Sponsoring Company: Vernier Science Education

Transform your classroom into a forensic lab with this whodunit-themed experiment. Guests at a party are getting sick, and a few have even succumbed to the illness. Using spectroscopy and Beer’s law, your students will uncover the truth in this active, inquiry-based learning experiment.

SPEAKERS:
Nüs Hisim (Vernier Science Education: Beaverton, OR)

Sponsoring Company: PASCO Scientific

Introduce students to the relationship between solution concentration and light absorption through hands-on experimentation.

Sponsoring Company: Activate Learning

Asking questions and defining problems provides students with an authentic and meaningful entry point into science and engineering. Experience a puzzling chemistry phenomenon and learn how to elicit, organize, and revisit students’ questions so that students feel ownership over their own learning.

SPEAKERS:
Tracy Marmolejo (Activate Learning: Greenwich, CT)

Sponsoring Company: Flinn Scientific

The persistence of laboratory incidents injurious to high school students demonstrates the need for work towards implementing strong safety cultures in our school science labs. Please join us to learn about simple things you can do to make the laboratory a safer environment for your students.

Sponsoring Company: Flinn Scientific

Seeing is believing! Flinn Scientific presents a variety of easy to perform and exciting chemistry and physical science demonstrations. Come see Flinn’s new demonstrations and some of your old favorites—all guaranteed to make your science classroom come alive. Handouts provided for all.

Sponsoring Company: PASCO Scientific

Modeling Ocean Acidification: A Hands-On Approach

Sponsoring Company: Proteus VR

Using the Meta Quest Pro and Quest 2, participants will explore and try the world's first chemistry lab in augmented reality. Pros and cons of the technology will be demonstrated, and real-life implementation will be discussed, as well as virtual reality vs. augmented reality in the classroom.

Sponsoring Company: Carolina Biological Supply Company

Rockets zoom and race cars zip through hands-on activities that engage your middle and high school students. Apply creative problem-solving skills and engineering practices to chemistry and physical science challenges. Experience how Carolina makes it easy to incorporate STEM into your classroom.

SPEAKERS:
Patti Kopkau (Retired Educator: National City, MI)

Sponsoring Company: Plasma Games

It's all fun and games but does it work? Take a deep dive into the difference between gamification and game based learning and how to incorporate both into your classroom for the best outcome. Bonus: Leave with an all inclusive access code to a 3D game based platform!

Sponsoring Company: Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers

Capture high school chemistry students’ interest by inviting them into a phenomenon-based curriculum! Perform a periodic table card sort and learn how to build an understanding of whether it is possible to turn a copper penny into gold. Presented by Living by Chemistry author, Dr. Angelica Stacy.

SPEAKERS:
Angelica Stacy (University of California, Berkeley: Berkeley, CA)

Sponsoring Company: Vernier Science Education

While building bottle rockets, students are instructed not to use more than 10 pumps on a bicycle pump. When a bottle bursts and injures students, it's up to you to investigate. Use Avogadro’s law and a Go Direct® Gas Pressure Sensor to solve the mystery in this hands-on experiment.

SPEAKERS:
Nüs Hisim (Vernier Science Education: Beaverton, OR)

Sponsoring Company: PASCO Scientific

Discover how collecting data from a classroom greenhouse can help you engage students in more meaningful explorations of environmental concepts. Learn how to measure, analyze, and control greenhouse conditions such as light, water, and airflow - then optimize them using block-based code.

Sponsoring Company: Plasma Games

Let's expose students to the diversity in STEM careers x3! Explore how to inspire the next generation of STEM experts by showing them STEM experts who are diverse in how they look, diverse in what they do, but most importantly diverse in how they got there.

Sponsoring Company: Flinn Scientific

Turn the traditional prescriptive lab on its head, adapting the learning style to meet your students as they explore and do science around real-world phenomena. See how you can combine videos, simulations, VR experiences, flexible assessments, and editable labs to create hands-on curriculum.

Sponsoring Company: PASCO Scientific

Help students develop a better understanding of mole ratios, stoichiometry, and limiting reactants through this hands-on activity using household chemicals and a Wireless Pressure Sensor.

Sponsoring Company: Carolina Biological Supply Company

Explore easy, engaging, and safe chemistry activities that guarantee a reaction in your students. Whether you’re new to chemistry or feeling out of your element, create excitement with hands-on labs, demonstrations, and Carolina’s digital content. These lab activities support 3-dimensional learning

SPEAKERS:
Laurie Nixon (Chemistry Teacher: Boone, NC)

Sponsoring Company: NOAA

How do hydrothermal vent communities survive without sunlight? Dive into the deep with us and investigate how these ecosystems thrive in the absence of light using a student sensemaking approach and activity. We’ll also share resources that make it easier than ever to connect to ocean exploration.

SPEAKERS:
Suraida Nanez-James (Education Specialist), Kristin Rademaker (NSTA: Arlington, VA), Bekkah Lampe (NOAA Office of Education: Silver Spring, MD)

Sponsoring Company: College Board

Come for an active session about helping students prepare for AP-level course work in STEM. We will align challenge areas identified using AP Chem exam data and correlate these with the Pre-AP Chem Course Framework and explore instructional strategies to help students meet these challenges.

SPEAKERS:
Laura Casdorph (College Board: New York, NY), Mitch Price (College Board: New York, NY)

Sponsoring Company: Vernier Science Education

Find out how you can use a simple reaction between food color and bleach to teach reaction kinetics. Learn how to select the best wavelength on a spectrometer, analyze the data to determine the rate constant, and write the rate expression. Collect data on your own device or use one of ours!

SPEAKERS:
Nüs Hisim (Vernier Science Education: Beaverton, OR)

Sponsoring Company: Plasma Games

Scientific literacy goes beyond understanding and requires students to make a claim that is supported with fact and reasoning. By incorporating comics, anchoring phenomenon, and repetition, we are taking these CER charts to the next level! Bonus: Leave with an all inclusive access code to a 3D game

Engage in a variety of activities, collect information and resources, and network with high school-level leaders. Discover new ideas and materials that you can use next week.

TAKEAWAYS:
The participants will network with other high school-level science educators and leaders to discover and engage in activities that will expand their knowledge and be usable in all aspects of their work.

Engage in a variety of activities, collect information and resources, and network with middle-level leaders. Discover new ideas and materials that you can use next week.

TAKEAWAYS:
The participants will network with other middle-level science educators and leaders to discover and engage in activities that will expand their knowledge and be usable in all aspects of their work.

Come hear our ideas on how to use graphic novels in science courses by increasing the science content. We will present a learning unit we developed with The Leak. We will share student examples that model enhancing science content and learning activities to engage the development of water literacy.

TAKEAWAYS:
Attendees will learn how to enhance the science content of a graphic novel focused on community water quality issues. Real-world examples of local and national water quality issues will be shared.

SPEAKERS:
Lacey Huffling (Georgia Southern University: Statesboro, GA), Kelly Moore (Berrien High School: Nashville, GA), Heather Scott (Georgia Southern University: Statesboro, GA)

Sponsoring Company: InnerOrbit

During this session you’ll build a scaffolded, NGSS-aligned assessments to use with your classroom, school, or district! We'll investigate building prior grade level assessments, cover common misconceptions around sensemaking, and best practices for scaffolding assessments for HS students.

Explore how excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere makes water more acidic through hands-on activities from the free 5E lesson plans in middleschoolchemistry.com.

TAKEAWAYS:
Teachers practice using grade-appropriate explanations of the interactions of atoms and molecules to help students better understand the causes of the phenomena they observe and its connection to the problem of ocean acidification.

SPEAKERS:
James Kessler (American Chemical Society: Washington, DC)

Give students a hands-on exploration of heat transfer and insulation with this engineering & design project. Kids build an insulator around a soda can to keep hot water hot, while immersed in an ice water bath. While competing, they develop constructing skills, and analyze their process and data.

TAKEAWAYS:
Get all the files and resources to launch an engaging project applying the concepts of heat transfer (conduction, radiation and convection - things on every middle school science curriculum). You will be inspired!

SPEAKERS:
Jon Coole (Louisville Collegiate School: Louisville, KY)

Do have the forensic skills needed to solve the mystery? Join Dr. Yemothy for a mini-CSI hands-on workshop exploring basic forensics skills needed to solve the murder. Leave with a packet of classroom activities and murder mystery for your students to solve.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will leave with the experience of practicing forensic skills that can be done in a classroom setting. Educators will be provided with a packet of forensic activities and a murder mystery to take back to their classroom for use with students.

SPEAKERS:
Nicole Yemothy (K-8 STEM Educator & Trainer)

Use chemical reactions to create colorful paintings in an activity designed around research-based STEAM practices that support identity and mindset in diverse learners. Leave with an understanding of the STEAM Practices framework, and an NGSS-aligned activity that can be modified for various ages.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will learn equity-focused strategies for integrating art and science in instruction, supporting STEAM-linked identities in learners, and fostering a STEAM mindset that emphasizes learners’ creative capacity to understand and transform the world around them.

SPEAKERS:
Perrin Teal Sullivan (University of Alaska Fairbanks: Fairbanks, AK), Laura Carsten Conner (University of Alaska Fairbanks: Fairbanks, AK)

With the catalog of known exoplanets growing, NASA scientists are searching these worlds for signatures of life as we do (and do not) know it. In this session, participants learn through hands-on activities about NASA astrobiology missions that attempt to answer the age-old question: are we alone?

TAKEAWAYS:
To offer participants resources and strategies for developing an astrobiology [life sciences] unit that integrates hands-on NASA education activities, cutting-edge scientific research, and differing worldviews [cosmologies] that combine science, culture, art and storytelling.

SPEAKERS:
Anne Weiss (Educator Professional Development Specialist)

Sponsoring Company: 3D Molecular Designs

Explore how physical models foster an understanding of the structure of water and how their interactions explain the properties of water observed on the bulk scale.

SPEAKERS:
Ruth Hutson (Blue Valley High/Middle School: Randolph, KS)