachers on the NSTA General Science email list about the lack of direct experience in their students’ background. Some have suggested that early childhood and elementary schools are not laying the groundwork for the later learning. One teacher said, “I [...]
I was excited to see a Monarch butterfly land on the Butterfly Bush in the yard (I hesitate to call it a garden). Does that mean that the Milkweed plant may yet become a home to Monarch caterpillars? I haven’t seen any eggs but there is still time. Maybe another insect has already staked a [...]
Although I credit my early childhood exposure to orchard, field, woods, and creek as the foundation for my understanding of the natural world, I would despair if I thought that same understanding is lost to children who grow up in urban, constructed places, or mostly indoors. My father told of swimming in Wissahickon Creek, a Schuylkill River tributary, [...]
Certain trees in my neighborhood are currently supporting populations of growing Eastern Tent Moth caterpillars. Children were excited to tell me about the “nest” they saw “way high” up in the tree (about 15 feet up). The wild cherry (Prunusserotina) is often host to several clumps of these larvae, or baby moths, until they pupate [...]
Science educators of all ages and backgrounds are generally interested in the Aquariums and Zoos of the cities they visit. New Orleanians are proud of the wonderful top 10 facilities they have with the Audubon Nature Institute’s Audubon Zoo and Aquarium of the Americas. The recovery efforts following Katrina were absolutely heroic. A stroll through [...]
