Students may lose confidence in science skills when inconsistencies are not addressed. Our project shows that students can feel success by understanding measurement error, identifying ways to reduce measurement error, and analyzing the impact of those modifications.

TAKEAWAYS:
This project will demonstrate educationally and statistically significant impact of a piloted, experiment-based measurement error lesson. Attendees will take home tips for addressing inconsistent data to foster student success.

SPEAKERS:
Alexandria Martin (Student: , SC), Tiannah Green (Student: Warrenville, SC), Hannah Smith (Student: Warrenville, SC), Darneisha Hughes (Student: Warrenville, SC), Destiny Ramos (Student: Warrenville, SC), Janiya Dunbar (Student: Warrenville, SC), Alexis Wren (Student: Warrenville, SC), Samantha Brosnahan (Aiken County Career Cente: Langley, SC), Vivian Swearingen (Student: Warrenville, SC), Sophia Taylor-Davis (Student: Warrenville, SC), Aubria Johnson (Student: Warrenville, SC), Jose Rodriguez (Student: Warrenville, SC), Atticus Lull (Student: Warrenville, SC), Savannah Manning (Student: Warrenville, SC), Chassity Williams (Student: Warrenville, SC), Kayleigh Thigpen (Student: Warrenville, SC), Katherine Roberts (Student: Warrenville, SC), Christie Palladino (Teacher: Warrenville, SC)

Students in K-12 science classrooms don’t think about diagrams the same way adults do, and can be easily “overloaded.” Research in cognition gives us tools to make science diagrams that more effectively support learning. Surprise: often, students learn more without features like arrows and colors!

TAKEAWAYS:
Effective diagrams direct student attention to the most important information and relationships while minimizing cognitive load. Strategies for doing so include tree structures, explicit cues for implicit information, replacing realistic photos with illustrations, and use of the proximity principle.

SPEAKERS:
Audrey Rabi Whitaker (Academy for Young Writers: Brooklyn, NY)

The Science Teacher Residency (STaR) Program was launched in 2018 in response to the need to expand access to high quality professional development for science teachers in Arizona. It is designed for third through eighth grade teachers from Title 1 designated schools, and provides instructional tools and resources to participants for free. The program is designed around its Theory of Change, which involves four facets: pedagogical approaches, content learning, access to expertise, and materials and resources. The program is externally evaluated by the Lawrence Hall of Science. Data on content knowledge level, fascination level, interest level, and intention to pursue science will be featured on the poster. Our target audience is for professional development providers.

TAKEAWAYS:
STaR expands access to high-quality teaching practice in science education for Arizona teachers. PD facilitators can obtain new ideas for research-based implementation of pedagogy, content learning, access to expertise, and materials and resources.

SPEAKERS:
Brenna Chambers (Manager of Professional Learning), Judith Lozoya (Professional Development Facilitator: Phoenix, AZ), Jennifer Petersen (Professional Development Facilitator: Phoenix, AZ)

For 90% of Earth history, there was no fire. Fire made humanity and civilization. Now fire so endangers us that we must repower without flame. Energy system transitions make history. What can we learn from past transitions? What does the future hold? Can we reframe how we talk about climate change?

TAKEAWAYS:
In climate change education efforts, we should talk more about fire as it’s both the root cause of modern climate change and was effectively nonexistent for the first 90% of Earth history. This reframing helps people see the issue in a new light, and has the potential to engage broader audiences.

Have you wondered how to teach the Nature of Science in an engaging way? Do you know that there are free accessible websites to help. Come see how a few simple activities that allow students to access the other dimension of the NGSS standards.

TAKEAWAYS:
Come away with free resources of Nature of Science activities. In addition learn the backed research principles that make this dimension of NGSS vital for scientific literacy.

SPEAKERS:
Kelly Mulligan (Bridgeport Public School: Bridgeport, NE)

NSTA provides a wide array of professional learning services for teachers, science specialists, and administrators.

TAKEAWAYS:
Learn how to bring NSTA professional learning services to your school, district, or organization (face-to-face, virtual, and hybrid).

SPEAKERS:
Michelle Phillips (NSTA: Arlington, VA)

Come learn about co.lab, an interdisciplinary course designed by Leyden teachers that includes Biology, Global Studies, English, Health/PE and Digital Literacy. Discover how we use our 4 period block of time in a traditional school day to reimagine how students learn and teachers collaborate.

TAKEAWAYS:
Participants will walk away from this session feeling inspired to collaborate within and outside of their departments, with ideas and strategies on how to do so. They'll learn the power of exhibiting student work, and hear new ideas on how to do so on a grander scale.

SPEAKERS:
Jamie Litzhoff (Leyden High School District 212: Franklin Park, IL)

A former national science fair judge provides insights on how good titles can improve the odds of winning at science fairs. The poster will describe what the parts of a "good" title are and how teachers can help your students create one.

TAKEAWAYS:
Teachers will learn the components of how to create a good project title (from a research project on science fairs) and how to help their students develop a good title for their own project that is structurally similar to those used by scientists to describe their own research at conferences.

SPEAKERS:
G. Michael Bowen (Mount Saint Vincent University: Halifax, NS)

Our High School Committee Poster will highlight the ways HS educators are creating a classroom culture grounded in Sensemaking for grades 9-12.

TAKEAWAYS:
What you can do tomorrow to flip your classroom so the HS student is the knower.

SPEAKERS:
Jodi Bahr (Harvard Public Schools: Harvard, NE)

"Believe you can and you're halfway there!" There's a lot of buzz about self-efficacy, but what does it mean for a science educator? Come discuss how practices that focus on self-efficacy for both students and teachers can impact academic achievement, goal-setting, and resilience in your students.

TAKEAWAYS:
Those that visit this poster will engage in conversation about what current research says about self-efficacy and K-12 science classrooms and will come away with resources to focus classroom practices on raising the self-efficacy of their students for performing scientific practices.

SPEAKERS:
Patricia Rushing (PhD Candidate: , VA)

Empower students to playfully explore science through food and cooking. Explore the theoretical underpinnings that support sensemaking in the classroom and practical avenues for facilitating equitable and accessible learning through food and cooking.

TAKEAWAYS:
Attendees will learn how to authentically leverage food and cooking to make science concepts concrete in the secondary classroom which platforms individual student voices, experiences, and ideas.

SPEAKERS:
Kate Strangfeld (Harvard University: Cambridge, MA)

How do we assess both DCIs and SEPs in a way that is not overly complicated nor burdensome, yet pedagogically sound? There is a clear way to integrate your course content without sacrificing an emphasis on the NGSS practices. You will leave with resources to implement this in your classroom!

TAKEAWAYS:
After outlining the current debate, attendees will examine several effective approaches to deal with both content and skills, while considering issues of equity, differentiation, and opportunity for students of all ages.

SPEAKERS:
Elise Naramore (Pascack Hills High School: Montvale, NJ)

At arrival participants would receive a green or grey colored paper. They would then be prompted with the question, How would environmental changes impact the population of both green and grey colored insects? After brainstorming they would read and view some graphics on the poster of the “Impacts of Industrialization,” looking at how scientists have long studied how environmental changes impact organisms over time. Then, educators would participate in an online simulation, they would play as a bird and eat the moths in the simulation. Participants would then debrief their observations, hopefully finding that dark forest environment represented what the environment was during and after the Industrial Revolution. The light colored trees became dark and bare, due to the harmful effects of the pollution; this made the lighter colored moths harder to see and therefore gave them an advantage to survive. Poster facilitators would them help educators brainstorm other SS/Science connections.

TAKEAWAYS:
Educators will find unique ways that they can incorporate their science and social studies lessons more frequently and naturally.

SPEAKERS:
Jennifer Petersen (Professional Development Facilitator: Phoenix, AZ), Judith Lozoya (Professional Development Facilitator: Phoenix, AZ)

Free phenomenon based unit around chromatin remodeling! Organization of a meter of DNA into a 5-μm nucleus is an obstacle and a way that genes are regulated. Using free resources including a 3D cut-and-paste model, this unit explores how DNA is organized and how access to DNA is controlled.

TAKEAWAYS:
DNA is coiled around histones. Tightly coiled DNA is inaccessible to gene reading machinery. Methyl molecules bind to DNA and block access to genes. Acetyl molecules bind to histones and improve access to genes.

SPEAKERS:
April Thompson (Lakeview Academy: Saratoga Springs, UT)

Explore what NSTA is offering online to support your professional learning needs.

TAKEAWAYS:
Learn about the variety of professional learning opportunities that NSTA has to offer.

SPEAKERS:
Michelle Phillips (NSTA: Arlington, VA)

Scaffolded unit of study— lake samples from local reservoir collected to find diatoms & classify them by shape. Students compare findings to research studies of lake sediment cores to infer how diatom biodiversity has changed in similar lakes over time to infer human influence on diatom habitat.

TAKEAWAYS:
Poster describes science & engineering processes applied by students as they attempted to answer the question—“How can diatom fossils tell us how humans have changed the land over time?”.

SPEAKERS:
Amy Telford (Salem Community High School: Salem, IL)

Pop culture is a shared language between teachers and students. Discrepant events from movies, television, video games, and even TikToks can promote argumentation and meaningful collaboration and are a novel way to approach teaching a STEM curriculum. Using pop culture to draw even distal connections between this world and the classroom increases engagement and helps to make learning accessible to populations historically underserved in STEM. With a bank of strategies developed over years of integrating pop culture in the classroom, we will show how to add relevance and accessibility to the STEM curriculum. We will illustrate how to seamlessly integrate these strategies into existing lesson plans and allow time for audience collaboration and brainstorming on how to incorporate these ideas into their classrooms. Web resources will be provided that are constantly being updated to keep content current and relevant.

TAKEAWAYS:
Mixing pop culture amps authentic engagement and understanding for all learners, including the historically underserved, reluctant, and ESL students.

SPEAKERS:
Matt Brady (Atkins High School: Winston-Salem, NC)