Want to establish a TK–5 classroom culture inclusive of all learners? Come experience how connecting Next Generation Science Standards and Social Justice Standards promotes inclusivity.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Experience a hands-on NGSS lesson; 2. Opportunity to get to know the Social Justice standards; and 3. Numerous resources to support science and social justice in your learning spaces.

SPEAKERS:
Channon Jackson (Alameda County Office of Education: Hayward, CA), Nancy Wright (Hayward Unified School District: Hayward, CA)

Learn how a nature storybook can help you meet Next Generation Science Standards and create crosscutting concepts.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will: 1. review NGSS and cross-curricular concepts for early childhood students; 2. learn how to review a children's storybook for standards alignment, and how to match the text to relevant Next Generation Science Standards; and 3. work in small groups to analyze a text for NGSS alignment as well as cross-curricular concepts and STEM extensions.

SPEAKERS:
Julie Travaglini (Allegheny Land Trust: Sewickley, PA)

Design a robotic insect to meet the requirements of a given environment and adapt the designs to changes in or new information about the environment.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. NASA engineers use biomimicry to design robots for other planets; 2. NASA STEM educator guides provide detailed information to implement STEM in the classroom; and 3. Practice designing a Robotic Insect.

SPEAKERS:
Susan Kohler (NASA Glenn Research Center: Cleveland, OH)

SWiRL your classroom with Giverny Award-winning storybooks and literacy strategies! Giverny books deliver outstanding story, art, and science content for elementary science classrooms. Free resources!

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Giverny Award–winning books provide science content within a story; 2. Giverny books can SWiRL literacy in the classroom through speaking, writing, reading, and listening; and 3. Giverny books’ multiple science concepts can be showcased and developed in elementary classrooms through mind maps, magnet summaries, and carousel literacy strategies.

SPEAKERS:
Renee Clary (Mississippi State University: Mississippi State, MS)

Literacy has used “Text to…”connections  to help students make authentic connections. Strategies/examples of expanded “text to…” connections for science and math are modeled.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will 1. explore how to expand a common literacy strategy of “text to” connections when using picture books in the elementary science classroom; 2. engage in investigations that model the use of “text to” connections that help students connect their own authentic experiences and help them understand and make sense and 3. consider criteria for the selection of books, identification of phenomena, and selection of investigations can be a powerful experience for students.

SPEAKERS:
Christine Anne Royce (Shippensburg University: Shippensburg, PA)

Practice Morrow and Zawaski’s 5E Sky Time lessons for understanding a day, the seasons, and a year, through an NGSS-focused movement and motion model.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Dynamic lesson plan, implemented without special materials or equipment; 2. Practice, as learners, a kinesthetic model of the solar system; 3. Individual opportunity to connect DCIs, SEPs, and CCCs into a lesson plan.

SPEAKERS:
Pamela Harman (SETI Institute: Mountain View, CA), Coral Clark (SETI Institute: Mountain View, CA)

Want to engage students in inquiry lessons, but don’t know where to start? Join us for hands-on experiences to take back to your classroom!

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Participate in a three-phase inquiry; 2. Obtain resources and materials for designing an inquiry; and 3. See how to link phenomena, inquiry, and the three dimensions of NGSS.

SPEAKERS:
Nicole Bay (Charles H. Barrows STEM Academy: North Windham, CT), Kim Lewis (Charles H. Barrows STEM Academy: North Windham, CT)

Teaching science through art makes learning more meaningful! Learn how our elementary specials team collaborates with classroom teachers to support science learning.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Learn how to use the arts to make science standards more meaningful to students who may otherwise not be engaged; 2. Participants will have the opportunity to participate in a simple green screen project to see how to put pedagogy first when teaching science through art; and 3. Teachers will leave with templates to help facilitate their collaborative efforts between elementary science teachers and specials/support staff.

SPEAKERS:
Lindsey Wuest (A. D. Henderson University School: Boca Raton, FL), Jennifer O'Sullivan (A. D. Henderson University School: Boca Raton, FL)

Participants will engage with a lesson sequence for elementary-aged students designed to support science practices and connections between precipitation and river flow using real-world data.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Young learners (e.g., the fourth graders we engaged in the Streams of Data project) have and can develop thinking skills that can enable them to think critically with and about real-world, professionally collected data in order to understand connections between phenomena such as river flow and precipitation; 2. There are appropriate instructional scaffolds that can be applied to the use of datasets that are available online from sources (e.g., USGS, NOAA, and others) to provide students with a foundation for making meaning of events and phenomena in local and/or regional contexts; and 3. Varied instructional resources—including real-world data (i.e., that are professionally collected or gathered by students), hands-on models, and media-focused elements (e.g., still images, videos)—can be combined with students’ own experiences to generate meaningful understanding of real-world events and phenomena.

SPEAKERS:
Ed Robeck (American Geosciences Institute: Alexandria, VA), Amy Busey (EDC Center for Children and Technology: New York, NY), Lindsay Mossa (American Geosciences Institute: Alexandria, MD)

Come experience how one California district is leveraging an opportunity to bring equitable STEM experiences to all preK–12 students.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. How one district approaches integrated STEM; 2. What an integrated STEM unit feels like; and 3. How one district supports and builds accountability for equitable STEM instruction.

SPEAKERS:
Scott Reynolds (Community Training and Assistance Center (CTAC): Boston, MA), Dean Reese (Tracy Unified School District: Tracy, CA)

Investigate fostering scientific understanding and practice skills in our youngest learners. Take away topics of inquiry and tools for planning experiments and documenting student thinking.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will come away with strategies to: 1. plan investigations to integrate science into their early childhood curriculum; 2. build scientific practice skills in our youngest learners; and 3. reveal and document student understanding through lab notebooks.

SPEAKERS:
Katie Morrison (University Child Development School: Seattle, WA), Deb Chickadel (University Child Development School: Seattle, WA)

Participants will dive into makerspace as a means to create an inclusive classroom with student choice for many outcomes, including sensemaking and assessments.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Explore key elements of makerspace activities; 2. View makerspace challenges as a means to provide student choice and voice in how they make sense of a phenomena, a solution to a problem, and core ideas; and 3. Explore ways to use makerspace activities where student choose a means to demonstrate their understanding of a core ideas as a means of assessment.

SPEAKERS:
Michele Detwiler (Gary Adult High School: Tampa, FL)

This engaging, evidence-based session answers the question, “How can we get families involved in their child’s education?” Science & Literacy bags provide unique experiences for families.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Participants learn about the science & literacy bags that encourage all students to describe, explain, and predict natural phenomena integrated with strategic science literacy skills; 2. Using the science & literacy bags, participants experience the science investigations integrated with science literacy skills along with management tips for successful implementation; and 3. Participants walk away with science & literacy bag ideas that promote powerful family, school, and community connections.

SPEAKERS:
Sandy Handrick (Educational Consultant: Leander, TX)

Learn effective strategies for engaging multilingual learners and culturally diverse students in collaborative phenomenon-based sensemaking.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Examine the principles for equitable engagement co-developed by NSTA and WIDA, and discuss how these relate to national reform efforts, but more importantly, how they are applied in science classrooms for multilingual students; 2. Examine suggested classroom norms that support collaboration and equitable engagement among linguistically diverse students and their peers—participants will engage in group discussion about equitable science teaching practices describing the data practices they currently use and which practices they would like to expand upon within their science teaching; 3. Learn new ideas about language and some new approaches to support multilingual students’ deep engagement in sensemaking; and 4. Map WIDA’s Teacher Discourse Moves and Student Discourse Moves onto the sensemaking process to support the exploration and transformation of science understanding.

SPEAKERS:
David Crowther (University of Nevada, Reno: Reno, NV)

Experience the PETE Method and learn how to implement it. The approach develops communication abilities, critical thinking, and content construction with discrepant events.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will: 1. experience the PETE Method and Discrepant Events from a learner’s perspective; 2. be able to find effective, NGSS-focused discrepant events for use with the PETE Method and implement the approach in their classrooms; and 3. learn how to use polling software for formative evaluation.

SPEAKERS:
Peter Rillero (Arizona State University West Campus: Glendale, AZ)

We use data to do science; data literacy is its own set of skills. Young learners benefit when we integrate data, literacy, and science together.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Identify how data literacy is a critical aspect of literacy and science literacy in the 21st century; 2. Explore strategies and resources to use to authentically integrate data into K–5 science instruction; and 3. Develop a plan for next steps to elevate data as an aspect of meaningful connections between literacy and science.

SPEAKERS:
Kristin Hunter-Thomson (Dataspire Education & Evaluation, LLC)

Makerspace is an engaging teaching pedagogy where students participate in sensemaking to solve real-world problems through innovation, creativity, and collaboration.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. Makerspaces are versatile and encourage student engagement; 2. Makerspaces teach students crucial 21st-century life skills; and 3. Hands-on exploratory learning leads to increased retention and understanding.

SPEAKERS:
Courtney Graf (Student: Shippensburg, PA)

This session introduces a way to create learning experiences that will give students opportunities to talk, read, and write in the service of sensemaking as they use the DCIs, CCs, and SEPs to explain natural phenomena.

TAKEAWAYS:
1. How to ensure students have access to science by designing investigations that promote and supports the use of literacy skills; 2. How literacy can be used in the service of sensemaking; and 3. How to embed formative assessment of science practices and literacy skills into an investigation in a meaningful and informative way.

SPEAKERS:
Victor Sampson (The University of Texas at Austin: Austin, TX)